Date: Thursday, August 16, 2007

Kids sites taking over cyberspace

Websites aimed at children might not sound that important, but kids’ virtual worlds are increasingly becoming multi-million pound earners.

The world’s focus may have been on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace in recent months, but that may be all set to change with the rise of the highly lucrative kids’ social networking sites. With the recent purchase of one of these sites, Club Penguin, for a phenomenal £345 million by Disney, it’s clear that these sites will play a large part in the future of the web. Club Penguin is targeted at children aged 6 to 14 and allows them to navigate a penguin through a virtual world and interact with other penguins. Children pay a $57.95 (£28) 12-month subscription to be a member of the site, whose numbers currently amount to over 700 000, rising to over 12 million if you include the numbers playing on the less sophisticated free version of the site. Clearly this is a massive marketing opportunity and the big companies have been quick to get a slice of the action. Businesses such as Viacom, owner of Nickolodeon, and Disney’s Virtual Magic Kingdom, are also big names on the market. However concerns have been raised at the consumerism of these sites aimed at children so young. Experts are concerned that the sites are exploiting their vulnerability and susceptibility to marketing.

Another website which is hot on the back of Club Penguin is Webkinz which works on the premise of retailing real-life cuddly toys which you can then convert in to online animated characters. The website is the brainchild of Canadian toy manufacturer Ganz who have created the toys, retailing at $12 each. The marketing ploy that this company has come up with to keep kids coming back to their site is that after a year the toy’s account lapses, and they have to buy another toy to maintain their relationship with their online cyber characters. Other websites proving popular with kids are dressing-up sites aimed particularly at young girls, such as Cartoon Doll Emporium which has 3 million visitors a month, and Stardoll which has 8.8 million members. With these sorts of figures it seems guaranteed that these websites are set to become very lucrative members of the online market.

Sources: Times Online, Guardian