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
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