Not All Apps Are Dead: Causes Traffic Triples in Last 30 Days

October 22nd, 2008

By Justin Smith

While some application developers are claiming that the Facebook Platform is “dead,” that’s not quite true for everyone. While many developers have experienced a dip in traffic since the Facebook redesign, many are still growing – and a few are growing quite rapidly.

One such developer that has experienced anything but a slowdown since the new Facebook launched is Causes. In the last 30 days, Causes’ traffic (counted by monthly active users) has increased 200% – from 3.1 million monthly users on September 22 to 9.3 million today. That’s by far the biggest jump we’ve seen of any application in the last month.

Here’s the Causes traffic chart for the last 30 days (click to zoom in):

Why has Causes done so well, when others have suffered traffic drops? Here are a few possibilities:

Causes is riding the wave of interest in and grassroots activism around the US elections, particularly the sky-high level of interest on Facebook in the Presidential election, foreign policy issues, and numerous local ballot issues.
Causes, along with iLike, was named one of the two inaugural “Great Apps” by Facebook back at f8 in July. Facebook’s Ben Ling (now at Google) said at the time that Great Apps appear more like native Facebook applications, meaning they “gain visibility similar to that of our own applications.” It’s possible that Causes is seeing some of the benefits of its Great Apps designation, either through increased News Feed distribution, greater profile publisher visibility, or higher communication channel limits.
Causes has made some design changes that have led to significantly increased viral growth.
Unlike applications that depend more on the profile box, Causes’ usage dynamics are more dependent on requests, notifications, and wall posts.

While we await comment from Causes on what exactly is causing the rise, it’s clear that some applications are still growing quickly in the new Facebook world.

Why do you think Causes has shown this kind of astounding post-redesign growth?

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11 Responses to “Not All Apps Are Dead: Causes Traffic Triples in Last 30 Days”

Frank Zapa Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 3:25 am
My feeling up is seeing an increment in traffic for some reason…the rest of my apps are suffering and existence crisis

http://apps.facebook.com/myenergylevel/
Jamie Scheu Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:21 am
It’s a great observation, Justin, but I think you missed a big component of Causes’ ongoing success: other apps are now using Causes (particularly its donor leaderboard) to promote themselves. (Lil) Green Patch, Sea Garden, and others donate to nonprofits through the Causes app and as a result, sit at the top of the donor leaderboards of those particular causes. These apps drive traffic to Causes, and Causes drives traffic back, bolstering growth for all parties.
Christopher Ross Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:28 am
Wow, that’s an amazing statistic.

Maybe more people are becoming involved in causes as we see more of them discussed on a national scale? Elections tend to bring out this type of discussion. Then again, it could be a nesting instinct. It would be interesting to see how this correlates to data in previous years.
Nick Stamoulis Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 8:55 am
Facebook apps are like anything else that grow with popularity. Some apps seem so useless and some are great and with the rise in popularity things will sometimes get a bit diluted.
Eugene Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 9:23 am
Nice article. Thanks. Eugene
Anonymous Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 9:41 am
As part of the ‘Great Apps’ program, Causes is allowed 60 invites per day, which is the reason it has surged. Most apps get 10-20 invites per day at most.
hollyster Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am
Do you see the same trend in traffic for iLike? If so, I’d suppose that much can be attributed for being a part of the “Great Apps” program.
Raj Lalwani Says:
October 22nd, 2008 at 12:04 pm
SocialCalendar has also had good growth since Facebook redesign. On Sep 22, 2008, we had 1,820,504 monthly active users and as of Oct 22, 2008, we have 3,405,627 monthly active users – an 87% growth in one month. We do get 30 invites per day and signup over 100,000 users/day. I am sure there are several reasons – users find SocialCalendar to be very useful and since it enables people to collaborate with friends and family around social occasions, it’s inherently very viral. But we couldn’t thank Facebook enough for constantly evolving the platform.
Jason Says:
October 23rd, 2008 at 10:07 am
I have yet to see a 3rd-party app feed on my home page, which consists of only FB apps. Being a part of the “Great Apps” program probably allows them to get some play on the home page while other apps get nada. Facebook has bent us over before, but this time it really hurts.
anti-Raj Lalwani Says:
October 24th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
If Social Calendar is signing up 100K per day and has 3.4 million monthly actives, then doesn’t that mean that you only have 400K users use the product in the last month that had the product installed before September 22? Pretty pathetic if you ask me…
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November 14th, 2008 at 2:13 am
[...] some observers have called the Facebook Platform “dead,” they apparently didn’t speak for everyone. While it’s true that many [...]