It’s nuts to do no social media - and crazy to do all of it
- Wed, April 20 2011
- Filed under: Social Media
I sat by a professional from a consulting firm at lunch today, and she bemoaned the fact she was in charge of “doing all social media” for her company - which she had interpreted as creating a presence on every single social network. She felt it was all a waste of time, since many people - like her mother - aren’t even on Facebook.
What I told her was this: it’s crazy to participate in NO social media, and it’s equally nuts to participate in ALL social media. She was living in a world of useless extremes.
Here are some new stats to back me up.
Via Geoff Livingston and Jay Baer, some freshly released Edison/Arbitron data make a few things clear. One, Twitter is likely overvalued - only 8% of Americans are using it. In addition, Geoff notes, Pew’s Twitter Research shows that only half of active Twitter users actually check other people’s updates more than once a month. As he notes, “That halves the population to 4% for actual engagement. Way overvalued.”
At the same time, the majority of America is on Facebook—51%.
So does that mean, focus on Facebook and ignore Twitter? Not quite. This data is a helpful reference but still doesn’t tell you which social media are right for you. The ultimate determinant is where your constituency congregates. If they are all on Twitter, Twitter is perfect for you. If they aren’t on the Internet, start licking envelopes. Don’t get caught up in the hype to the point you forget what really matters: which social networks are home to your community—as well as places where you can devote some concentrated time and energy. Those are the places that go to the top of your list.
Comments
Thanks for “giving me permission” to stop worrying so much over our Twitter followers. I’ve agonized over ways to increase our engagement on Twitter for weeks with a little success, but I was convinced it was so not worth my time. I think I’ll focus most of my time on “all” the other social media sites I have to manage!
I agree that national % are not much use - we need to worry about what our target audience is doing. And yet, I can’t help wondering how print media stack up against these numbers. Do you have any idea?
I wonder to what extent listening to “internet radio” and “local AM/FM radio” overlap. For example, someone driving to work may listen to Sirius/XM in the morning, which is not local, but in the workplace tune in to local stations accessible through their websites.
Katya, this is the best blog I have ever signed up for. I have been getting the daily posts for about a month now and I would say 98% of them have been of high value to me. I love the short format with just a tidbit or two. They are so relevant to me as the Director of small nonprofit. My only complaint is that there is so much good info in your posts that I can’t implement and integrate it fast enough. But, I’ve decided to read each day anyway and do what I can knowing the seeds are planted for later. Thank you so much!
Wow thanks Amy! You made my day. Tel & Karen: The study has some interesting data that answers the questions you all have about TV and non-Internet radio. You can check it out for free in the link I provide in my post. In terms of print, it doesn’t cover that… One fun stat: “Forty-five percent of all Americans aged 12 and older now say the Internet is the medium which is “most essential to your life” compared with 20% in 2002. Among young adults aged 18 to 34, 60% say the
Internet is their most essential medium. When given the choice between having to theoretically give up their non-iPhone smartphone or give up TV, nearly six in 10 (58%) non-iPhone smartphone owners would rather eliminate TV from their lives.”
This is valuable data, but I really hope that no one makes a decision simply based on this. A deeper level is that Twitter users tend to be early adopters, bloggers, natural networkers, and more, which sometimes makes them more influential than their non-tweeting friends. So, we have to consider: 1) How many of our targets are in a particular channel and 2) how many people can those channel participants influence.
This is a simple but incredibly important point. The first step is knowing where your audience is. If you don’t know that, you’re going to have a tough time engaging them! There is a lot of hype about all of the different social networks, so it is a good idea to pick a few that your audience uses and focus on them. Spreading yourself too thin is a recipe for disaster that many organizations make.