Which social networks are dominated by male audiences? User survey data

Focuses on an active (writing) audience. The publication presents data on the audience, age, gender and regional distribution of authors of social networks in Russia. It also includes data on the most popular authors and groups of the most popular social networks.

Social media activity by source type

The number of “talking” authors in November 2016 was 35 million and 698 million messages were generated. 71.8% of total volume public content accounts for social networks (504,940 publications). In 2nd place are video content sources (YouTube and Vimeo) - 12.7% of the total volume of public content, and Twitter moved to third place, its share was 8.7%.

VKONTAKTE
VKontakte has 13,278,000 active authors; in November they published 317,508,100 messages.

INSTAGRAM
There are 4,645,700 active creators on Instagram, with 78,185,400 posts published in November.

FACEBOOK
In the Russian segment of Facebook there are 1,021,700 active authors, 50,909,500 messages were published in a month.

LIVEJOURNAL
LiveJournal remains a platform for the production, but not the consumption, of content. There are 196,200 active authors here, and 6,743,500 posts. Fewer than on other sites, but more viral and spreading far beyond the source.

Social media trends in Russia 2016
1. A significant increase in the activity of thematic (“club”) forums and public channels in messengers.
2. The growth of video content and broadcasts in almost all social networks. The activity of the Russian segment of Youtube has increased. On Instagram, the share of videos averaged 7%, and among viral content – ​​more than 50%. On VKontakte, the most popular authors are video bloggers.
3. VKontakte and Instagram launched “smart feeds” that determine the interests of users by their activity and adjust the news feed to them, similar to the Facebook feed. Such feed generation algorithms have enhanced the effect of an “information bubble-shell” that locks people into their own beliefs.
4. Rapid growth in the activity of spam bots. It is significant that growth is observed in several social networks at once - LiveJournal, VKontakte, Facebook, and the topic of spam in them correlates.
5. The predominance of social media over classical media in terms of influence on public opinion. Brexit, elections in the USA, a referendum in Italy - these are cases showing the decisions of large communities of people contrary to the “official information” of the media.
6. FakeNews and the need to check information for accuracy. The desired speed of issuing information for the media and social networks is so high that there is no time left to check publications. In 2017, the industry must find a solution to counter this trend.
7. The Russian part of Facebook has become practically Moscow - 50% of the authors are from Moscow.

How the data was obtained:

Brand Analytics collects and indexes All public messages social networks in Russian, Tatar, Ukrainian, Kazakh and some other languages, as well as data of their authors.

To highlight data by country For each social network, the percentage of geo-determination is taken into account: the number of messages that have geographic data is divided by the percentage of messages with geo-data. Likewise for authors.

To determine geography: Data is taken from author profiles, geo-tags of messages, as well as message texts. Geo-dictionaries for all social networks are unique and expanded with all variants of spelling toponyms, including “custom” ones.

To determine gender: data taken from author profiles and supplemented with gender data obtained through linguistic analysis of the author's first and last name.

To determine age: data taken from author profiles.

Data for Odnoklassniki is not included, since the API of this social network does not allow such research.

Basic research terms:

Message– any open (public) post - in status, on the wall, in groups, comments, etc. Messages in personal correspondence or in “friends only” mode are not taken into account.

Engagement Index(EI) is an indicator of the audience’s reaction to the author’s publications. It is calculated as the sum of comments, likes and reposts to all the author’s publications for a month.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube top the social media rankings worldwide, but users in Russia (and other post-Soviet countries such as Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine) often prefer regional replacements for these platforms.

And this difference in popularity may have great value for companies that use such sites for advertising, as this can completely change marketing strategy(which is used in other parts of the world). In addition, social networks, the rating of which in Russian-speaking countries differs from the global one, can provide enormous opportunities for international communication. Currently, eight social networks are the most popular.

