American Social Media Habits

I've been drawn to the recently launched Nielson Quarterly Social Media Report courtesy of an article in by Brian Solis in Fast Company magazine. And it makes for fascinating reading. The key findings from the research are:

1. Social networks and blogs continue to dominate Americans’ time online, now accounting for nearly a quarter of total time spent on the Internet
2. Social media has grown rapidly – today nearly 4 in 5 active Internet users visit social networks and blogs
3. Americans spend more time on Facebook than they do on any other U.S. website
4. Close to 40 percent of social media users access social media content from their mobile phone
5. Social networking apps are the third most-used among U.S. smartphone owners
6. Internet users over the age of 55 are driving the growth of social network-ing through the Mobile Internet
7. Although a larger number of women view online video on social networks and blogs, men are the heaviest online video users overall streaming more videos and watching them longer
8. 70 percent of active online adult social networkers shop online
9. 12 percent more likely than the average adult Internet user
10. 53 percent of active adult social networkers follow a brand, while 32 percent follow a celebrity
11. Across a snapshot of 10 major global markets, social networks and blogs reach over three-quarters of active Internet users
12. Tumblr is an emerging player in social media, nearly tripling its audience from a year ago

One statistic that surprised me (and thank you to @drewb) for pointing this out, was the fact that Internet users in the U.K. viewed 229.6 million pages on Tumblr, the second most page views on any social network or blog in the country after Facebook (20.2 billion page views). But for overall insight into the fast growing social media habits of the American people, do take a look at the report. If only for the fact that it's a barometer to what will likely happen in other parts of the world.