30 Social media marketing stats to satisfy the skeptics

Still not sure if social media marketing is the right play for your small business? We get it. Managing a social media strategy is definitely an investment: time, money, resources, you name it. 

But it’s worth it. If you want to press the hyper-growth button, social media is your best bet. It’s cheap, has a huge reach and is quickly proving to be a primary marketing channel for all brands, not just B2C. We know talk is cheap. As a social media marketing agency we’re always going to tout the power of a healthy social media strategy. If you’d rather look at the numbers, you’re in the right spot. We’ve compiled 30 social media marketing stats so you can make the call based on cold, hard data. 

High-level social media marketing stats

1. 90.4% of millennials, 77.5% of Gen X and 48.2% of Baby Boomers are on social media. (eMarketer)
   
   
2. About 3.5 billion people around the globe are active on social media – about half of the world’s population. (Emarsys)
   
   
3. Consumers spend up to 3 hours per day on social media sites. (Global Web Index) 
   
   
4. 54% of social media users use social media to research brands. (Global Web Index) 
    
5. 49% of consumers depend on influencer recommendations. (Digital Marketing Institute)
   

Facebook stats

1. Users 65 years and older are the fastest-growing group on Facebook. (Sprout Social) 
   
   
2. 41.3% of Facebook’s monthly active users come from Asia-Pacific (APAC), and only 10% come from the U.S. and Canada. (Facebook)
   
   
3. Facebook Live videos generate 3x longer watch times than videos that are no longer live. (Social Pilot)  
   
   
4. Facebook video ads have the lowest CPC with an average of $1.86. (Social Pilot)
   
   
5. Facebook accounts for 43.3% of all social networking site visits in the U.S., beating other platforms like Twitter (~24%) and Instagram. (Influencer Marketing Hub)

Twitter stats

1. 44% of U.S. 18-24-year-olds use Twitter. (Pew Research Center)
   
   
2. American Twitter users are more likely to be Democrats than the average American. (Hootsuite)
   
   
3. Tweets with a hashtag get 100% more engagement. (Social Media Today) 
   
   
4. In Q3 of 2019, Twitter had more than 145 million monetizable daily active users – a 17% YoY growth. (Hubspot)
   
   
5. People are 31% more likely to recall what they saw on Twitter vs. general online browsing. (Twitter) 

LinkedIn stats

1. As of 2019, the platform had 90 million senior-level influencers. Decision-makers were at 63 million and opinion leaders at 17 million. (Influencer Marketing Hub) 
   
   
2. Sponsored InMail has a 52% open rate on average. (Hootsuite)
   
   
3. LinkedIn makes up more than 50% of all social traffic to B2B websites and blogs. (Omnicore Agency)
   
   
4. 80% of B2B leads come through LinkedIn. (Business of Apps)
   
   
5. In 2019, more than 30 million companies were listed on LinkedIn. (Oberlo)

YouTube stats

1. If your target audience is composed of teenagers and young adults, YouTube will be crucial for your social media strategy. 81% of U.S. internet users aged between 15-25 are on YouTube. (Sprout Social)
   
   
2. YouTube is responsible for more than one-third of mobile internet traffic. (Statista)
   
   
3. YouTube is the second most-preferred platform for watching video on TV screens among 18-34 year-olds. (Hootsuite)
   
   
4. 78.8% of marketers consider YouTube to be the most effective platform for video marketing. (Oberlo)
   
   
5. 90% of people say they discover new brands or products on YouTube. (Think with Google)

TikTok stats

1. TikTok has the highest follower engagement rate per post compared to other social media networks. (Influencer Marketing Hub) 
   
   
2. TikTok is the number one downloaded app of 2020. (Hootsuite) 
   
   
3. If you’re interested in an influencer marketing strategy, TikTok will be your sweet-spot. 40 of the most popular creators on TikTok have over 10 million followers. (Business Insider) 
   
   
4. Due to COVID-19, TikTok got an average engagement increase of over 27%. (Convince and Convert)
   
   
5. TikTok users spend an average of 52 minutes per day on TikTok. (Oberlo)

There you have it: all the social media marketing stats you need to take the leap and start investing in a social strategy. We know it can be intimidating to start fresh and create a new marketing plan. What kind of resources will you need? What kind of time are you going to need to carve out each week to manage your business’s social media presence? Are you going to need to purchase new tech? 

Our advice: baby steps. 

Seriously, start with perfecting how your brand is displayed on each social media profile. Make sure the whole "About" section is filled out, make sure your profile and cover photos are high-quality and stunning. Start thinking about the kind of content you would share that would create interest and value for your audience. Heck, you can even plan it out on a calendar if you’re feeling ambitious. 

Just start. Trust us, in 6 months, you’ll be glad you did.