People are sharing digital content more than ever, with 93% of respondents to the “Content Fitness Test Report,” a recent study from PAN Communications, claiming that they share content with their network.
The study consists of data from the responses of a survey sent to more than 1,000 marketing professionals, all of whom donned their consumer hats when responding. According to the study, while 50% of respondents still seek news and information from online news sites, this is 14% less than in 2012. This was followed by Twitter, cited by nearly a quarter of respondents, and blogs (15%). Additionally, although 82% of users consume information and news on their laptops, 85% do so on their mobile devices—driving up the value of responsive design.
The amount of users seeking content on Twitter rose 3% from 2012 to 2013 to 24%, while blogs rose from 6% to 15% in that same time frame.
Though the shift toward using social media and other non-traditional outlets for news and information may seem slow, communication via social media is becoming increasingly commonplace. In fact, 81% of consumers now use Facebook to communicate within network. SMS comes second for communication, with nearly 68% of respondents citing it; LinkedIn and Twitter round out the top four communication tools at 70% and 67%, respectively. Of the 93% of consumers sharing content across these platforms, only 76% feel that content is directly relevant to them or their network.
With such a high rate of sharing, marketers who produce shareable content stand to gain as the paradigm shifts further toward using these non-traditional platforms as information sources.
