Recent numbers from NM Incite, a Nielsen/McKinsey Company, offers some insight into why U.S. social media users visit these sites.
According to the research, the top driver of social media use is to find/maintain old friends, which received an 89 percent response overall. This figure was 91 percent for parents and 86 percent for non-parents.
Keeping in touch with family followed with 88 percent – 92 percent for parents and 87 percent for non-parents.
Finding new friends followed with a 70 percent response overall – 78 percent for parents and 66 percent for non-parents.
When it comes to products/services, 68 percent of respondents said they read consumer feedback on social networking sites (71 percent for parents and 64 percent for non-parents), followed by 60 percent who said they go to these sites to learn about products (64 percent for parents and 59 percent for non-parents).
Meanwhile, 58 percent go to social networking sites for coupons/promotions (64 percent for parents and 56 percent for non-parents), 54 percent go to these sites to give positive feedback (59 percent for parents and 52 percent for non-parents) and 51 percent go to give negative feedback (57 percent for parents and 49 percent for non-parents).
When it comes to career/networking, 48 percent of respondents said they use social media to keep in touch with business contacts (54 percent for parents and 46 percent for non-parents) and 28 percent said they use social media to find jobs (29 percent for parents, 27 percent for non-parents).
For the lifestyle/entertainment category, 67 percent of respondents said they use social networking sites for entertainment (76 percent for parents and 63 percent for non-parents), while 64 percent said they use these sites as creative outlets (73 percent for parents and 59 percent for non-parents).
Meanwhile, 47 percent said they use social media for gaming (54 percent for parents and 43 percent for non-parents), 45 percent use it for “how to” information (47 percent for parents and 45 percent for non-parents), 35 percent use it for following celebrities (39 percent for parents and 34 percent for non-parents) and 16 percent use it for dating (13 percent for parents and 17 percent for non-parents).
According to a separate report from Nielsen, Facebook ranked as the No. 2 Web brand in August with 163.2 million visitors, ranking behind Google. However, the social network boasted the highest time per person during the month, with 7:45:49 (hh:mm:ss). YouTube was fifth with 128.0 million visitors.
Sources:
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/august-2011-top-us-web-brands/
Network
