Pretty much most people have, or have had, a Facebook page, to catch up with old friends, classmates, or just to keep in touch with Aunt Sophie who lives on the other side of the country. But as much as it may not directly affect us, the parents or 30+ club, social media sites live and die because of young people and how much they use it. Unfortunately, Facebook has started to become uncool.
According to the Piper Jaffray’s semi-annual “Taking Stock with Teens” report, Facebook saw a 10% decline among teen users since spring, and almost 20% since Fall 2012, making it only the second most important social media site to teens surveyed. Number 1? Twitter made a comeback from its second place spot in spring to number one with 26% of teens surveyed stating it’s the most important social media site. Not that Twitter can rest on its laurels, Facebook had 23% and Instagram, owned by Facebook, also had 23%, a 6% jump from spring.
Even though the Pew Research Center reported in May that teens complained about privacy issues and called Facebook a “social burden”, a quarter of teen social media users are on Twitter, 94 percent have Facebook profiles and 11 percent have Instagram accounts. Still, teens may have a Facebook but that doesn’t mean they are using them.