On the Internet, It's All About "My"

IT'S not you, it's me. Actually, on the Internet, it's "my."

The Web is awash in sites that begin with that most personal of pronouns, and not simply MySpace. A few quick clicks will connect you to MyCoke, My IBM, My Subaru, MyAOL — even MyClick, a mobile-phone marketing company. Collectively, they amount to a new world of Web sites designed to imply a one-on-one connection with a corporation or large business.

Last month, as part of a nationwide effort to reinvent itself, Starbucks started My Starbucks Idea to solicit consumer feedback on its stores, products and image problems. If the '70s were dubbed the Me Decade, this era could well be the My Decade.

The rise of sites with the "my" prefix is an outgrowth of an increasingly customized world of technology, such as the iPod and TiVo. "Marketing says, ‘We all want to be individuals and this brand will help you express your individuality,' " said Nick Bartle, a director of behavioral planning at the advertising agency BBDO. "These ‘my' Web sites are the logical extension of that strategy."

But they illustrate how corporations are striving to show that they can be as intimately connected to their customers as in-vogue social networking sites. They're not just impersonal businesses; they are your close, intimate friends.