August 29, 2011
Social networking growing fast beyond young adults
If your news organization’s social media strategy has been mainly targeting young adults, it’s time to think more broadly. New research from the Pew Internet and American Life Project indicates that U.S. adults aged 30 and over are the fastest-growing segment in terms of frequent social networking usage…
Pew’s research indicates that for the first time, half of all U.S. adults (and 65% of online adults) now use social networking services such as Facebook. The only online activities that remain more popular are e-mail and search.
The percentage of young adults (18-29) who use social networking may have topped out at just over 80%, but older adults are catching up fast. Pew reports: “In the past two years, social networking site use among internet users age 65 and older has grown 150%, from 13% in April 2009 to 33% in May 2011. Similarly, during this same time period use by 50-64 year-old internet users doubled from 25% to 51%.”
Women tend to be the most active users—48% of women use social networking services on a typical day, compared to 38% of men.
The News for Digital Journalists blog is made possible by a grant to USC Annenberg from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
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Tags: research, social media, demographics, pew internet and american life project
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