Too Much Information Online Leads to Using Social Media for Searches
Are portals and search engines yielding ground to social media sites in the realm of online searches for information?
This is the question Nielsen looked at in some recent research, which included an online panel of 1,800 participants in August. The company looked at “three main consumer segments using search (Searchers), portals (Portalists) or social media (Socializers) as their primary vehicle for content discovery,” according to a blog post written by Jon Gibs, vice president of media analytics at Nielsen.
Beyond the tantalizing names for these consumer segments lies some interesting information.
When the question “When looking for new information online, on what type of Web site do you start your search?” was posed to participants, 37 percent said search engines were the starting points of choice, followed by 34 percent who said portals. Another 11 percent said sites dedicated to that type of information.
However, 9 percent said Wikipedia, 5 percent said blogs and 4 percent said Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other similar social sites were the places they started their search for information online. Altogether, this 18 percent was regarded as a group that uses social media as a core navigation and information discovery tool, according to Gibs.
“While still a smaller percentage than those who use search engines or portals like Yahoo! or MSN, it is a significant figure,” he wrote. “And as social media usage continues to increase (unique visitors to Twitter.com increased 959% YOY in August) I can only expect this figure to grow.”
Gibs goes on to discuss the sometimes overwhelming heaps of information available online regarding topics such as “the latest smartphone released into the market.” It’s this difficulty of ascertaining which pieces of information to take seriously that leads Socializers to look to social media sites to help them sort the information.
Twenty-six percent of Socializers, who are categorized as those who spent 10 percent or more of their online time on social media, said “There is too much information online,” compared to 18 percent of Portalists and just 5 percent of Searchers.
“Socializers trust what their friends have to say and social media acts as an information filtration tool. This is key because Socializers gravitate towards and believe what is shared with friends and family. If your friend creates or links to the content, then you are more likely to believe it and like it,” Gibs explains.
When researching for a new purchase online, nearly 15 percent of Socializers said they trusted blogs, while almost 20 percent of them said they trusted information posted on message boards.
Socializers trusted blogs, Facebook or Twitter and message boards the most, followed by Portalists and then Searchers. For Wikipedia, the order was Portalists, Socializers then Searchers.
So, are social networks replacing portals or search engines? Gibs’s response: “Perhaps.”
He does add “if we don’t understand and address people feeling increasingly alienated by the amount of information on the Internet, and the need for a human guide, yes, your favorite social network (or something like it) will become the next great content gateway.”
Source:
