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If you’re going to look up social media statistics, you’re likely going to drown in a sea of information, interesting and not-so-interesting stats, and stats that might even contradict themselves. At NeoReach, we spent a lot of time combing through the best and most interesting social media stats so we could compile them all here.
Instagram Statistics
People are now spending almost as much time on Instagram as they do on Facebook: an average of 53 minutes per day on the platform
Our thoughts: While Facebook might be losing users and trust because of data security issues and because “parents killed it”, Instagram is going strong and slowly making its way up to becoming the most popular platform for younger generations
In 2018, there are an estimated 1 billion monthly active users on Instagram
Our thoughts: Instagram is one of the best options for reaching your audience online
Instagram is popular all over the world, but some countries are clear leaders in terms of Instagram users: the United States is the first on the list with 120 million users, Brazil comes second with 61 million, and India and Indonesia have 59 million, and 56 million users, respectively
Our thoughts: What these numbers are telling us is that people from all over the world use Instagram, but a majority of the users are in a few key countries
A large majority of Instagram are branded: as of 2017, 7 out of 10 hashtags are branded
Our thoughts: Brands on Instagram know how important user-generated content (UGC) is and are leveraging it by creating these branded hashtags.
Instagram users love a good pregnancy announcement from a celebrity or a first look at celebrities’ babies. A majority of the most liked Instagram posts ever are either a pregnancy announcement or a baby picture – from celebrities and influencers like Kylie Jenner, Beyonce, and Cristiano Ronaldo. Kylie Jenner, for example, got almost 20 million likes for her first Insta post with her daughter:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Be3rTNplCHf/?hl=en&taken-by=kyliejenner
Our thoughts: People love a cute baby. ‘Nuff said.
Facebook Statistics
Even with all of its recent issues with data security, Facebook is still the most popular social network in the world: with close to 2 billion active monthly users spending an average of 58 minutes a day on the platform
Our thoughts: Even though things were looking a bit grim for Facebook just a few months ago, it seems like the biggest social network in the world is still going strong – maybe it was Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony before Congress, the new ad campaigns that were (somewhat) apologizing for the data misuse, or maybe it was just that we love Facebook too much to give it up yet; one thing is for sure though: Facebook is still the leader in terms of social networks
There are more male Facebook users than female in almost every age bracket, except for the 55 to 64 age group and users over 65 years of age. In terms of 18 to 24 year-olds, there are 16% male users compared to 12% female, and among 25 to 34 year-olds, 18% are male and 12% are female
Our thoughts: Worldwide, there are more male users than female, particularly in younger age groups; once we get to 35 years old and up, the numbers get closer and closer to each other
As of January 2018, an overwhelming majority of Facebook users accessed the platform via their mobile: 95.1%, to be exact. Next in line are laptops and desktops, with 31.8%, while tablets get about 8.8% of total usage
Our thoughts: People check their social media mostly on their smartphones. That’s important to keep in mind when creating social media content or social media campaigns; for example, if you create a video for Facebook, you should make sure it’s not too long and that you always use subtitles, as the user might not have their headphones on when checking their feed (and they might also be at work…)
Americans love Facebook – especially adults. In fact, 68% of American adults use Facebook, while the next social network in line is Instagram, with 28% of adults using it
Our thoughts: While younger people are flocking towards other social networks (like Instagram or Snapchat), either because they’re bored with it or there are too many of their parents on it – 34% of American teenagers online think Facebook is for “old people” – (just to name a few possible causes…), adults still use Facebook predominantly across the US
Facebook users love video: 500 million people watch videos every day on Facebook – about 100 million hours of video watched every day, and most of it, on mobile
Our thoughts: Video is clearly the way to go! Brands need to use more video in their Facebook strategy so as to attract more views, more fans, and more subscribers. And as we mentioned earlier, don’t forget about the subtitles either because a staggering 85% of Facebook videos are watched without the sound on
Youtube Statistics
YouTube is now the second most popular website in the world, getting the most traffic after Google; as per Alexa, users spend an average of 8 minutes and 51 seconds every day on YouTube and view an average of 4.83 pages per visitor
Our thoughts: YouTube is hugely literally all over the world and people spend a lot of time every day on the platform. That brings some amazing opportunities for brands who want to reach their audience in an effective way!
YouTube has over 1 billion registered users and they watch over 1 billion (!) hours of video every day. In fact, in the US, just on mobile alone, YouTube reaches more 18-34 year-olds than any TV network!
Our thoughts: Network TV? That is so last decade. If you want to reach your younger audience, YouTube is the place to be
The most viewed video on YouTube is Luis Fonsi ft Daddy Yankee – Despacito, with over 5 billion 334 million views, while the most popular YouTube channel in terms of subscribers is PewDiePie, a YouTube gaming influencer with over 64 million subscribers
Our thoughts: Unsurprisingly, the most popular videos and people on YouTube are those with a wide appeal: mainstream music and opinionated gamers
If you want to reach these huge social media audiences, leverage social media influencers – we can help!
