Many marketing managers and business owners are scratching their heads, wondering if they can just wait until this "social media thing" flames out. But we are witnessing a revolution in the way consumers interact with brands—and with each other—and that genie isn't going back into the bottle.

Think about it:

  • 96% of Gen Y (aka Millennials) use social networks and in 2010, they outnumbered the Baby Boomers.
  • For those under 40 years old, 70% of what they read was written by someone they know. (Forrester Research)
  • If Facebook were a country, it would be the 3rd largest in the world at 845 million users.
  • And Facebook is not just for "kids"—the fastest growing demographic is 55+. (Sept. 2010 data)
  • Print media is in free-fall, with 24 out of the top 25 daily newspapers posting declines in circulation and layoffs. From 2008 to today, more than 160 papers have closed and there were more than 32,000 layoffs and buyouts. (PaperCuts.com)
  • Online news sources have gained ad dollars and readership; they also enlist "citizen reporters" to contribute breaking news. Nielsen Online reports newspaper websites were up 10.5% in Q1 2009; Q1 2010 saw an even bigger jump of 74.4 million unique monthly visitors.
  • Aggregators Google News (100 million unique monthly viewers) and Yahoo News (138 million) have surpassed CNN (66 million) and NY Times (92 million) as news sources. (comScore, May 2010)
  • The mobility of content via smartphones is profoundly changing the way we consume media and interact with social networks. Facebook reports mobile usage grew from 30 million in April 2009 to more than 100 million by February 2010.
  • Nielsen reports that time spent on social media sites globally rose 82% in 2009.
  • Twitter has passed the 2 billion tweets per month mark.
  • SMS texting raised $5 million in donations for Haiti in 24 hours.

What does it all mean?

The old model of top-down, one-way, push messaging has reversed itself to opt-in, in-bound, listening-based communications and marketing. Public relations has always been about influencing the influencers, leading to third-party endorsement and word-of-mouth buzz. But who those influencers are, and how we engage them, is a whole new world. That world is talking about your brand—are you listening?

For more statistics, here are two excellent overviews of the new media environment:

Social Media Revolution

Did You Know 4.0