social media an introduction hitwise

The Impact of SocialNetworking

Robin GoadResearch DirectorHitwise

May 2008

Social network growth in the UK• Social networks now receive

one in every five page impressions in the UK.

• Social networks have overtaken webmail as the primary form of web-based communication.

• Traffic peaks at Christmas time

• Facebook accounted for one in every 48 UK Internet visits in March

• More members = longer session time. E.g. Between Feb 2005 and 2006, Bebo tripled its market share and more than tripled its average session time to 22 minutes.

What is a social network?

• Online communities of people who share interests and activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others.

Rank Website Domain Market Share1 Facebook www.facebook.com 22.93%2 Bebo www.bebo.com 16.02%3 YouTube www.youtube.com 14.45%4 MySpace www.myspace.com 9.47%5 YouTube UK uk.youtube.com 3.11%6 Faceparty www.faceparty.com 0.97%7 Yahoo! Answers answers.yahoo.com 0.94%8 Windows Live Spaces spaces.live.com 0.91%9 BBC h2g2 www.bbc.co.uk/dna 0.70%10 Stumble Upon www.stumbleupon.com 0.66%11 Windows Live Messenger messenger.msn.com 0.63%12 Club Penguin www.clubpenguin.com 0.58%13 Moneysavingexpert Forums forums.moneysavingexpert.com 0.57%14 Friends Reunited UK www.friendsreunited.co.uk 0.50%15 Yahoo! Groups groups.yahoo.com 0.48%16 Gumtree.com www.gumtree.com 0.47%17 Yahoo Answers UK uk.answers.yahoo.com 0.47%18 MySpaceTV www.myspacetv.com 0.42%19 Nasza Klasa www.nasza-klasa.pl 0.41%20 Digg www.digg.com 0.35%21 Google Video UK video.google.co.uk 0.33%22 LiveJournal www.livejournal.com 0.32%23 Club Vaio www.club-vaio.com 0.31%24 deviantART www.deviantart.com 0.29%25 Habbo UK www.habbo.co.uk 0.29%

Top 25 Social Networks and Forums, w/e 5/4/2008

Users are fickle

The impact of social networks

Industry Downstream ShareComputers and Internet - Social Networking and Forums 17.92%Entertainment - Multimedia 6.46%Entertainment - Games 3.72%Entertainment - Photography 2.52%Entertainment - Television 1.77%Shopping and Classifieds 7.80%Shopping and Classifieds - Auctions 2.40%Shopping and Classifieds - Apparel and Accessories 0.93%Shopping and Classifieds - Department Stores 0.86%Lifestyle - Blogs and Personal Websites 2.15%Lifestyle - Dating 1.00%Business and Finance - Banks and Financial Institutions 1.73%News and Media 4.50%News and Media - Print 1.51%Sports 2.92%Sports - Football 0.95%Travel 1.67%Travel - Destinations and Accommodation 0.45%

Key downstream industries

MySpace and the Music Industry• Social networks: +40%

• Music sites: +3%

• Search: -4%

Apparel and Accessories

Social network users getting older

Justgiving.com

Power of blogs

iPhone bloggers

Conclusions

• Social networks now account for 1 in 5 page impressions in the UK – and this figure is increasing.

• Social networks are inter-dependent – the growth of small nice networks will go hand in hand with larger sites.

• Social networks account for 1 in 10 visits received by other sites.

• Early adopter industries focussed on the youth market, by users are getting older and the variety of sites benefiting is increasing.

• www.ilovedata.com