Let's get social....

There are 3.5 billion people online across all social platforms. Most people gravitate to one (or two) social platforms on a personal level.

Adoption of social media platforms for business is unique

But, if you are exploring social media for your business community building, promotion or hiring employees, identifying the best fit social platform may not be as simple as creating a business page or handle on your favorite (comfortable) platform.

For instance, you're reading this from LinkedIn - and you might feel great about navigating the forums, profiles and low-engagement environment (factoid: the average LinkedIn users checks in here just once per month for less an hour a time). But, if you're in the fashion and beauty space using LinkedIn as the lynchpin of your social media platform for community building,  promotion or recruiting is not likely to be a best-choice platform.

Finding the best platform for your business should include a deep-dive review of your business objectives overall, tied to your growth, prior successes or failures on social media and insight into the behaviors and trends of your target audience. 

Before you even get to a social media position analysis, I'd encourage you to understand the bigger scope of social media. Beyond the hype that you 'hear' about. (For instance, Twitter tends to dominate traditional media, but look at some of stats below and you'll see that that volume of that talk might be disquising reality.)

Here are some current stats on the number of registered users on some of the trending platforms:

• Twitter (microblog): 307 million
• Facebook (social site): 1.4 billion
• YouTube (video streaming): 1 billion +
• LinkedIn (professional networking): 396 million
• Instagram (image/photo streaming): 400 million
• Tumblr (microblogging): 227 million+
• Periscope (live streaming): 10 million+ 

Some notable trends and facts to consider:

• You'll note G+ isn't on the list. It's not 'dead', but its not a platform to build bank on right now. If you're just starting out, go to a higher-value placement for your needs. 
• The fastest growing platforms to get on now include: Periscope, Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram and LinkedIn.
• The fastest growing social platform is a toss-up between SnapChat and Instagram.
• About 1/3 of U.S. Tumblrs are 25 - 34 years old. 
• The fastest growing user demographic? Retirees age 65+ who are going online by 14.6% of their total population, specifically to Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest with little to no adoption on Instagram or Tumblr.
• Publishers are driving content trends on Social Media. National Geographic being the most successful publisher touting 115,416 social actions per piece of content.
• Video is king of content. It is highly engaging and shareable. Thanks to YouTube, it can be SEO-friendly, too.
• Speaking of Video - streaming video is my prediction of a trend to follow for 2016.
• 80% of all YouTube users are outside the US.
• Facebook, while a behemoth, has flat (or maybe even declining) usage. 
• Teen Angst: 24% of teens go online “almost constantly”; 71% of teens use more than one social network site; and, no, Facebook is not dead to teens (it's the most popular platform with the group); Instagram comes in a distant second.
• 65% of all US adults use social platforms (an increase of 7% since 2005).
• Social media adoption is more likely with people in higher-income households and increases with those who have 'at least some college.'
• Social media adoption at-large is not impacted by gender. Although specific platforms (Pinterest in particular) may have a higher adoption by females.

If you're reading this from LinkedIn and would like to connect here, please send me an invitation.

You'll find me at StephKelly- if you have a solid profile, I'd be happy to connect for collaboration.

If you're on any social platforms other than LinkedIn, I look forward to seeing you there!

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