2014 has already been a pretty decent
year for Mark Zuckerberg and his Facebook. The company celebrated its 10th
anniversary back in February, is hosting its first summit since 2011and it
has reached 1.28 billion users as of April, 2014. Yet, for some reason, there
are people who believe that Facebook is on the decline.
While Facebook may be losing the
younger generation, it’s still expected to increase user growth in APAC by
28-32% by 2015. It also remains the social network when it comes to user
activity. For example, 57 percent of millennials coordinate plans via Facebook
at least once a week. A whooping 62 percent of this same demographic post what
they are doing, who they are with, and where they are at to Facebook as well.
And, 30 percent of people in the U.S. get their news from Facebook. Facebook
isn’t going anywhere and there remains a lot of potential for the network.
Of course, there’s one person to thank for all of this.
Mark Zuckerberg, obviously.
Over the last decade, Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of
Harvard, created an insanely popular social media service, was the subject of a
major Hollywood motion picture, and has made more money than Steve Jobs did
when he was the same age. And, don’t expect that to change anytime soon. He’s
out to change the world.
Since Mark Zuckerberg is celebrating a landmark birthday
on May 14, 2014 when he turns 30, we decided to highlight five things that you
didn’t know about Facebook’s founder along with some important lessons for you
to use on your journey.
5. Facebook Was Almost Acquired
According to David Kirkpatrick’s The
Facebook Effect, there were numerous companies who attempted to acquire
Facebook from Zuckerberg, even as early four months after Facebook’s inception.
Here’s a look back at those failed acquisitions:
Facebook, then known as TheFacebook.com, went live in
February 2004. Just four months later the then 20-year-old Mark Zuckerberg
received a $10 million offer from an unnamed financier from New York. Another
early bidder was pioneering social networking site Friendster, however there
aren’t many other details beyond that.
By the summer of 2004, Zuckerberg had relocated to Palo
Alto. Kirkpatrick notes that eventually “a couple of Google executives came
over to see if there might be a way to work with or even buy TheFacebook.” That
deal obviously didn’t happen, but there was an offer from Viacom for $75
million in March 2005. It was around the same time that MySpace also was
checking in on the availability of Facebook.
Later on in 2005, Viacom came back into the picture to
have some sort of merger with MTV and Facebook. NBC also showed interest, as
well as, News Corp in January 2006. However, Zuckerberg is said to have stated
“We built this to last, and these guys [at MySpace] don’t have a clue.”
Viacom made one last ditch effort in 2006 by offering
$1.5 billion for Facebook, with $800 million up front. This was followed by
another $1 billion offer from Yahoo! in the summer of 2006.
The Lesson: Today, Zuckerberg is worth an estimated
net worth of $26.3 billion and Facebook probably somewhere in the
neighborhood of $100 billion. In addition to becoming one of the wealthiest
people on the planet, Zuckerberg gained more followers on Google Plus than
Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin in July 2011. Ouch.
Sometimes, when you have a dream and a vision for that
dream, it’s best to keep on going – even if you lose out on millions of dollars
in the beginning. As the cliche goes, all good things come to those who wait.
4. From ZuckNet to Facebook
Growing up in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y, Mark’s
father had a dental practice located on the first-floor of the family home. To
make life easier for his father, Mark created ZuckNet for the family to
communicate with in 1996. According to his his sister Randi, “Anyone could
log into any computer around the house and send a message.” Yep. Mark
Zuckerberg has been social networking since the 90s.
But, that wasn’t the only Zuckerberg creation. He also
invented an automatic playlist creator called Synapse while in still in high
school. The program even caught the attention of companies like Microsoft and
AOL, but he refused the seven-figure offers and gave it away for free.
By the time Zuckerberg was attending Harvard in 2003, he
came up with Course Match and the controversial, yet popular, network Facemash.
The network was shut down by the university, but several months later he began
writing the basic software for TheFacebook.
Despite Facebook becoming a juggernaut,
there have been some hiccups along the way, remember that whole HTML5
fiasco in 2012?
That still has prevented Zuckerberg from pushing the
limits of what Facebook can and can’t do. And, besides being filthy rich,
Zuckerberg has over 50 patents. Some could work, others may fail. But, he’s not
giving up.
The Lesson: Pretty obvious. Don’t ever give up.
Instead, learn from your mistakes and make the adjustments so you won’t repeat
them in the future.
3. Fear of Public Speaking
It’s been claimed that Mark Zuckerberg has a fear of
public speaking, or at the very least wasn’t all that great at it. For example,
do any of you remember the Wall Street Journal’s D8 conference back in June
2010? Zuckerberg floundered during the interview. We’re not knocking the guy,
some people just have that charisma where they can become a rock star when
speaking in front of a crowd. The problem, however, was that the founder of the
most well-known social media network couldn’t handle sitting in front of a
group of people.
Fast forward to July 2011 and may have noticed that
Zuckerberg was much better during the press conference that announced a
collaboration with Skype. And, he only got better when he improved while on the
Charlie Rose in November of the same year.
What happened?
We don’t know what Mark Zuckerberg does behind closed
doors, but we’re guessing that he was made aware of his D8 interview and worked
on getting over his public speaking issues. But, that was a little more to it.
He also surrounded himself with a strong support system. When he appeared on
Charlie Rose he was joined by COO Sheryl Sandberg.
Sandberg is one of the most influential
people around, is author of Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead and is one of the best speakers that
TED has ever had. We’re pretty sure she gave Zuck some pointers and helped
pick-up the slack when needed.
The Lesson: No matter how great of an idea or
business plan you have in place, there are just some areas that aren’t your
strong point. And, there’s nothing wrong with it, either. Instead of letting
that area go, why not surround yourself with people you can improve that area?
This will make your business complete.
2. Unleash the Beast
You’ve probably heard that Mark
Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla own a Puli, aka a Hungarian sheepdog, named
Beast. But, did you know that Beast has his own Facebook page with
1.8 million likes? While that doesn’t come close to the over 5 million likes
that Grumpy Cat has acquired, that’s still very impressive for man’s best
friend. In fact, that’s probably more likes than most of us will ever
accumulate.
The Lesson: Animals are taking over social media.
Which, in reality, makes sense. They’re cute, cuddly, and do goofy things that
make us chuckle or shake our heads. And, our animal friends are a big part of
our daily lives. In short, people love checking out animals on social media
outlets. Mark Zuckerberg knows that. Which is why he proudly shares the
adventures of Beast with the rest of the world by giving people what they want.
But, it doesn’t have to be an animal. It could be
anything that you know your audience will enjoy and engage with. And, that’s
the whole idea behind social media.
1. Why Does Facebook Have The Blues?
Did you ever stop and wonder why
Facebook is blue? That’s because Mark Zuckerberg is red-green colorblind. He
told The New Yorker in 2010, “Blue is the richest color for me. I can
see all of blue.” Today, we can’t imagine Facebook being any other color. It’s
a trademark.
The Lesson: Is there a lesson here? We think so.
And that’s showcasing a little bit of humanity. While many people may not be
aware that Zuckerberg is colorblind, he’s never hidden the fact. And, he used
it to his advantage. It shows that behind Facebook and all of the myths
associated with him is a man who has flaws, just like the rest of us. That’s a
great way to connect with people as well.
And, let’s not also forget, that what some could perceive
as a weakness could be an asset.
What have you
learned from either Facebook or Mark Zuckerberg from the last ten years?
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