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By Liam Dowd - January 7th, 2015
Why email ranks top with Internet users not social media. Reddit reports record breaking year and how major industry post on Facebook.
Workers prefer email to social media
It can be easy to believe that social media is an obsession with technology savvy workers. However, new research from Pew Internet has revealed that the opposite it true – at least for the sample that they used to conduct their study.
According to Pew: “The high value of email comes despite the challenges of the past generation, including threats like spam and phishing and competitors like social media and texting. Surprisingly, landline phones outrank cell phones for these internet-using workers. Social media is very low in importance.
“In this sample (of 1,066 adult internet users, 18 years of age or older), email and the internet are particularly important to adults who work in traditionally “white collar,” office-based occupations such as professionals, executives, managers, business owners, and clerical workers. They are also critical for the 59% of employed online adults who take their jobs outside of the physical boundaries of the workplace at least occasionally.
“What is potentially surprising is that even in the face of constantly evolving forms of digital communication, potential threats like phishing, hacking and spam, and dire warnings about lost productivity and email overuse, email continues to be the main digital artery that workers believe is important to their jobs. Since taking hold a generation ago, email has not loosened its grip on the American workplace.”
Corporate marketers then should take a more board approach to their activities. The behaviour of their colleagues offers an insight into how technology is actually being used and more importantly, the level of engagement that social media has.
Social media 2014 at a glance
If your corporation is trying to understand how social media developed last year, a handy infographic from Buzz Plant offers a concise overview.
Four Out of Ten Users Access With Mobile
Mobile usage is continuing to climb. This year, 40% of social media users used a mobile device to log into a social network. Many people access social media networks exclusively on their mobile devices. This summer, for instance, Facebook reported that 30% of users access Facebook exclusively through their phones!
Fastest Growing Networks: Tumblr & Pinterest
Tumblr and Pinterest grew their active user bases exceptionally well: +110% for Pinterest and +120% for Tumblr. Growth in these networks is indicative of an overall shift toward visual-based content around the web.
Fastest Growth In Mobile: Snapchat
Speaking of visual content, SnapChat, which consists almost entirely of visual, user-generated content, experienced the fastest growth of any social network in the mobile space (56%). 71% of Snapchat users are under the age of 25.
Age Gap: Tumblr/Pinterest v. Facebook
In 2014, Tumblr and Pinterest captivated the youngest audiences; 70% of these users are between the ages of 16 and 34. On the other end of the spectrum, Facebook has the oldest user base; one out of four are over the age of 45.
Facebook Is #1, But Organic Reach Is Poor
While Facebook still stands as the #1 social media network of 2014 (based on global users), its organic reach is poor. I predict that more social media marketers will be looking at other networks when budgeting out their advertising dollars.
YouTube Gets Most Visits
In 2014, YouTube was visited by 85% of all online users each month, giving the site the highest visitation rate of any social network. Users watched six billion hours of video per month and uploaded 100 hours of video every minute.
Multi-Networking On the Rise
Perhaps the most important fact in Didit’s social media infographic is that multi-networking is flourishing. Nearly one in five social media users visit YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ every single month. And nine out of ten adults (age 16-64) visit at least one of those sites on a monthly basis.
Reddit reports record breaking year
Founded in 2005, Reddit has continued to expand its reach and now boasts a number of impressive statistics:
- 71.25 billion page views
- Over 8 thousand active communities
- 54.9 million posts and submissions
- 535 million comments
- 3.73 billion link votes
- 2.01 billion comment votes
For marketers getting their content into the hands of the right people is even more important in the age of social media. How content is consumed and the sentiment it then generates are important for all corporations to get right. Reddit is just once channel, but clearly one that can’t be ignored.
How major industry post on Facebook
Understanding how social media should be leveraged across your corporation is clearly vital to get right. New research from Unified reveals how six major industries use the social media leviathan.
Until next time….
The Useful Social Media team.
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