Social networking is the next big thing, we all know it, everybody is talking about it, the internet is filled with it. Almost everybody has a Facebook, Twitter and/or LinkedIn account. I have them as well, but sometimes I have the feeling that I’m missing the vibe of all this social networking stuff. I don’t feel the need to use my Facebook as some kind of public diary, I don’t tweed every hour of the day and my LinkedIn Profile is only for 50% complete. I ask myself the question: Am I an active user or not? Am I the only one who thinks like this?
So, I did some research. I was convinced that I am not the only one who has an account on Twitter and never tweets. Numbers have confirmed my suspicion. A study from security firm Barracuda Labs provides some interesting insights into the state of the Twitterverse. This company looked at 19 million Twitter accounts to search for active Twitter users. The definition they used was the following: An active or “True” Twitter user has at least 10 followers, follows at least 10 people and had tweeted at least 10 times. By that definition though, only 21% of Twitter users are active users. Surprisingly, I am not one of them…
Then I looked at some statistics of Facebook. As we take a look at the Facebook statistics page, we see that Facebook already has more than 400 million users. 50% of the people who have an account log on to Facebook in any given day and almost 10% of the total users update their status each day. According to the numbers an average Facebook user looks like this: he has 130 friends, sends 8 friend requests a month, spends more than 55 minutes per day on Facebook, clicks the Like button on 9 pieces of content each month, becomes a fan of 4 Pages each month, is invited to 3 events per month and is a member of 13 groups. I recognize myself in all the ‘passive’ things. I have more than 130 friends, I receive more than three event invitation a month and I become a fan of more than 4 Pages each month. But when I look at the ‘active’ things such as inviting friends, hitting the Like button and spending time on the site, I must confess that I’m not a real facebook user.
If a want to become a real active user of social networks, I'll have to try harder.
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