Is Social Media a Fad or a New Way of Communication?
Here today and gone tomorrow! Is that what you think social media is?
The jury is no longer out, social media is the biggest trend shift since the industrial revolution. Over 50% of the world is under 30 years old now. From this group, 96% have subscribed to a social network. The most dominant social network (Facebook) has officially taken over the 2nd most trafficked website in the world (2nd only to Google). Rumors have been confirmed that Facebook has more daily search queries than Google on some days. – Wissner-Gross maintains that it shows a Google search has “a definite environmental impact.” [1]
It is no longer your choice to do social media in business. The bigger question is how to get started and carry on. Here are some facts for you to chew on that might help you understand the world of social networks and communication.
Decision Influencing
24% of consumers trust internet advertising while 90% trust peer recommendations (social networks). [2]18% of traditional television campaigns produce positive ROI.
Top Countries That Use Social Media
The top ten countries that use social- media [3] in the world include …
- US
- Poland
- Britain
- S.Korea
- France
- Spain Russia
- Brazil
- Germany
- Argentina
- Turkey
Most Popular Activity
That’s not even half of the facts that will completely blow you away about social media. Social media is the most popular activity online including pornography [4]. Pornography used to be the most frequented activity online. Now, people are seeing there’s more to life (even the porn industry)!
Wikipedia
Recent studies have concluded that Wikipedia’s information is as accurate as encyclopedia Britannica [5]. They now have well over 750,000 articles published by volunteer staff[6]. Wiki is a Hawaiian word that translates to “quick”. Almost 80% of the content published on WikiPedia is not English.
Marriage & Divorce
Are you married? It may surprise you to know 1 in every 8 couples that were married in the US met through a social network [6]. At the same time; you should know that researchers have found that Facebook fuels divorce. Suspicious spouses cannot resist checking on Facebook to see what their other half is really doing.[7]
How Many Blogs on the Internet?
Currently there are over 153,304,673 blogs indexed by BlogPulse since 2002 on the Internet [8]. Out of of all blog owners, 54% publish content or post status updates on Twitter every day. 34% of blogger post content about brands and products.
50 Million User Milestone
Let’s compare the main advertising venues over time…
- Radio – 38 Years
- TV- 13 Years
- Internet- 4 years
- IPod- 3 years
More than 500 million active users have joined Facebook [9]. Downloading of IPod applications topped 1 billion in a 9 month period. 50% of mobile Internet users in the UK use Facebook.
The Country of Facebook
Imagine if Facebook were a country. It would be the third largest county in the world. It would be second to China and India. Average Facebook users spend 55 minutes per day logged in (almost 7 hours a week).
Learning & Education
The department of education in the United States revealed a study that online students outperform those receiving conventional teaching (face to face).
Recruiting
72% of companies plan to invest more time in recruiting using social networks. Currently, 80% of companies use social- media for recruitment purposes. Of these companies 95% of them use LinkedIn. Quality candidates have been obtained from social media for employee referrals and internal transfers.
Age Segment Growth
The fastest growing in each segment on Facebook is 55 to 65 year old females. Another interesting note to take away is no matter what age group, females are signing up faster than men. More than 46% of Facebook’s audience is over 26 years of age.
Celebrities on Twitter
Between Brittany Spears and Ashton Kutcher they have more Twitter followers than the following countries …
- Panama
- Israel
- Sweden
- Ireland
- Norway
Email Communication Is Old School
Generation Y. and Z. say no to e-mail. Universities and teaching institutions begin to stop distributing e-mail accounts. The new standard is i-pads, e-readers or tablets.
YouTube Is Second Largest Search Giant
YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world, second only to Google (unofficially I believe Facebook is right in the mix). Roughly every four in half minutes 100 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube.
MySpace Is Gone
The one time rival for Facebook seems to have faded into nowhere. Before Facebook my space was the most popular social- networking website. Rupert Murdoch (Owner of MySpace) is not very impressed. “MySpace is on life support now”
In 2010 any doubts about social networking being a fad were completely debunked. It is the way we have now chosen (as a human race) to communicate online. The facts above clearly show us all what is happening with our internet. Advertising value is at an all-time low due to lack of trust people have. Peer communication is at an all time high online and it is not going away anytime soon.
Enjoy 2011
Resources
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August 8th, 2011 at 10:38 pm
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