"VKontakte"

VK (formerly known as VKontakte) is the most widespread social network in Russia these days, with more than 46.6 million visitors per month. Undoubtedly, this resource tops the ranking of social networks in the post-Soviet space.

There are many interesting opinions about this site, but it can best be described as a combination between Facebook and a data sharing service. Similar to Facebook, each user has a profile and can search and add other users as friends to see their status updates, new photos and videos.

Along with these traditional functions, users can also download audio and video files of any kind and share these resources with other people. This has previously come under scrutiny as it has at times crossed legal boundaries, but recent reports indicate that VK is now working with major record labels. This made it possible to launch a subscription service that allows you to legally share media files. This is why VKontakte has been leading the ranking of social networks in Russia for several years.

"Classmates"

While VKontakte may be the most popular service among young users (aged 18-35 years), OK (originally Odnoklassniki) is more commonly preferred among social networks. This service has more than 31.5 million visitors per month, with a larger percentage (69%) being women. This platform, by the way, was the first in Russia and, one might say, gave rise to such a phenomenon as social networks. The ranking of sites in this category will always remain incomplete without its mention.

Like VK, OK allows users to create profiles, search for friends, and share status updates and images. The main purpose of creating the platform is to communicate with classmates and friends with whom users may have lost contact many years ago, so the search parameters are quite detailed.

Additionally, the site has a feature that provides information about who has visited your page (whether or not you are their friend). To view the profiles of other users, there is an anonymity feature for which you must pay (to enable “Invisibility Mode”).

"My World"

Perhaps the best generally accepted analogue of the Russian “My World” is Google+. Both of these services are extensions of the ISP email(in the case of “My World” - mail.ru). "My World" has struggled to find its own unique niche on a broader level, but the network's popularity is not that great. However, more than 16.6 million people use this service every month to share images, music and videos, as well as to play games and meet new friends, which is why it is included in the ranking of social networks. The My World online search strategy contains several parameters that are not available in other platforms.

Facebook

Social networks, which have a high rating all over the world, have not bypassed the post-Soviet space. Even though Facebook is not the most popular site in Russia, its popularity has definitely begun to grow - it now receives more than 21.6 million Russian-speaking visitors per month. This is not surprising, since Facebook is constantly changing its platform to better meet the needs of users.

Analysts believe that one of the reasons why Facebook is becoming increasingly popular in Russia is business communication. According to some sources, more than 30% business discussions in Russia it happens on Facebook. Therefore it will not be surprising if this platform will eventually top the rankings

"Live Journal"

Livejournal is a blogging platform that has been around since 1999, but has not been used in much of the world since then. This trend is far from true in Russia, where more than 15.1 million users visit LiveJournal every month. This figure is more than half of the site's total traffic.

Twitter

Twitter is another classic social media site that works well in Russia. While it doesn't get as many unique monthly visitors as the other services on this list (about 7.7 million monthly visitors), it does boast a following of every user. So while Twitter may not be a mainstay for most Russian social media users, those who choose to use it do so on a large scale.

Rutube and YouTube

Rutube is essentially Russia's answer to YouTube - a social media platform focused on video sharing for content of all types. Although the service hasn't reached the same reach as YouTube, it has collected a lot of content from a variety of users.

Rutube hosts both licensed content and user uploads. The vast majority of downloads are in Russian. This high percentage Russian content makes the platform an incredibly valuable resource for those trying to learn the language.

Instagram

The first social media platform on this list, Instagram, has become extremely popular in the past few years, and its popularity in Russia is no exception. Instagram is quickly moving up the rankings, and today has 12.3 million monthly users (of which 77% are young women).

This shift in popularity is largely due to the crossover between Instagram and other platforms where users can use great photo editing tools. This allows you to enhance and capture a photo and then post it on both Instagram and other popular social media sites.

While Instagram's core features continue to be easy to access and use, there are several options for tools and third party applications, which most users don’t even know about. It is expected that this platform will soon top the popularity ratings of social networks in most countries.

