If there was any doubt in your mind then let the above graph speak to your soul: Facebook, in terms of pageviews, is killing it.
What does one do when they are so far ahead of everyone else? An opportunity to relax? Probably not.
In terms of consolidating our efforts to engage with social networking sites it would seem logical to put a few more resources into the clear and obvious winner.
Thoughts?
One word: Pictures. People love pictures and people will spend a good amount of time clicking thru them. In order to see an album at a reasonable size you have to click through. If one album has 50 pics = 50 clicks.
Kudos on MySpace still being relevant enough to come in second.
i think pics too
YES!
Hectic!!!
I can understand that twitter is so far behind – 3rd party apps is the way to go.
But facebook so far ahead, hmmm, myst be all the apps and tabs on your profile/home feed
It seems that it has become cool to kill your Facebook page lately. This is too bad, because although Facebook has dramatically changed in the past few years, it is THE best online platform for connection. I was a little miffed when it went from my college friends (Facebook was released my Freshman year of college) to everyone and their mother (literally) and while this made me second-guess Facebook for a hot second, this is huge for churches. Everyone is there, so quit trying to build personal, custom, “for us only” stuff and go where the people are!
This has gotten a bit long, but to wrap it up: if churches realized Facebook is not only the social media giant, but an opportunity to engage with real people in real time in a real online environment, much more would be done to expand that platform.
I totally get what you’re saying, but I also get where people come from in killing their Facebook page. In fact, I almost did it.
I absolutely hate their model and agreements for how they deal with your information. At one point, your pictures became their property. Sure, the easy argument is not to share things you don’t want Facebook owning, but how many photographers were trying to generate business that were at fault for not reading the fine print?
Another example is how much information they collect from you – admittedly, at your discreation – and, should you choose to want to leave Facebook, the process is arduous. The main way of disconnecting is to “deactivate” your account which is basically saying “keep everything I’ve given you, I just don’t want a page.”
I see both sides of it, but I think people unease with Facebook is founded. We’ve not had anything like this before and as people get more educated about what they’ve gotten into, I totally get their wanting kill their page.
I definitely hear you on that. Facebook can get a bit sketchy with info. Still, it’s undoubtedly the most beneficial online space for connection.
My father-in-law, who has literally built a carrer in school and public safety told me this when I asked him why he wasn’t on Facebook: “It’s against my principles.”
At first I scoffed. But, now- and especially in light of these points- I see where he’s coming from.
There’s something to be said so facebookcide, and avoiding it all together.
BTW- I’m doing neither. It’s against my principles.
agreed. great points here.
It’s definitely not an opportunity to relax. Palm did that with their Garnet OS and almost went out of business. Microsoft did that with IE and, well, look what happened.
I have mixed feelings about seeing these numbers. I’m assuming that the numbers are tallied by partial views (pages retrieved via ajax as well) because so much of Facebook is a mashup of smaller widgets. If that’s not the case, then that’s huge.
Honestly though, I’d be more interested into seeing an infographic of the breakdown of what pages were actually viewed. I mean, are the page views predominantly pictures and videos? What about fan pages? Notes? Etc.
I’m not underestimating the significance of the page views – I’m wondering what areas should be targeted.
Maybe I’ll drop a screenshot of ChurchCrunch in my pictures
.
that’s why i have like 1 picture in facebook.
Couple of random thoughts about this list:
- I’m impressed that StumbleUpon is here at all. Who even goes on the StumbleUpon site? I guess the web toolbar must track impressions, because that’s the only way I can see them having nearly that many pageviews.
- Xanga? I think Slashdot would be pretty embarrassed if they realized that Xanga was beating them…45 years after Xanga was cool…
- Makes sense to me why Twitter doesn’t have more pageviews. I think for the most part, people who use the Twitter homepage aren’t heavy-duty users. Of course, there are lots of exceptions to that, but most who are active use third-party clients.
- Some days I feel like I single-handedly boost Facebook’s pageview count.
hahaha. love that last point……
Facebook is killing it in terms of pageviews, but…
a) Most of what’s happening in Twitter is happening in 3rd party apps. IMO a more insightful comparison of Facebook & Twitter would be total number of items posted – tweets vs all status updates, links, pics, vids posted to FB.
b) I’m still not seeing a lot of engagement on Facebook between people and organizations. I’d be interested to know how many of those FB pageviews are on FB pages (vs person profiles). But I do still think it’s important for an organization to have a FB page because fans will see the org’s updates in their stream.
good points paul.
If you want to see engagement, just put something like “Twilight sucks!”, or “Taylor Swift can’t sing!” in your status, and grab some popcorn for the fireworks.
And yes- I am speaking from experience.
My point: I’ve heard of colleges ceasing the issuing of email addresses due to facebook; I’ve seen some amazing conversations take place between teens, in public, on their walls (we’re talking volume, not necessarily content). The engagement is there, you just have to know where to find it.
Here’s a statistic: 35-54 year olds accounted for the largest growth on facebook in 2009 (SRC: http://bit.ly/99CzHu)
I <3 numbers.
Like Brett said, pictures are huge. In addition, I am sure they have also benefited from the interactive online games they’ve made available to users (Farmville, Mafia Wars, Poker, etc).
As for MySpace, I wonder how much of their numbers are helped by the fact that many musical artists still utilize MySpace for their promotion. I’ve been wondering if (or when) Facebook is going to venture into that territory.
The music pages are the only reason I can come up with in my mind why Myspace was second on this list.
I’m surprised Classmates is so far behind.
Not.
Wow. Talk about a ball hog.
To chime in on fb profile vs. pages; our church plant has seen very little interaction with our page. However, we have seen interaction on leaders profiles. I think it’s easier for people to interact with people than an abstract concept like a corporation, organization or church (entire community).
I find your comment about the interaction you have seen on profiles vs. pages very interesting. As someone who is trying to help develop an online community at work, it makes me wonder which is more beneficial.
Are people quieter because they don’t really know who they are talking to on a page? I wonder if anyone else has found this to be true. I can see why that would be the case.
i’ve seen some massive responses from peeps on the People of the Second Chance Fanpage…7K peeps on there who LOVE to interact…
Good example. Definitely the exception rather than the rule, though.
Facebook pages seem to be a lot like blogs in that they have a high ratio of lurkers to commenters, there has to be a critical mass of core commenters to make things take off, and it’s a real challenge for most organizations to reach that critical mass.
Jim, you are right about the page, lots of interaction. 7000 people is a huge number, but with a couple big names in Christian circles behind it, I could see 7000 happening out of a response to an initial invitation. I wonder what kind of percentage of the fans interact compared to those who became fans and then went on their merry online way. To me, this is where pages get tricky, how many fans are actually there, and returning?
POTSC is definitely doing it well, though. Huge props to that community.
I think so, it’s not very natural talking to an abstract concept. Kind of Wizard of Oz-ish.
Pages are about community. If you miss this, you miss the point. If you’re not engaging in the conversation, people won’t either. Just like in “real life”, there is a reciprocity that is absolutely necessary for success.
I absolutely agree! Facebook brings me about twice the amount of traffic than Twitter does. I think my next step is to develop a facebook fan page. I read a great post on how to do maximize this today here: http://www.wchingya.com/2010/03/facebook-applications-fan-page-popularity.html
What is Hi5??
who cares?
jjust kidding.
number 3.
sorry- couldn’t help myself either.
WOW!