Social Media Update, August 2021

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“You should be on every single social media platform out there,” insists one very well-known social media “expert.”

Whenever I hear this, I feel my eyes doing an eye roll. The problem with a lot of the social media advice out there is that it’s really for major brands like Pepsi, Southwest Airlines, and Apple, but not authors, entrepreneurs, and small business owners with fewer than a handful of employees.

“You should tweet once an hour, every single hour of the day for 24-hours. Don’t worry. You can write all your tweets at one time and then just schedule them to go out once an hour. You don’t even have to be there,” he goes on to say.

Um, no. How long would it take to come up with 24 compelling tweets and schedule them, every single day?

Question: Who has this kind of time?

Answer: Major brands do and they have people dedicated to each platform, including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube, Clubhouse, and the list goes on.

One person cannot do everything, so I get tired of hearing this kind of advice when they never point out who the recommendations are actually for.

Here is my advice

Pick two social media platforms and go deep.

Pick platforms that you like (Well, like enough to use, anyway.)

Make sure the two you pick are where your audience likes to spend their time so that you can talk with them.

I think it’s a fairly simple formula and it’s doable.

Let’s take a look at some actual statistics regarding the demographics of their users so you can make informed decisions. Better to check the stats rather than just what someone might say in a post or while attending a webinar or other event.

According to Pew Research, there are 3.78 billion social media users worldwide in 2021 — a five percent increase from a year ago. Here are some of their results as well as some from a recent study conducted by Khronos, a major marketing company. Keep in mind these numbers are worldwide — not only in the US or other specific country.

Also, when researching this, the numbers varied widely, which is why I picked sources that are respected, and I didn’t use the company’s numbers. The reasons for that are pretty obvious, I think.

Facebook: 2.7 billion monthly active users

Age 

  • 86% of people ages 18-29 use Facebook
  • 77% of people ages 30-49 use Facebook
  • 51% of people ages 50-65 use Facebook
  • 34% of people that are 65+ use Facebook

Gender

  • 54% of Facebook users are female
  • 46% of Facebook users are male

Time

On average, Facebook users spend 35 minutes a day on the platform


Instagram: 1 billion monthly active users

Active daily users: 500 million active daily users

Age

  • 67% of people ages 18-29 use Instagram
  • 47% of people ages 30-49 use Instagram
  • 23% of people ages 50-64 use Instagram
  • 8% of people that are 65+ use Instagram

Gender

  • 51% of Instagram users are female
  • 49% of Instagram users are male

Time

On average, Instagram users spend 53 minutes a day on the platform


Twitter: 330 million monthly active users

Age

  • 38% of people ages 18-29 use Twitter
  • 26% of people ages 30-49 use Twitter
  • 17% of people ages 50-64 use Twitter
  • 7% of people that are 65+ use Twitter

Gender

  • 50% of Twitter users are female
  • 50% of Twitter users are male

Time

On average, Twitter users spend 3.39 minutes per session


LinkedIn: 260 million monthly active users

Age

  • 21% of people ages 18-24 use LinkedIn
  • 60% of people ages 25-34 use LinkedIn
  • 17% of people ages 35-54 use LinkedIn
  • 3% of people that are 55+ use LinkedIn

Gender

  • 43% of LinkedIn users are female
  • 57% of LinkedIn users are male

Time

On average, LinkedIn users spend 6 minutes and 7 seconds per session


 YouTube: 2 billion monthly active users

Age

  • 81% of people ages 15-25 use YouTube
  • 71% of people ages 26-35 use YouTube
  • 67% of people ages 36-45 use YouTube
  • 66% of people ages 46-55 use YouTube
  • 58% of people that are 56+ use YouTube

Gender

Over 50% of YouTube users are female

Time

On average, YouTube users spend 11 minutes and 43 seconds per day on the platform

Bottom line

Again, pick two platforms that you enjoy using and go deep. You want to be where your audience is, so hopefully the numbers above will guide you in your decision making.

To your success!

Joanne

P.S. Are we connected on social media yet? If not, why not? Click on the widgets below and let me know!

P.P.S. And now for today’s musical selection. Do you feel better when you’re dancing?

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