Why did hi5 fail?

Hi5 was a social media network created in 2004 and it quickest became profitable from its first year, and by 2006 it was the 8th biggest social media network and the company’s main funding relied on investors. In 2007 it was the second largest social media after Myspace (which I will be talking about next time) , they also raised 35 million dollars from investors. Hi5 was popular because of its unique features which came from the name where users could give other users virtual high fives and you would give different types of fives like warrior fives, crush fives and so on.

However, in 2009, hi5 added features targeted more towards gaming and it was ranked a gaming website in 2011.

But with the raising popularity of Facebook Hi5 struggled to keep up and with other issues present the website couldn’t go on like it once did.

The reasons for the failure:

Hi5 had many issues, and I am going to be explaining each one and why it matters.

1- No real connection with people:

People who used HI5 felt no real connection to it because the connections they had with people on it were not real connections while its competitor Facebook let you have real connections with real people or your real friends.

2- Privacy concerns and issues 

The feature “who viewed your profile” might’ve been a good idea to some users but it also Felt like a privacy issue because users felt like they were stalked and felt like they had no privacy on the site which is a very important thing that needs to be on a social media site, and its competitor Facebook did not have this feature at the time which made it more successful.

In addition to that privacy issues were a big thing for Hi5 because users value privacy and feeling safe in their environment and their socials, so this was definitely a reason for its downfall 

3- Fake profiles and the lack of “real” people 

Fake profiles were a big issue on Hi5 and that made a lot of people turn away from the service because of the lack of genuineness. And Facebook positioned itself as the network of real people and that gave them a competitive edge which made a lot of users migrate to it. And with the large number that migrated to Facebook that killed Hi5 because it didn’t have as many users anymore.

4- No clear branding

Hi5 went through many changed from a social gaming site then it turned itself into a site for meeting new people which made it feel like a dating site and made Facebook an even more attractive site for people who wanted a real connection to their friends.

And the constant rebranding made users more confused than ever and made people lose their interest in the site.

What replaced Hi5:

As I’ve mentioned before Hi5 was replaced by Facebook for the reasons I’ve mentioned above and as we all know Facebook is still going strong and getting stronger everyday by buying more social media sites like Instagram and WhatsApp which made them a bigger force to be reckoned with.

Although I feel like I should mention Hi5 is still up and running but it does not have the same glory that it did before which means that technically it did fail.

Last words:

As always, this blog post is only for educational purposes, and I have nothing against Hi5 or any of the people related to it and the point of this blog is purely educational and to learn business lessons from it.

Please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions for things I should talk about or suggestions in general please let me know.

Thank you for reading, stay safe!

Ola