British based online music service Last.fm is working to becoming a more user friendly, mainstream service for clients as the site tries to forge its own niche within the highly competitive online music market.

Users of the site are now able to link their likes and dislikes with Facebook and share tracks that they enjoy while there will also be a friend finder service now made available for users.

Already Last.fm attracts a global audience of more than 30 million people online but is one of many similar services and is said to be struggling to hold onto its position within the market since it was first launched back in 2002.

Industry insiders have said that the site has become too much of a niche and needs to do more to compete with free services now on offer to continue to keep them a popular choice for subscribers who pay a monthly fee of £3.

Matthew Horn of Last.fm said: “I know we have a lot of work to do, but we want to become the connective tissue between services like Spotify and iTunes and the place where people publish their music taste online.”

He added: “We now need to focus on making the service more mainstream and plugged into people's other music experiences and social networks.”