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New Data: Twitter As Popular as Facebook, But Lags in Usage

Posted by Mike Volpe on Thu, Apr 29, 2010
 

If you read this blog at all you know that I love marketing data.  There is a new study by Edison Research with data on Twitter out that I was fortunate enough to get a a preview of.  The most interesting stats to me were theones about awareness and usage for Twitter and Facebook (I really wish they had included LinkedIn...).

  • Twitter has significantly grown in awareness, where now about as many people have heard of Twitter (87%) as have heard of Facebook (88%)...
  • ...however, Twitter is only used by 7% of Americans, while Facebook is used by 41% of American.
  • This means that the conversion rate from awareness to usage for Twitter is about 8%, while for Facebook it is 47% - quite a remarkable difference.

This data seems to match the results from the last couple "State of the Twittersphere" reports which said that Twitter was slowing in terms of usage.  Twitter appears to have become very well known because of the celebrities and large brands using it, while lagging in terms of usage with the everyday person.

twitter facebook awareness marketing data

twitter facebook usage marketing data

Download the whole study from Edison Research here: http://www.edisonresearch.com/twitter_usage_2010.php and if you want even more data like this, check out some other marketing data.


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COMMENTS

There seems to be a chasm in terms of the understanding of what Twitter can do and can be vs what Facebook is and does for its users. I see lots of Facebook users "try" Twitter and then post things like "not getting this whole Twitter thing". It isn't as obvious to the everyday person what power Twitter holds for them whereas Facebook seems more obvious. I think Twitter has a more recognizable business application but for personal it takes a lot more explanation.

posted @ Thursday, April 29, 2010 2:22 PM by Jon-Mikel Bailey

Thanks Mike! I would agree, as your own data has shown, that there was a pretty big Oprah/Ashton fueled surge last year for Twitter usage, but certainly there has been recent slowing. As I mentioned in the webinar, I think Twitter has yet to clearly articulate its value for most (social networking) users. 
 
Thanks again for covering this, Mike!

posted @ Friday, April 30, 2010 9:06 AM by Tom Webster

I was not surprised to read those statistics. I've found that colleagues simply don't know what to make of twitter and can't wrap their heads around it's usefulness as a networking tool. It's definately not just a "I'm eating a taco!" kind of place. Although, I admit I started out like many others did posting things just like that. It was about getting into the space feeding off of and feeding what others were doing that it finally hit me. Thanks Mike.

posted @ Friday, May 07, 2010 12:14 PM by Bill Colbary

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