Startup Blog

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

Posted by Mike Volpe on 4/29/10 2:01 PM

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.

Mike Volpe

Written by Mike Volpe

Mike Volpe is a startup advisor and angel investor based in Boston.

Topics: Twitter, data, stats

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