Teens’ Top 5 social media picks: DIY survey

Nothing formal and scientific, but a quick up-to-the-minute snapshot: To get a handle on current social media use by teens and young adults, Silicon Valley investor Gary Tan blogged, he conducted a little survey with DIY market research startup Survata. He wrote that he asked just under 546 13-to-18-year-olds and 492 19-to-25-year-olds what social media services they use regularly. What he found was that, across the board, “usage levels were higher” among teens than young adults, but for both groups, the Top 5 services are Tumblr (61% for people 13-18; 57% for people 19-25), Facebook (55%; 52%), Twitter (22%; 17%), Instagram (21%; 11%), and Snapchat (13%; 4%). “Respondents were slightly female skewed (60% vs. 40% dudes) … and appeared on blogs and content providers like Hyperink,” Tan wrote, adding that “perhaps the most heartening observation from the Snapchat/Instagram phenomenon is that new social behaviors can and will happen” (see my post this week about Snapchat and Poke). Interesting that – though FB, Twitter, and Tumblr all have mobile apps, Nos. 4 and 5 are native apps. Mobile is huge now (as if parents didn’t know!).