Chime.In: New Social Media Network that Makes You Money
Making its debut this week, Chime.In, Uber Media's new social networking site combines Twitter's sharing ability, Reddit voting and it actual pays users for their posts.
Chime.In is like other social networks with users sharing content with each other. It has the familiar newsfeed, profile pages and "chimes" which are a cross between a Facebook status updates and a blog post. Chimes however, runs up to 4,000 characters and has threaded comments with a downvote system like Reddit.
Chime.In allows users to tag their chimes with five interest tags like Tumblr that people can view or subscribe to. Users can get updates that relate to their interests. So far, so common with other social media networks.
The social media landscape is already populated with such heavy hitters like Facebook and Twitter so what does Chime.In have that will set it apart from the crowd? The biggest selling point is Chime.In will pay users to share content. The site will give users 50 percent of the advertising revenue the site earns from ads on the user's profile pages. Individuals or businesses who add their own ads on Chime pages can keep all the proceeds from the ads.
"This is a firing shot in social media," UberMedia CEO Bill Gross told The Huffington Post. "Finally, the interests of the content creators are aligned with the interests of the publisher because they get something for their hard work."
New social media sites have a hard time attracting new users but with financial incentive, Chime.In hopes to attract people to invest and drive more users to the site.
"We're relying on the crowdsourced efforts of millions of people who are interested in driving traffic to our place," said Gross of Chime.In's strategy. "We're going to have great communities curated by really strong people and they'll be driving traffic to us."
Gross believes that Chime.In will profit from a stronger presence among publishers who want to capitalize on the social media craze. UberMedia already has deals in place with E!Online, Disney, Bravo and other publishers.
"Celebrities, movie studios, TV shows and publishing companies will want to make pages here because unlike with a page on Facebook, they can achieve monetization adjacent to the content itself, not only through a link," said Gross. "Not everyone follows a link posted on Facebook."
It still remains to be seen whether Chime.In will catch on with the netizens around the world. Getting revenue from ads is a strong hook but UberMedia still has a long road ahead.