Facebook Leads in Social Media News Consumption
A recent study by Pew Research Center in collaboration with the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, revealed just how social media users consume news across several social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Google+, reddit, Tumblr, Myspace, YouTube, Instagram and Pinterest, among others. The results show that news consumption varies widely across these networks.
More than 30% Facebook users in the US turn to the social network to read news
According to the research, Facebook is the largest social networking site among U.S. adults, and the most popular when it comes to news consumption too. From 64% users active on the network, 30% read news on site. By comparison, Google+ ranks sixth, with only 14% active users, and only 4% reading news on site. Second to Facebook, YouTube has 51% active users, and delivers news on site to 10% of them. By comparison, Twitter reaches just 16% of U.S. adults, but 8% use it for news. LinkedIn ranks third, with 19% reach, however only 3% of its users consume news on site:
The data is important to define targeted content marketing strategies, especially by news organizations that need to refine their digital reach. Many mainstream publications developed Facebook apps to serve news directly on the social network, while others lag behind.
