Facebook Traffic Increases 194% in September

According to recent figures released by Experian Hitwise, the number of visits to Facebook in September increased nearly threefold from a year ago.

Facebook attracted 58.59 percent of all visits to social networking sites in the U.S. during September, according to Experian Hitwise, which was the largest share of the 155 social networking sites the company tracked. This was up from 55.15 percent in August and up from 19.94 percent in September 2008. Visits to Facebook increased 194 percent year-over-year, according to the company.

MySpace was second on the list with 30.26 percent of U.S. visits to social networking sites in September, down from 33.00 percent in August and down even further from 66.84 percent in September last year. Visits to MySpace declined 55 percent year-over-year.

Tagged was third with 2.38 percent of U.S. social networking traffic in September, up slightly from 2.36 percent in August and up from 1.62 percent in September 2008. Visits to Tagged increased 47 percent year-over-year.

Twitter was in fourth place with 1.84 percent of social networking traffic in the U.S., down from 1.95 percent in the August but up from 0.15 percent in September last year. Visits to Twitter increased a whopping 1,170 percent year-over-year.

myYearbook was fifth with 1.05 percent of U.S. visits to social networking sites in September, down from 1.16 percent in August and down from 1.76 percent in the same month last year. Visits to myYearbook declined 40 percent year-over-year.

Though MySpace was second to Facebook in terms of visits, MySpace beat out Facebook in terms of time spent on its site.

The average U.S. time spent on MySpace was 25:56 in September, down from 29:37 in September 2008, or a year-over-year decline of 12 percent.

Tagged was second with an average time spent of 25:17, up from 23:31 in September last year, or a year-over-year increase of 8 percent.

Facebook saw an average time spent of 23:00 in September, up from 18:38 in the same month last year, or a year-over-year increase of 23 percent.

myYearbook was fourth with an average time spent of 18:07, down from 26:12 in September 2008, or a year-over-year decline of 31 percent.

Twitter experienced an average time spent of 15:52, down from 36:27 in the same month last year, or a year-over-year decline of 56 percent.

Experian Hitwise also notes that older users are increasing their presence on these social networking sites, especially Facebook and MySpace. Overall, visits to social networking sites from users in the U.S. who are 55 and older have increased 77 percent year-over-year, while visits from users 18 to 24 have declined 33 percent during the same time period.

Source:

http://www.hitwise.com/us/press-center/press-releases/social-networking-sept-09/