Most people who follow social networks know the latest demographic trends: more older people are adopting Facebook, Twitter attracts mostly Gen Xers, and mySpace is quickly becoming a graveyard of neglected profiles. And now another shift is starting to occur- Twitter users are becoming younger, attracting more Gen Yers. As someone who would be considered Gen Y, I’ve definitely noticed a slew of my friends and acquaintances moving some of their social networking activity to Twitter. During one conversation, someone commented on how cluttered looking Facebook had become and a Twitter friend replied that clutter was the reason she started using Twitter more.
This isn’t to say that people are going off Facebook- I think there’s just a redistribution of efforts what’s balanced among networks. A “Gen Y expert” confirms that younger people are expanding their networks through more channels because they want to “build entirely new online contact lists and create new identities more closely tied to information-sharing.” Reading her assessment reminded me of the first person in my group of friends to start using Twitter. She is in marketing and had just attended a seminar called “Building Your Personal Brand,” which, as you can imagine, is particularly important for marketers. Although many of her tweets are about her day-to-day activities, she often comments on marketing related items, from trends in her agency to more light topics like advertising missteps. She keeps her list of people she follows on the site limited to close friends whose updates she’s actually interested in.
The broader implications of these trends is the “closing of a generational gap as it relates to technology,” according to a University of Texas professor who follows online trends. By this, he means that that we’re headed in the direction of social networking sites that host all ages in the same place. Niche social networks that try to cater to people of certain ages are seeing their users switch to Facebook. After all- if the social networking site gets more valuable as more people join, why would they choose to be somewhere exclusive?
This makes some aspects of recruiting harder and some easier. On one hand, all of your prospects are starting to convene in the same places online. This makes them easier to identify with less effort. Instead of having to be a part of many social networking sites, increasing your presence on the most popular sites will give you the maximum amount of exposure for your efforts. However, it may be harder to keep your audience. Although a baby boomer and a Gen Yer might both be on a social networking site, they may not both be attracted to the same types of information. Whereas before, the challenge was to create contact to keep up in many spaces, that has transformed into creating content in jsut a few spaces to appeal to a broad audience.
No Comments