If you’re like most small businesses or solopreneurs, producing digital content sucks up WAY too much of your time. You’re already the head salesperson or the bookkeeper—and that’s not counting all the work it takes to deliver your core products or services!
Or, maybe you beat yourself up because you don’t spend the amount of time you think you “should” on blogging or posting or recording content and engaging with your prospects and customers on digital platforms (add me to this category.)
But there’s good news: you DON’T have to be on every social media platform posting original content every single day!
Focusing on the top two platforms (or three at the most) where your target audience hangs out is the best. Mastering those two, measuring what content performs best, and optimizing as you learn is the best way to multiply engagement and alleviate the massive time wasted on creating social media content.
To help you decide which platforms are best for you to reach your target audiences, here’s a quick overview of each, who hangs out there, and some info on what digital content works best for each (data is for the US only and found on the Pew Research Center website unless otherwise noted.)
With a domineering global reach of over 2.8 billion active users as of July 2020, Facebook is one of the two largest social media platforms (YouTube is the other.) And overall, video content tends to perform better than all other types of Facebook posts. In 2020, news dominated the top-performing content on the platform, with listicles and humor/comedy content coming in second and third.
% of people, by gender, who use Facebook
75% of women use Facebook
63% of men use Facebook
% of people, by age group, who use Facebook
13-17 year olds: 51%
30-49 year olds: 79%
18-24 year olds: 76%
50-64 year olds: 68%
25-30 year olds: 84%
65+ year olds: 46%
% of people in each regional area who use Facebook
Urban: 73%
Suburban: 69%
Rural: 66%
% of people, by educational level, who use Facebook
61% of people with high school education or less
75% of those with some college education
74% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use Facebook
69% of people making less than $30k per year
72% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
74% of people making $75k + per year
Having turned 10 years old in 2020, Instagram usage has climbed to over 1 billion. The photo and video-dominant platform is more popular among younger users, with 13.9 percent of global active Instagram users being women between the ages of 18 and 24 years, according to Statistica. More than half of the global Instagram population worldwide is aged 34 years or younger.
% of people, by gender, who use Instagram
43% of women use Instagram
31% of men use Instagram
% of people, by age group, who use who use Instagram
13-17 year olds: 72%
30-49 year olds: 47%
18-29 year olds: 67%
50-64 year olds: 23%
65+ year olds: 8%
% of people in each regional area who use Instagram
Urban: 46%
Suburban: 35%
Rural: 21%
% of people, by educational level, who use Instagram
33% of people with high school education or less
37% of those with some college education
43% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use Instagram
35% of people making less than $30k per year
39% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
42% of people making $75k + per year
YouTube
YouTube is the world’s largest online video platform with over 2 billion monthly logged-in users. users in 2020. With ads that appear at intervals for users without a premium subscription, YouTube’s brand engagement conversion rate sits at about 70%. Over 44% of all internet users use YouTube each day, with men using the platform more than women. And as of October 2020, most popular YouTube channels based on monthly views were music and children’s content.
% of people, by gender, who use YouTube
68% of women use YouTube
78% of men use YouTube
% of people, by age group, who use YouTube
18-24 year olds: 90%
30-49 year olds: 87%
25-30 year olds: 93%
50-64 year olds: 70%
65+ year olds: 38%
% of people in each regional area who use YouTube
Urban: 77%
Suburban: 74%
Rural: 64%
% of people, by educational level, who use YouTube
64% of people with high school education or less
79% of those with some college education
80% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use YouTube
68% of people making less than $30k per year
75% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
83% of people making $75k + per year
Strict rules irritated some users leading to a decline from 330 million to approximately 315 million from 2019 – 2020. Still, at 22% adult usage in the US, Twitter users love discovering new content. That makes it a great place for timely information like events about to happen (or in progress), customer service updates, and popular news. Its demographics have deeper pockets and tend to be socially well connected.
% of people, by gender, who use Twitter
21% of women use Twitter
24% of men use Twitter
% of people, by age group, who use Twitter
13-17 year olds: 32%
30-49 year olds: 26%
18-29 year olds: 38%
50-64 year olds: 17%
65+ year olds: 7%
% of people in each regional area who use Twitter
Urban: 26%
Suburban: 22%
Rural: 13%
% of people, by educational level, who use Twitter
13% of people with high school education or less
24% of those with some college education
32% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use Twitter
20% of people making less than $30k per year
20% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
32% of people making $75k + per year
With its mission to “connect the world’s professionals to make them more productive and successful”, LinkedIn is a professional networking platform with over 722 million registered users worldwide. However, 70% of users are from outside the US. LinkedIn is also one of the top places to find Senior-level influencers with decision-making authority.
According to a 2016 post on LinkedIn’s Marketing Solutions blog, 80% of B2B marketing leads from social media come through LinkedIn. If you’re trying to drive B2B traffic to your blog or website, take note! Even though LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter collectively drive 90% of social traffic to B2B sites and blogs, more than half of that traffic comes straight from LinkedIn as of May 2019.
% of people, by gender, who use LinkedIn
24% of women use LinkedIn
29% of men use LinkedIn
% of people, by age group, who use LinkedIn
18-29 year olds: 28%
30-49 year olds: 37%
50-64 year olds: 24%
65+ year olds: 11%
% of people in each regional area who use LinkedIn
Urban: 33%
Suburban: 30%
Rural: 10%
% of people, by educational level, who use LinkedIn
9% of people with high school education or less
26% of those with some college education
51% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use LinkedIn
10% of people making less than $30k per year
26% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
49% of people making $75k + per year
Did you know that Pinterest started off as an invitation-only platform? Me either! But since it’s debut in 2009, it’s been the fastest site in history to reach 10 million unique monthly visitors and high user engagement metrics. Pinterest has over 300 million worldwide users, a visual-first focus, and an audience that skews heavily female. This makes this social platform ideal for designers, creators, or any business that has great visuals to showcase products or to share inspirational or aspirational content--especially to women!
% of people, by gender, who use Pinterest
42% of women use Pinterest
15% of men use Pinterest
% of people, by age group, who use Pinterest
18-29 year olds: 34%
30-49 year olds: 35%
50-64 year olds: 27%
65+ year olds: 15%
% of people in each regional area who use Pinterest
Urban: 30%
Suburban: 30%
Rural: 26%
% of people, by educational level, who use Pinterest
19% of people with high school education or less
32% of those with some college education
38% of those with more than college education
% of people, by income, who use Pinterest
18% of people making less than $30k per year
27% of people making $30k-$74,999k per year
41% of people making $75k + per year
Building relationships with social media content takes time and effort!
So stop stretching yourself and your business by needlessly managing too many social media accounts. Use data to determine where your ideal customers spend the most time, and focus your efforts on growing engagement there.