Nielsen reports that social networking  in online communities and blogs has become a more popular Internet activity than e-mail. It is growing three times faster than the overall Internet and twice the rate of other top Web categories such as search, portals and PC software.
Nielsen estimates that one out of every 11 minutes of online activity on a global basis is attributable to social networks, blogging sites and other types of member communities. Moreover, these social-computing sites are being visited by more than 67 percent of the global online population -- a trend that shows no signs of slowing, according to John Burbank, CEO of Nielsen Online.
"Social networking has become a fundamental part of the global online experience" and "will continue to alter not just the global online landscape, but the consumer experience at large," Burbank said.
Expanding Demographics
Though social networking owed its initial popularity to support from younger Internet users, Nielsen notes that the audience is fast becoming much more diverse. Facebook, which Nielsen says is visited monthly by three out of every 10 people online, added 13.5 million visitors in the 50- 64-year-old age group last year, or twice the number that the world's No. 1 social-networking site had added in the under-18-year-old demographic in the same period.
Social networking is also becoming more mobile, with 19 percent of all U.S. mobile-device users saying they use their handsets for social-networking purposes -- up 156 percent from the year-earlier period. Nielsen also estimates that nearly three million U.S. mobile users were texting Facebook on a regular basis at the end of 2008.
Burbank also noted that an interesting connection is rapidly developing between social networking and live television, with 11 percent of the households that Nielsen sampled during this year's Academy Awards simultaneously following the broadcast on live television and over the Internet.
Those individuals who used Facebook while watching the live program viewed about 50 percent more of the TV broadcast than the average Oscar viewer, even as they spent an average of 76 minutes at the social-networking site. Additionally, Nielsen estimates that more than 100,000 messages were sent through Twitter during the live broadcast.
The Challenge Ahead
While there is still a lot to learn about the interaction of social networking and TV, Burbank said it's clear that there is opportunity for programmers and advertisers to leverage telecommunities -- people simultaneously watching live television programs and chatting in real time with an online network of like-minded fans -- to drive audience participation with both the programs and the advertising. (continued...)
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Social Media and the Customer Experience