Nowadays there are a lot of social media channels through which we can communicate with others. You might have an account on all of them or maybe only on a few. A survey was held among American teens to find out which social media channels are most popular amongst them. A surprising finding might be that Facebook is becoming less popular for teenagers.
The survey included 9,400 teens from 13 till 19 years old, coming from households with an average income of $68,000. Around 56% of the teens were male.
The results showed that Instagram was the most important and popular social media. One third of the teens ranked Instagram first. Twitter ended second in the survey, ranked first by 20% of the teenagers, which is a little better then Snapchat’s 19%. It might be surprising that Facebook is not as popular under youngsters as you might expect. Only 15% of the teens considers Facebook as their most important social network. The results are also in the figure above.
From Facebook’s perspective 15% can be considered as slightly disappointing. However, we must not forget that Facebook bought Instagram in 2012. Even though Facebook is losing interest from teens over the years, the growth of Instagram makes up for this. Facebook’s core audience is getting older and the figure shows this as Facebook was by far the most important social networking site for teens in 2012.
So should Facebook be disappointed with the results? I don’t think so. Facebook still owns the most popular social networking platform for teenagers and has the ability to focus on an older core audience now with their own platform. This gives Facebook the possibility to provide social networking platforms that suit anyone.
So now you know which social media are most popular and important for teens, did you expect this result? And what would be your personal order of social media? And what do you reckon Facebook thinks after seeing the results of this survey?
I think it’s surprising that it changed so much in a few years. I would have still expected Facebook to be number one, but I guess this doesn’t come to my attention, as most of the people our age still prefer Facebook. This shows how much the preference has changed over the years. I belief concluding from this post that teenagers nowadays like to share pictures, which is actually also not that surprising, as more and more people are taking pictures.
My personal order would be Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, as I do not have an instagram account. I have a twitter account, but I never tweet something. I also do not post a lot on Facebook, but I still like it, as I can keep in touch with friends who I don’t see that often. This is also why, Snapchat is on second place, as I would only send pictures to my friends whom I really talk to. Therefore, the reach of Snapchat is lower for me and I would not send pictures to random people.
I agree with you that Facebook does not have to be disappointed in the results and I would reckon Facebook to stay the same. If Facebook would change to something similar like Snapchat or Instagram, it would lose a lot of its original followers. They should just continue what they’re doing.
The main reason I guess for the lost visitors, is the fact that Instagram and Snapchat are more specific. With these apps you are only focussing on taking pictures and sharing them with your friends. With Facebook there is a much bigger reach when it comes to seeing and doing stuff. Maybe people get confused and they are looking for a more specific app, so they actually know what is going on.
I agree with susanne381816.
I also think it’s that Instagram and snapchat are easier to use compared with facebook. This because facebook began as a website. The other platforms began with apps. So they are truly focused on app usage. I myself have facebook, snapchat and Instagram. And from experience snapchat app is very user friendly and easy to use, then Instagram and last the facebook app. Because these apps focus on one kind of sharing it is easy and fun. Another point is that on facebook you have a lot of people. Now days teenager don’t want to share everything with their parents, so they go on a platform where they can share their pics and what they are doing without having their family and parents seeing it.
Thank you for the interesting post! I was kind of expecting this result, since I see a growing trend among teenagers to post and like many pictures on Instagram. Besides that, teenagers share almost every daily activity on Snapchat. Meanwhile, Facebook becomes more popular among adults, since the most common age demographic is 25-34 years, which drives away more teenagers.
Second, the number of ‘original shares’, or personal updates, on Facebook decreased with 21% this year, due to the fact that nowadays professional content and the number of advertisements is rising.
New apps or social media channels are first discovered by innovators and early adopters, where after the innovation will be adopted by more users. Facebook is now adopted by more users and therefore in the maturity stage. From a teenagers’ perspective, Facebook is now in the decline stage where Instagram and Snapchat are in the growth stage.
My personal order of social media would be Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook. I only use Facebook for study-related purposes or invitations and never share updates anymore. Besides, I deleted my Twitter account many years ago.
I agree with the opinion that Facebook has to stay the same. Changing their business model in order to compete with the new social media channels, will ensure that many people stop using Facebook. However, I think that it is necessary for Facebook to develop a new social media product or channel that will become the new trend when Instagram and Snapchat are in the maturity or decline stage.