Social media currently
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, or a typewriter or something, you know that social media isn’t just for teenagers anymore. Tweens, business professionals, and grandparents all use social media (for different reasons, of course), but the networks and platforms they use may differ.
Social media management platform Tracx recently published a demographic breakdown of all the major social networks – here’s what you need to know to maximize your social media marketing.
The climate
As of January 2017, there are 2.8 BILLION active social media users across the globe. Image the entire population of the world in 1955 tweeting and posting and pinning and liking – that’s the world we’re living in, and usage is still on the rise: 22 percent more people used social media last year than the year before.
Facebook is the favorite
It’s slightly skewed toward female users, and it’s your best bet for reaching millennials and Gen-Xers.
People spend an average of 20 minutes on Facebook a day, compared to only 2.7 daily minutes on Twitter’s mobile app.
More time means more engagement!
YouTube is surpassing TV in a big way
The video-sharing platform is used by more males than females, and reaches more millennials and Gen-Xers than any U.S. cable network. Aaaand it’s launching a TV streaming service, so . . .
Instagram is on its way up
Most of Instagram’s users are female, and 90 percent of ‘grammers are under the age of 35.
Any musicians or music industry professionals in the audience?
Take note: over half of Instagram’s users follow bands.
Tweets are fleeting
Most Twitter users are male, and primarily millennials.
Most significantly, over half of Twitter users aren’t tweeters: they never post a thing.
Even if they’re seeing your brand’s tweets, they aren’t engaging, which means most campaigns just won’t stick.
Pinterest is forever
Pinterest is heavily dominated by female users, but in terms of age, Pinterest is evergreen: its users are pretty evenly split between millennials, Gen-Xers, and Boomers. Want to hang out with your mom and your grandma at the same time? See you on Pinterest!
Another interesting find – when people find a product on Pinterest, they’re 10 percent more likely to purchase it from an ecommerce site than users on other social networks.
That could be because Pinterest is relatively small, with only 317 million unique users each month, compared to Facebook’s colossal 1.9 billion.
Pinterest feels more like a community, and it’s often home to aficionados – design geeks, DIY fanatics, and so on – whose product recommendations are worth taking seriously.
Most importantly, a pin lasts forever (in social media years). The half life of an average pin is 151,200 minutes, compared to 90 minutes for a Facebook post, and 24 minutes for a tweet. That means something you pin today is still relevant about 3.5 months later.
LinkedIn is the ‘business in the front’ part of the social media mullet
The professional and B2B networking site is slightly skewed toward male users, and those who use LinkedIn are slightly less likely, on average, to use other social media platforms.
In addition, nearly half of those who earn $75,000 or more a year make use of LinkedIn, while only about a fifth of those who make $30,000 or less have joined the site.
Reddit is almost anything you want it to be
Reddit is extremely dominated by male users (67/33) and nearly two-thirds of Reddit users are under the age of 30.
If anything, Reddit is a place for PR – NOT marketing.
Sales content is highly discouraged on this user-moderated platform, and redditors take their community seriously.
The deal with demographics
This demographic breakdown holds an important lesson: one size does NOT fit all when it comes to social media marketing.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Demographics change constantly and it is good to know the difference in the platforms” quote=”Demographics change constantly and it is good to know the difference in the platforms.”]
Decide exactly whom you want to reach before you decide on how to reach them.
