Social media usage is in decline for the first time in history, according to the Infinite Dial 2018 report.
If this is accurate, what does that mean for you?
Let’s get into that in a minute.
What is the Infinite Dial Report?
Since 1998 the Infinite Dial report has covered media and technology usage.
This year they have found that social media usage is down for the first time in history, by almost 4%.
Usage has dropped from 80% in 2017 down to almost 77% in 2018.
And Facebook takes the biggest hit, they have fallen from 67% usage in 2017, down to 62% this year.
This is shocking news because social media usage has actually increased 7% every single year for the last 9 years.
2018 is the first time that we have seen things begin to shift in the opposite direction.
The report has also reveals that young people are now moving away from Facebook and Twitter, something which has long been predicted by marketing experts.
We now finally have evidence of this beginning to happen.
Young people are moving towards Snapchat and Instagram, so if that is your key demographic (people from the ages of 12 to 34) you might want to invest your advertising dollars in targeting them on those platforms.
I’m gonna talk about more about advertising, specifically Facebook advertising in a second.
Why is there a Decline in Social Media Usage?
The reason for the decline in social media aren’t clear at the moment.
However, the Convince and Convert website suggests that usage in Facebook has declined because of politics.
Now I don’t discount that, but I do think that is probably only part of it.
There is an ever growing sense of distrust in Facebook as a whole, but this is not the end of social media – not by a long shot.
We’re not talking about some cataclysmic event that’s going to wipe out social media.
But as a result of the shift in usage, no matter how small we can almost guarantee that the price of Facebook ads are going to increase.
How will this Impact Facebook Ads?
Prices are going to increase.
So now is the perfect time to start building an authority website that attracts large-scale traffic, in preparation of that coming price increase.
However, CNBC reported that advertisers, for the foreseeable future, are sticking with Facebook despite the recent negative press, and general distrust in the platform.
Advertisers are still seeing an opportunity in Facebook, and I agree with them – for the moment.
Its got the largest audience size, it cannot be beat.
The level of advanced targeting is just phenomenal, and no single platform can give us the same kind of opportunities to advertise that Facebook can.
And a lot of advertisers are still experiencing cheap rates and most still regard it advertising there has ‘a low level of risk’.
In 2018, if you want to test out an offer, or test s sales funnel, then Facebook is a great way to do it.
So no major change there, but Facebook is running out of places to put their adverts.
That means those places will become more valuable, as more people leave the platform.
Imagine Facebook a limited number of resources that are beginning to run out.
Therefore the resources that they have, which are ad placements and the user base, are slowly becoming more valuable – and that means more expensive.
But if you are adamant that you don’t want anything to do with Facebook, which I completely understand, then I have a Youtube video that gives you 7 alternative platforms you can use to drive traffic to your website instead .
So I’m going to leave it there for today, if you’ve found this useful then share it with your network.