Nielsen: Twitter Was Fastest Growing Community Last Month
Last night, Nielsen Online reported that Twitter has now surpassed Facebook and others to become the fastest-growing site in the "Member Communities" category for the month of February. Although Facebook, the world's most popular social network, has more members than Twitter, that's not what this measurement is about - it's about growth. And Twitter is growing. It's growing like crazy.
Twitter's Growth
According to a post on Nielsen Wire, unique visitors to Twitter.com increased 1,382 percent year over year, from 475,000 unique visitors in February 2008 to 7 million in February 2009. This growth earned it the title of "fastest growing member community site," a term that encompasses not just social networks but any online community - even one such as online wiki community Wikia, which, incidentally, came in at number five on the list. Zimbio and Facebook followed Twitter, growing 240 percent and 228 percent, respectively.
Nielsen also reported that the largest age group on Twitter was not college students or teens, but adults from the ages of 35-49. This group comprises nearly 42% of the site's audience at 3 million unique visitors. Twitter is also a popular site for people to visit while at work, notes Nielsen's Michelle McGiboney, as 62% of the combo unique audience accesses Twitter.com from work versus only 35% from home.
Of course, visitor stats to Twitter.com from a traditional web browser don't show a complete picture since the service is also accessible from a number of desktop and mobile clients as well as SMS. In January, 735,000 unique visitors hit Twitter's mobile web site, averaging 14 visits per month and spending an average of 7 minutes per visit. Twitter also had 812,000 unique users sending and receiving text messages in the last quarter of 2008. However, this last stat only took into account AT&T and Verizon cell phones. Within that group, though, there were nearly 240 tweets per person for the quarter.
A Word About These Numbers
Before taking these numbers to the bank, it's worth noting that they are being pulled from Nielsen NetView (U.S. Home & Work), so they're not representative of the service as a whole - they only give us a snapshot of what's occurring there. Also, the demographic chart is annotated with a note that reads "these demographics have insufficient sample sizes" in the 18-24 age group column, which may speak to the overall insufficient sample size of this particular survey, a number which was not reported.
That said, these numbers do seem to confirm what our gut instincts have been telling us for some time. Twitter is apparently not becoming the next big thing with teens and other members of Gen Y, despite rumors to the contrary. The hype surrounding Twitter's connection to the younger generation was even skewered hilariously by Jon Stewart not too long ago on "The Daily Show."
It looks like Twitter may be for "old people" after all. Just like Facebook.
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Great post, but you might want to correct the headline. ("Fasting"?)
Great news! I think the best is yet to come for Twitter. Now that there's a Twitter-Facebook app, the growth will be massive. Can't wait to see the figures for March next month.
@Sarah - You might wanna modify the post title:
Nielsen: Twitter Was "Fasting" Growing Community Last Month
I think it should be "Fastest":-)
Wow, bad! I fixed that right away, thanks. :)
This is also be one of the reasons that a lot of Twitter based services and applications emerge each day. It looks like simplicity can make a product popular
Sarah - Too much coffee, eh? :)
John - Yeah, you're right. Here's an example: A microblogging service from Nigeria.
See link:
http://www.startupsnigeria.com/2009/02/naijapulse-nigerian-microblogging-service-like-twitter/
I like what twitter is doing. Flashback to a year or two ago and I would have never envisioned this (maybe in one of my wildest dreams though.) way to go twitter.
I think it’s great that Twitter is doing so well. I think it’s surprising that mostly adults ages 35-49 use the service rather than teenagers. Maybe it’s because adults can be on Twitter all day long (even when they’re at work) and teenagers don’t have that luxury while they’re in school.
Right now, Twitter is the next best thing for fast, informative information made tangible at searchers’ fingertips. I think we should begin to ask ourselves what will follow this expedient information portal. Social networks and blogs have now surpassed email usage, internet trends no one would have predicted five years ago. Will social networkers eventually get tired of the same mundane networking functions? I believe the next best thing will be integrating a prize initiative for members, just like eZanga.com’s recently launched social network, http://www.HopOnThis.com. Members earn points by staying socially active on the site. A rewarding twist added to an already popular hobby.
The kids are all about Smorgblaatt. What's that? You're not familiar with Smorgblaatt? Hrmm. *sniff* You must be a bit long in the tooth. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to blargle my nzorgts on the 'blaatt.
Great post, Sarah. Was wondering if anyone would be able to count the number of users who called the API using a stand alone app?
That 42% is web lurkers plus authenticated users?
I'm not surprised! I log on to Twitter several times a day from my webtop to check in with everyone, bounce ideas off my followers, and continue conversations. I can also see why it's a "work appropriate" application since many people use it as part of their business!
Chris has a good point, how many tweets come from the web? Not many. Are they tracking apps too?
Regardless, don't count out young people. Remember, Myspace didn't start out as a "teen" website, it started out with the Los Angeles music scene and grew from there.
The one problem I see attracting young people, they are very into "kool" unicode symbols and I'm not sure if these symbols translate through the API.
I'm not surprised. We just launched http://www.TweetTop.com to help people figure out who to follow on twitter on a variety of topics.
J
Great post. We did online focus groups March 5 among Millennials to see what they thought of social media. They don't know why they need Twitter if they have Facebook, we had a hard time finding Millennials who Tweet.
A very nice summary! I chuckle at little bit at the how the numbers are represented. When you're already big, it's hard to lead in growth by percentage. Looking at the Nielsen numbers by users added:
Twitter: 6,563,000
Facebook: 45,661,000
Facebook added almost 7x times as many members. It will be interesting to see if Twitter can keep up the Torrid, but tiny, pace. I hear about Facebook from everyone. I only about Twitter from people in our line of work and the media.
Hm very interesting. Now what will supersede Twitter??
Reminds me of the "Blue Duck" episode of Dilbert..
Old people using twitter -> the taint of uncoolness..
Posted by: cankoklu.pip.verisignlabs.com
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March 20, 2009 1:42 AM
Excellent post!! Twitter is like a breath of fresh air on the Social Media scene. I have been on it for just a few weeks now and I have met several interesting people. It is a platform to network with people you would like to meet in real life. Check me out!!
http://twitter.com/spryka
very good, thank you
The speed of growth is amazing. People that I know using twitter are like soccer fans they want you to be a fan too and they won't stop telling you how cool it is until you sign up.
I've been saying for a while that I think communication industries like PR and Marketing need to incorporate social networking into biz use, but I predict that there will be a business specific service launch in the next year and half to become more corporate.
One thing is for sure, for good or bad, this technology can't be ignored any longer.
I love this! I love Twitter so much more than Facebook, and have constantly been hearing how much faster growing Facebook was than Twitter. It's nice to see there are some statistics to back it up to show this isn't true! It's also nice to know that the largest group who have twitter accounts aren't college age. This debunks another myth! Thanks for the facts!
krissy knox :)
follow me on twitter :)
http://www.twitter.com/iamkrissy
Thanks for sharing
hadi bakalımm
very good, thank you
The kids are all about Smorgblaatt. What's that? You're not familiar with Smorgblaatt? Hrmm. *sniff* You must be a bit long in the tooth. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to blargle my nzorgts on the 'blaatt
Last night, Nielsen Online reported that Twitter has now surpassed Facebook and others to become the fastest-growing site in the "Member Communities" category for the month of February. Although Facebook, the world's most popular social network, has more members than Twitter, that's not what this measurement is about - it's about growth. And Twitter is growing. It's growing like crazy. thaks