10 social media facts you might not know

Social media facts you might not know

Social media has become the mainstream way to market in the digital age. There seems to be a platform for every social need. Connecting with friends and family: Facebook and Twitter have you covered. Looking for a new job, or new colleagues: LinkedIn is great for forging new relationships; wondering how to save all those promo photos: Instagram and Flickr can keep them save while freeing up space on your devices.

Regardless of which social media platforms we interact with, they are a part of daily life. According to a study by FastCo, there are a handful of facts about social media you likely do not know, but should.

1. Your advocates’ follower counts

First: your biggest advocates have the fewest followers. Less than one out of every ten mentions will come from power users. 91% of mentions have less than 500 followers and 6% of all mentions were deemed overly negative and therefore of no use in regards to marketing.

2. Different types of crowds

Second: Twitter has six distinct communication networks, with six distinct types these are: polarized crowds: politics or divisive topics; tight crowds: hobbies or professional topics; brand clusters: brands, public events, or trends; community clusters: global news events; broadcast networks: media outlets, famous individuals;support networks: companies or services with customer support (read more about these types and what they mean to your marketing efforts, here).

3. Which is better – visual or written content?

Third: marketers say written content trumps visuals; 58% prefer original written content, 19% original visual assets. This seems difficult to believe in our highly visual world, but perhaps it is because we are so overrun with visuals, written content stands out from the crowd.

4. You have a limited amount of time to respond

Fourth: to optimize your marketing opportunities, you have less than one hour to respond to a Tweet on Twitter. The study found 53% of users who tweet a brand, expect a response within the hour. If this Tweet happens to be a complaint, an astounding 72% of people expect a response within the hour. This means you need someone, or some application, dedicated to responding to social media posts, if you truly want to keep your customers happy.

5. Best time to retweet?

Fifth: the best time to retweet is late at night, particularly between 10 to 11 p.m. This advice follows the late-night infomercial effect (share when share volume is lower, and your content has a greater chance to stand out), so it makes sense to see that this type of engagement would be highest after hours. Try this out with some of your Tweets and see if your level of engagement changes based on the time of day.

6. When to Facebook?

Sixth: Fridays are Facebook’s best day for engagement. Friday all three types of content (comments, likes, and shares) are high. The next best day is Sunday. You might trying saving your best stuff for the end of the week when people are truly ready to engage with your content and see if it changes the amount of engagement you receive.

7. What’s making Facebook Pages successful?

Seventh: photos are driving engagement on Facebook pages. As of March 20, 2014, 75% of page updates are photos. Try posting more photos on your Facebook feed, but keep in mind the third suggestion: written content trumps visual, so while more people are sharing photos, make sure you include a line of text relevant to your product or service.

8. Where is all of the traffic?

Eighth: Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter drive the most traffic. These three offer the most referred traffic, whereas, YouTube, Google+, and LinkedIn ranked as the top three sources for referrals in terms of time on site, pages per visit, and bounce rate. According to Fast Company if you’re after a big reach and spreading brand awareness, go with Facebook and Twitter, and think long and hard about joining Pinterest, too. If you are interested in more qualified traffic, then be sure to invest time in Google+, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Wherever your business needs traffic, social media can assist.

9. Why can’t you reach fans on Facebook?

Ninth: As Facebook rules have changed, page reach has dwindled. Fast Company suggests new per post goals: aim for 28, 118, or 385 interactions per post, depending on your total fans. Pages with 1 to 9,999 fans: 28 interactions per post; 10,000 to 99,999 fans: 118 interactions per post; and 100,000 to 499,999 fans: 385 interactions per post. Interactions include comments, likes, and shares. These are not hard and fast rules, but can serve as guideposts to know if you are heading in the right direction.

10. Winning on Pinterest

Finally, studies have found there is an optimal day for almost every category on Pinterest. Monday is fitness. Tuesday is best for technology. Wednesday is best for quotes. Thursday is best for fashion. Friday is best for humor. Saturday is best for travel. Sunday is best for food and crafts. If your brand fits one or more of these categories, make sure you are pinning something on the appropriate day to optimize your reach.

While these finding can give you a good starting point, they may not work for every brand and every situation. Test them out and see if you can expand your reach by change the day you post, what you post, or what time you post. Simple changes could make a big difference.