Concluding this review, it is worth noting that the success of such unique social networks as VK and OK in Russia and neighboring countries may surprise those who are accustomed to Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, which have a complete monopoly in the world.

There is definitely a whole series Sites that target a specific user base, whether geographically (as in these examples) or based on demographics (age of users), benefit from sites that target a specific user base.

Brand Analytics presented regular research data active audience social networks in Russia, winter 2015-2016.

The study provides data on the audience, age, gender and regional distribution of authors of social networks in Russia and includes data on the most popular authors and groups for each social network.

The main focus of the study is on the active (writing) audience, since Brand Analytics studies social networks as a means of public communication and their influence on the formation of public opinion.

Social media activity

One of the key indicators of the “vital activity” of a social network is the number of “speaking” users who openly express their position through public messages on social media. There were about 37 million such active authors in Russia in December 2015; they generated 588 million messages per month. Active authors creating public content make social networks a relevant indicator of public sentiment, allowing one to catch “living” social problems at the very beginning of the formation of significant trends.

In terms of the number of Russian authors writing, VKontakte is in the lead - 18.8 million unique authors. Instagram, which is next in second place, has incredible growth rates; in December, 10.6 million authors were recorded on this network, almost 5 times more than in the spring of 2015. Third place is Twitter - the number of active authors here continues to decline; just over 1 million people.

When it comes to the number of messages posted on social media every day, there is no such drastic change. In first place, as before, is Vkontakte, second is Twitter, then Instagram and Facebook.

Twitter traditionally leads in terms of engagement, although the average number of messages has become slightly lower in winter period- per active author in this network there are an average of 90 messages per month. Second place - LiveJournal - on average, 49 messages per author, third - Facebook - 39 messages per author. VKontakte and Odnoklassniki are very close in this indicator - 15 and 14 messages per author, respectively.

Social media audience

According to TNS, the monthly audience of most social networks has decreased slightly, but there are also sources that have shown growth. Thus, the VKontakte audience stood at 46.6 million people, second place went to Odnoklassniki (31.5 million people). The Facebook audience in December 2015 amounted to 21.7 million people, closely followed by “My World” - 16.6 million people and “Live Journal”, with an audience of 15.2 million people. By December 2015, the Instagram audience increased by 2 million people. and amounted to 12.3 million people. The Twitter audience remained virtually unchanged and equaled 7.7 million people.

Statistics for Russia for each social network

The monthly audience is 46.6 million people, 40% of whom (18.8 million) are publicly active.

As for the age structure of VKontakte authors, one can note an increase in the number of authors 25-34 years old, their share was 32.1%, a slightly higher share of authors aged 18-24 years old - 32.3%, authors under 18 years old - 24%, Only 11.6% of active authors are over 35 years old.

The geographic distribution of VKontakte authors is smoothly redistributed towards more uniform regional penetration - in first place is St. Petersburg with a network penetration level of 31.7%, in second place is Moscow with 23% of the registered population, then the Murmansk and Kaliningrad regions and Sevastopol - 19 .4%, 19.3% and 18.8% of population activity, respectively.

The monthly Instagram audience in November 2015 was 12.3 million people, and the number of active authors was 10.7 million people.

Instagram remains the most feminine of all social networks in Russia; in the winter of 2015-16, 77.1% of active authors were representatives of the fair sex.

The penetration level on Instagram has remained virtually unchanged - they are still in the lead Leningrad region- 38% of the population, Moscow - 22.3% of the population and Sakhalin region - 17.2%.

In the age structure of Facebook, the categories from 25 to 34 years old and 35-44 years old are still leading - their share was 35.3% and 32.6%, respectively. 6.1% of authors are under 24 years old, and a total of 26.1% of authors are over 44.

It is worth noting that Facebook remains a unique social network in the Russian Federation both in terms of the age structure of its authors - more than 65% of whom are aged 25-44 years, and in terms of public content - it is a network focused primarily on business contacts and businesses.

