Facebook Nearing the Finish Line

The October Compete.com and unemployment data are now in and guess what? Many of the findings in our previous blog entries regarding Facebook trends have been solidified even further.

The relationship previously identified between Facebook traffic and the unemployment rate has been only strengthened with the inclusion of the October data. As Figure 1 below shows, this month’s increase in the unemployment rate to 10.2% coincides with a similar increase in Facebook unique visitor counts. In fact, the correlation between these two metrics now stands at a whopping 98.2%. The relationship simply cannot be denied during this time. It is quite amazing.

Figure 1

By viewing Figure 2 below we can easily see that with the incorporation of the new October data, Facebook will, without question, actually surpass Google in term of visits by the end of the year (as predicted in our previous blog entry). And, shockingly they may even surpass Google regarding unique visitors even sooner than we could imagine (see Figure 3).

Figure 2

Figure 3

However, one may ask did this major increase in Facebook traffic for the month of October negatively impact some of the other engagement metrics like pages viewed and time spent on site? The answer is an astounding NO. See Figures 4 & 5 below. In fact, October represents some of the most significant jumps in these engagement metrics seen in some time.

Figure 4

Figure 5

Versus YouTube, we see Facebook pulling away at an even more dramatic rate in terms of engagement (Figure 6). They appear to be leaving YouTube in the dust.

Figure 6

There is no question that Facebook is on a roll. Please look for our next blog entry titled “And the Winner is…Facebook.”

Perry & Rhonda

First Google, Now YouTube

In case you did not read all of my last blog entry titled "Has Facebook Been Lucky" you probably missed the fact that Facebook has now overtaken YouTube on a key engagement metric -- average time spent per visit.

I realize both sites are different in terms of content and purpose but it is still an important event -- showing us that that Facebook has the ability to draw us into its grip for longer and longer periods of time per visit. YouTube, on the other hand, has been actually slipping regarding this metric over the past 12 months (see Figure 1).

Figure 1 - Average Stay per Visit, Facebook (blue) vs YouTube (green)

In addition, YouTube has also been losing the battle to Facebook in terms of attracting / growing its customer base. Note the unique visitor trend shown below in Figure 2. Facebook has surpassed YouTube as of February of this year.

Figure 2 - Unique Visitor Counts, Facebook (blue) vs YouTube (green)

And, in terms of raw number of visits by month, forget it. Facebook is leaving YouTube in its dust as we can clearly see in Figure 3.

Figure 3 - Visit Counts, Facebook (blue) vs YouTube (green)

Could it be that Facebook is rendering YouTube to be less valuable than it once was? After all, not only can we post our own videos and share with others on Facebook, we can do so much more!

Perry