The Missing Consumers

While the mainstream press, and most digital marketing firms, are convinced that social media are changing the consciousness and habits of humanity, I've chanced upon two studies that suggest otherwise:

• Only 5% of blogs are updated more than once every 120 days, and less than a million are updated every day.  Out of 133 million blogs included in the late 2008 survey by Technorati, most of them are abandoned after the first post or two
• While blogging has subsided to levels last seen somewhere in 2005 or so, about half of Twitter's micro-bloggers post, or tweet, less than once every 74 days.  Most of the platform's traffic is generated by 10% of its users, according to this Harvard study

Those are still staggeringly large and directionally important numbers.  Advocates and detractors will incessantly debate them, but I think the idea that more people will communicate with one another more often, and for more reasons, is all but a forgone conclusion.  Bickering about the details doesn't change the inevitability of the future. 

But the usage numbers do bring into question 1) when will that future arrive, and 2) how will we get there?

The perception that social media usage is today's cultural and communications phenomena has led many companies to invest in experimental programs, then struggle to invent ways to measure them.  However creatively memorable the campaigns have been, the numbers mimic the ersatz measures for internal states of brand that never quite felt right in the old days (best case), or reveal clicks, time spent, or other metrics that would consider even indirect relevance to branding an accomplishment.

Now consider the possibility that the reason why the numbers don't add up is because people aren't using social media as much as we were led to believe?

Facebook registers a zillion clicks every nanosecond.  So does YouTube.  But visiting sites for entertainment or conversation isn't new; we’ve been doing it in analog reality since Ogg debuted his first finger painting on a cave wall in Lascaux.  The big aha of the social web is the democratization of content, both creating and sharing it.  The consumers to whom we want to sell have become producers, or so the liturgy goes, who insist on participating in our businesses.  Blogging, of any sort, is a primary way they narrate and advocate that participation, and it's supposed to change the way we deliver branding.

It turns out that there are just far fewer of those consumers online at any given moment.  Further, if there aren't so many of them actively doing anything, do we consider them "evangelists" spreading the word into the cosmos, or perhaps a small cadre of individuals who are busy effectively talking only to one another? 

Here's the scariest thought: what if all those consumers who abandoned traditional media, and rejected the presumptions of marketing upon which we have for so long relied, are still missing?

Comments

[Briana Tomkinson]

I think when you spend all your time living & breathing social media, and hanging out with friends & colleagues who do the same, you can lose your perspective.

Social media has been oversold as an immediate *replacement* for traditional modes of communication. In my opinion, it has emerged as a complimentary channel and a disruptive force, but it's clear to me that advertising & more traditional marketing & communications will be around for a long time yet.

Social media has enabled more people to share their thoughts online, but I think it's a basic fact of human nature that not everyone wants to step up on the soapbox. More does not equal 'all'. It doesn't mean it's not important. Take the Twitter data on dropoff: it's not who joins that matters, it's who remains. I think too much focus has been put on the raw numbers (which naturally include people testing out the various tools) and not enough effort looking at behaviour in these spaces online. If the people who remain are the people you most need to reach, it's actually a good thing that the space isn't cluttered by too many looky-loos.

As for the blogosphere, I think it's natural that the numbers shrank. It doesn't mean that those people aren't still communicating online, just that they're not using blogging platforms to do it. When blogging was booming, it was the best tool around for the purpose. Then social networking sites got better, and for many online diarists, Facebook or other socnets became a better venue for this kind of expression. Once Twitter came along, many one-time bloggers who used it primarily for link-sharing discovered that Twitter was a better medium for them, and a number of them either ceased updating their blogs or reduced post frequency.

The fundamentals of enabling self-expression, creating a sense of community and speeding up the transmission of ideas & information remain the same regardless of which platform is "hot." Whether it's blogging, Facebook, Twitter or another tool is a strategic decision based on personal preference, audience analysis and the technological environment of the time.

[Erick]

People are fundamentally lazy. They will not put in consistent participatory effort that does not provide the substantial emotional reward of tribal connection.

The shallow superficiality of "friending" on Facebook or MySpace, the voyeuristic quality of "following" on Twitter (as well as the exhibitionistic nature of daily living played out for an audience) guarantees no real meaningful social connections and no way to sustain long-term interest and participation.

We Tweet and Run.

[Aurelia Masterson]

I do not believe they are changing the habits of HUMANITY. Honestly, these people need to visit a 3rd world country. Not too much has actually changed.

Sure, tons of people experiment with Social Media and don't end up sticking around, and their perception of the internet may change. They may even be astounded by the world they never knew existed, but these SM pundits should not be listened to. They are the ones that care about funny cat pictures, not the rest of the world.

Basically, at least right know, it's a niche, and I doubt it will never genuinely go main stream. Tons of "net natives" still reject the culture. They are not at all evangelists. Like I said, I think most people pretend that that world just doesn't exist. They will probably stay "missing"

They are daily replaced, however, like an army of Davids, I have heard it called. The number of people who use sites like Twitter regularly will grow, but to think that it will change humanity or in 20 years everybody will be like a 13 girl with her Facebook is ridiculous.

[Tamsen McMahon]

It seems to me that we're reacting to all the recent data, Nielsen and otherwise, with blockbuster thinking...when social media is, and always has been, the very definition of "The Long Tail."

And perhaps the numbers don't add up to what we were led to believe, because we've been talking about social media sites and certain individuals as "hits"?

What I'd like to see is how the total activity of all those infrequent posts and tweets total up and compare to the blockbuster sites and users.