The gender distribution of the Russian-speaking part of Facebook continues to shift towards the weaker sex (58% of authors).

The geographical cross-section demonstrates stability - most regions retained their positions: Moscow - 6.4% of the population, Altai - 3.75%, Yaroslavl region - 3.2%.

Odnoklassniki, as before, remains primarily a platform for interpersonal communication. The network's monthly audience is 31.5 million people, while only 1.1 million authors are publicly active in groups.

In Odnoklassniki, as before, the bulk of active authors are in age group 24-34 years old - 26.6%. Almost equal shares fall on the groups 35-44 and 55 and older - 20.7% and 20.9%, respectively. There are only 15.8% of active authors under 24 years old.

In November 2015, the Twitter audience was 7.7 million people, and the number of active authors was 1 million people.

On Twitter, the share of men among authors continues to grow; in December 2015, the share was already 51.6%. A year ago, in December 2014, men on Twitter were 45.6%, and in the spring of 2015 - already 50.6%.

In terms of Twitter penetration, the leadership remained with St. Petersburg - 2.1%. Almost the same penetration was recorded in Moscow - 2% of the population. The third place was taken by the Novosibirsk region, penetration there was 1%.

The network's monthly audience decreased by 10 million people and amounted to 16.6 million, and the number of active authors was 830 thousand people.

The gender structure of My World has remained virtually unchanged, 41.8% men and 58.2% women.

LiveJournal remains a platform for those who like to “read, not talk”: out of a monthly audience of 15 million, only 111 thousand authors are active.

The age structure of LiveJournal is stable, the largest share of authors falls in the groups of 18-24 years old - 37.2% and 25-34 years old - 35.8%.

Comparison of socio-demographic characteristics of authors

Over the past six months, social media has managed to mature, the proportion of authors under 18 years of age has decreased, authors aged 18-24 and 25-24 years predominate in LiveJournal and VKontakte, in other networks - authors aged 25-34 and 35-44 years old.

For Twitter and Instagram, there is no data on the age of active authors.

Trends and Forecasts

There is a significant increase in the activity of the Russian segment of Instagram. Moreover, most of the authors of this social network are active users of other social media - the share of cross-posting from Instagram to other social networks exceeds 50% of messages.

The Russian part of Facebook continues to grow. Moreover, this growth is observed primarily in the field of business contacts and business. Facebook's share in analyzing business topics often accounts for more than 30% of the total volume of social media data on the topic.

The active growth of sites with reviews continues - both in the number of new reviews and in traffic.

The Russian part of Twitter is slowly losing activity. At the same time, the activity of spam bots on Twitter is also decreasing, but nevertheless it still accounts for more than 30% of the flow.

Basic research terms:

Message - any open (public) post - in status, on the wall, in groups, comments, etc. Messages in personal correspondence or in the “friends only” mode are not taken into account.

Audience - the number of people who visited the site at least once a month.

Odnoklassniki project's response to Brand Analytics research

Last week, Brand Analytics released a study on the audience of social networks in Russia. Unfortunately, this is not the first study that has been published on behalf of the agency. According to our observations, report data is often used by brand managers and SMM specialists for work and strategic planning. We not only disagree with the results of the study, but we are also forced to report that the numbers and data collection methods are incorrect. We would not like our partners and colleagues to be misled by false information. We took the amazing BA methodology as a basis and calculated real data. We share them with you.

In December 2015, in Russia, Odnoklassniki registered 24 million “authors” according to Brand Analytics terminology, compared to the 1 million they mention in their study. The Jewish Autonomous Region, which is in first place on BA's list, is actually in 7th place from the bottom.

• Krasnodar region
• Samara region
• Khabarovsk region
• Moscow (as a city)
• Sverdlovsk region
• St. Petersburg (as a city)
• Primorsky Krai
• Voronezh region
• Saratov region
• Irkutsk region.

