Facebook Users are Shifting Platforms
The truth is that no one is leaving social media per se - they're simply switching to different platforms. While the report declared that Facebook users have declined, another SNS site (Instagram) which is apparently owned by Facebook is on the rise. Compared to Facebook, however, Instagram’s audience reach is still somewhat lower than Facebook’s. On the brighter side, the survey by Edison's discovered that Instagram usage grew from 34 per cent in 2017 to 39 per cent at present.Ageing and Decline
CEO of online marketing firm MuteSix, Steve Weiss, begged to disagree. He said Facebook users are not abandoning the social network. But Facebook does have an ageing user base which can account for the decline. Weiss said:While the younger demographics may be shifting to Instagram and Snapchat, Facebook is also seeing increased gains from the 55+ segment.Per Edison’s report, the only users Facebook gained since 2017 were the 55+ age segment. Yuval Ben-Itzhak, CEO of SMM data tracker Socialbakers, said his company could not provide enough information in connection with Facebook user gains and losses. Ben-Itzhak said that Facebook reported an increase in the fourth quarter of last year. Twitter, on one hand, stopped reporting on users. This could imply a lack of user growth.
Facebook vs. Instagram
Drug Agency content strategist Ben Heiser concurs with Weiss in the Facebook versus Instagram user growth issue. He said:Everyone likes to take shots at Facebook usage being down as the end of social media as we know it, but social media is more of a media channel now than ever before.He added that Facebook has international influence and active users are simply moving to Facebook-owned Instagram. Because surveys tend to skew perception, the 15 million loss in Facebook users was simply a misunderstanding. Looking at real numbers, however, instead of survey results, Facebook's total user count is still at 1.52 billion daily active users. This was based on data gathered in Q4 last year. And there seemed to be an increase of 9 per cent year-over-year in its usage.
Does Facebook Still Deliver?
There is no clear answer to this question. It basically depends on your standpoint as a business or marketer. Or how you use the social media platform in the first place. In certain quarters, Facebook advertising still delivers to some extent. Weiss said that despite user decline, his ad agency was not severely affected. He was convinced of the conversion power of Facebook’s Stories ad product, which recently rolled out. He believed this will be a driving force in the world of online advertising. According to Weiss:With Facebook’s continued investment in analytics across all its platforms, we also expect to see advanced engagement metrics for Stories, which will ultimately boost bottom-line revenue for Facebook.
