Candystand Integrates Facebook Connect Instead of Building Its Own Social Network

candystandAs surprising as it might be, many game portals have actually been somewhat slow in integrating social capabilities. However, Candystand.com is not one of them – the popular portal recently integrated Facebook Connect in an effort to give the website a bit more of a social network feel.

Currently, the games site sees about 10 million visits (5 million uniques) each month with approximately 13.8 minutes per visit. Of course, the problem is that these have traditionally been more or less solo-based games, and while those numbers are not bad at all, parent company Funtank believes there is potential for much more.

Scott Tannen, President of Funtank, says that above everything else, the amount of time players spend on Candystand should see the greatest increase. By making the games more social, visitors will be able to invite friends, set up challenges, add their avatar to their Facebook profile, and compete against others via features such as high scores and leaderboard systems.

Curiously enough, Tannen has said that the company did actually consider building a social network of their own, but scrapped the idea. With 250 million people on Facebook, and roughly 70% of Candystand’s current user base having a Facebook account already, it only seemed logical to integrate with Facebook Connect. Ironically, Candystand games are only available through the portal itself and not Facebook. According to Funtank, this is to avoid any significant dependency on an external site.

Despite this reasoning, however, Funtank is looking to publish its games on other platforms such as the iPhone and PlayStation Portable. Unfortunately, the details of when and how have not yet been revealed.

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6 Responses to “Candystand Integrates Facebook Connect Instead of Building Its Own Social Network”

  1. Laurent Courtines says:

    What Candystand.com has done with FB Connect is one of the best I have seen on a game portal. Scott and his team should be very proud.
    I think this implementation illustrates what Zuckerberg wants to do with facebook. Facebook is not the destination!
    Great stuff.
    Laurent
    (646) 374-8311
    http://blog.games.com

  2. social media revolution | namewise. blog. says:

    [...] thing is: they are a true platform. you can build your business on this platform. like candystand. they prefer to use facebook connect instead of building their own social [...]

  3. This Week’s Top Headlines from Inside Social Games says:

    [...] Candystand Integrates Facebook Connect Instead of Building Its Own Social Network [...]

  4. Why Not To Start Your Own Social Network says:

    [...] advice then is, work within a Social Network to build community if that’s your goal (here’s an example). For big brands, I’ve yet to see a sustainable model – the reality is, once the brand has [...]

  5. USA Network Continues Social Gaming Expansion with New Deals says:

    [...] developers to turn their online portals social. However, while we have seen casual portals such as Candystand.com and mainstream developers such as Konami go this route, the social integration for USA marks one of [...]

  6. XPO Games Turns Gaming Into A Social Network says:

    [...] changed significantly over the past few months as more and more portals adopt social features (i.e. Candystand.com or myLifetime.com). The latter, Facebook and its ilk, focuses on providing much more than just [...]

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