And here is the top region by absolute number of authors, in which Moscow is expected to be in first place:

• Moscow
• Krasnodar region
• Sverdlovsk region
• Saint Petersburg
• Samara region
• Rostov region
• Stavropol region
• Novosibirsk region
• Saratov region
• Irkutsk region.

Last year, based on the results of a similar Brand Analytics study, we decided to open the data and provided expanded access to the API for more correct data processing. Unfortunately, this did not affect the relevance of the study.

WITH today We are officially closing Brand Analytics' access to our API and prohibiting the use of grabbers.

If your company is engaged in data analysis and processing, you can get advanced access to the API by writing a request to [email protected] with the theme "Analytics".

Comment Brand Analytics

Brand Analytics is in dialogue with representatives of all major social networks, seeing its mission in the further development of measurements of the social media market, in the development of technological cooperation to solve the stated problem. The level of discussion of recent data once again proves that we are only at the beginning of this path. We appeal to all market participants with an open proposal to discuss mutual steps in this direction and will continue to invest our own resources in the development of research.

A little more about the figures for Odnoklassniki (OK). The study is based solely on data from 100 thousand OK groups. An explanation about the use of data only by groups is given in all relevant places in the presentation - next to the tables and diagrams. This decision is due to the fact that, unlike the APIs of other social networks Mail.ru Group that we use, the Odnoklassniki API provides data only for groups and does not provide data outside of groups.

Despite the insufficient completeness of the data, even such figures, assessment of the social demographic, activity and geography of OK authors in a situation of lack of information on this social network are important for the market - the target audience of many brands is concentrated in Odnoklassniki.

Incorrect interpretation of the presented data on geography by the OK authors in a number of discussions of the research results also requires comment. The figures for the number of authors in groups and penetration in regions are sorted precisely by the second metric - by the penetration of authors in the region, normalized to the number of population of the region. Correct reading of the presented data eliminates questions about the activity of OK users in the regions.

In conclusion, let us once again note the usefulness and importance of the current discussion for further development measurements of the social media segment. We are confident that our partners from OK will be able to find the right organizational and technical solution, in order to expand the representation of data on one of the main Russian social networks in the near future.

The Internet and everything connected with it today is wildly popular among all segments of the population, regardless of age, gender and status. Social networks are best way communicate with friends and family, as well as to keep up with the latest news and always be aware of the latest incidents.

The variety of social networks is quite huge and there is something for every person. best option, ideally suited according to all criteria, from the interface to the available menus and options. There is even a rating of social networks 2017, which contains the best social networks, according to the opinion of the world, humanity. The data to create such a rating is collected according to statistics. The total number of visitors and actions on a social network are the main criteria for moving up the rankings. The number of registrants also plays a role. If we consider the ranking of social networks in the world , then it will look like this:

• In fifth place in the world ranking of social networks is a network such as VKontakte. Marvelous? If it were not for the departure of the social network LinkedIn from the Russian Federation, the latter would have had a larger audience. At the same time, correct actions VKontakte's leadership in the South American market allowed us to gain enough new audiences to enter the world's top 5 social networks.

Rating of social networks in Russia 2017

World ranking is total number choice of people all over the planet. The top five may vary significantly in each country because people do not always have the same preferences. For example, the popularity rating of social networks in Russia 2017 will look like this:

“Chief editor of the GetGoodRank blog, web analyst, blogger.
It is important to understand which social networks are the most popular and for what purpose users visit them in order to effectively optimize your SMM strategy.”

Social media has become a powerful marketing tool to work with target audience. Recent changes in social networks are turning them into full-fledged trading platforms, and social networks themselves have become closed systems: a marketer can find a user, profitably demonstrate a product or service, and sell it right there.

The Buffer blog has published 5 important studies that will help you profitably change your marketing strategy.

1. Facebook is 2 times more popular than the next social network in the ranking

79% adults active users Internet users are registered on Facebook, while only 32% are on Instagram.

The study was conducted with the participation of 1520 users over 18 years of age. The results showed that Facebook remains the most popular social network. 79% of study participants actively use Facebook, while only 32% use Instagram, 29% constantly use LinkedIn, 24% use Twitter (contrary to the general belief about the popularity of this social network).

It is noteworthy that the number of users on Instagram has increased significantly over the past few years (from 13% to 32%). Pinterest's popularity has also skyrocketed (up 31%). The study also found that engagement Facebook users significantly higher than in other social networks. 76% of users open Facebook several times a day, while 22% of users open the social network every day.

Only 51% of users open Instagram every day.

Conclusion #1: Facebook remains the #1 social network for marketers. Latest Updates Facebook's ranking algorithm gives priority to video content. Instagram is the second most popular social network with high prospects.

2. A third of Instagram users engage in surveillance

Getting information about users is the primary reason for registering on a photo social network. The University of Alabama studied the motives that guide users when registering on Instagram.

The following table shows Instagram usage statistics on a 5-point scale, where:

• 1 = never use for this purpose
• 2 = very rarely used for this purpose
• 3 = sometimes I use it for this purpose
• 4 = often used for this purpose
• 5 = I always use it for this purpose

The respondents' answers were classified into 4 groups:

• surveillance- people use Instagram to keep up with other people's affairs or get information about people (who is doing what on certain moment). They monitor both close people and strangers;
• documentation of life events- Instagram becomes a virtual photo album key points users' lives;
• social popularity- users register on Instagram to be trendy or gain popularity among loved ones, emphasize their own importance, and attract other users to their lives;
• creativity- many people use Instagram to show their creativity and ability to get the most out of ordinary photography.

36% of users register on Instagram to follow someone and keep up to date with brand news.

10% of users register on Instagram to show the highlights of their lives.

8% of users want to stay trendy, so they use Insta.

6% show their photo abilities.

40% of users go to Instagram for different purposes and do not belong to any of the selected groups.

The study revealed:

Conclusion #3: publishing relevant news will attract the attention of the audience, and will also present the community, page, profile as an authoritative source of information.

4. Social media increases user loyalty

Online brand activity increases user loyalty and trust, and also increases the likelihood of recommending a product or service to other users.

42% of companies said their social media budget was lately increased, while only 7% of marketers report that they have reduced spending on social marketing. Today, there is not enough research into how social media and online brand activity determines users’ attitudes towards the company.

A small study of the American market found that users who interact with their favorite brands online have more stable “relationships” with companies than users who do not follow brands online.

Conclusion #4: Today it is important to be online. Public page brand or group convinces the user of the reality of the company, reduces fears and concerns, and shows how the brand interacts with users.

5. Three types of gamification that increase user engagement

Challenge, curiosity, fantasies generate likes, reposts, and comments on Facebook. To attract audience attention and increase engagement on Facebook, gamification is becoming one of the best tools.

The study shows how gamification elements increase user activity on Facebook.

Call

How many differences do you see in the photo? Or: we know that everyone wants to be the first to comment on a post, but now we want to see who will be the last! Let's start, pay attention, let's write!

Remember that the task should be easy, difficult puzzles to solve show low engagement.

Curiosity

Forget canned fruit for Thanksgiving! We'll talk about delicious recipe fruit jam that you can make in 5 minutes from what you have in the refrigerator! Or: choosing a gift for a guy is quite a task! We have collected best ideas for gifts for those who have everything!

Interesting fact, such posts are collected large number likes, reposts and comments only if the post itself does not contain a link to an external site. If a link is published in a post, the user simply leaves the discussion and goes to the site.

Fantasies

What would you use your $7,500 Walmart coupon for?

This is very useful posts, because they make users think about what they need to buy, what they want. Often such thoughts and fantasies are converted into real actions.

Conclusion #5: not every post needs to sell, attract and expect a specific action from the user. Experiments with the most effective posts will show you what works best with your target audience.