send: Thursday, January 29, 2009

276% Growth in 35-54 Year Old Users on Facebook

Not to beat a dead horse (sorry! no horses were harmed), but I saw this link come through and it is really interesting. You can download an excel spreadsheet that includes 2009 Facebook Demographics, Stats and Trends.

View 2009 Facebook Demographics

Lots of old folks joining Facebook, are you going to find a new place to go?

Read the articles. Watch the videos.

It won't take that long.


You'll do better on the quiz.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

The growing population of age 35-54 groups would expand the facebook community to all variety of users. As the article itself mentions, the demographic would mean a different arrays of advertisements that the website can host such as the alcohol commercial. The increasing population of the 35-54 group would expand facebook's infuence onto web users and especially organizations and corporations (which the 35-54 age group usually belongs to) but I think it is even harder to have a niche with expanding demographics and eventually, one group would be forced out the target market which might either be the students or the older group.

ebhariton said...

Now this might be a stupid question, but don't they have programs that can distinguish personality profiles for users and apply advertisements to match their interests? If they had this "program," then there wouldn't be a problem with niche advertising. With all the money invested into Facebook, they should be able to afford programs that have advertisements for adults featuring alcohol and ones for kids featuring Coka Cola and Red Bull.

ebhariton said...

Now this might be a stupid question, but don't they have programs that can distinguish personality profiles for users and apply advertisements to match their interests? If they had this "program," then there wouldn't be a problem with niche advertising. With all the money invested into Facebook, they should be able to afford programs that have advertisements for adults featuring alcohol and ones for kids featuring Coka Cola and Red Bull.

Anonymous said...

The expansion of the older demographics involvment on Facebook doesn't deter me from using it, but I do personally find it rather odd when one of my Mom's friends writes on my wall to check in. I don't think the change in demographics makes it likely that college age students will move somewhere else, unless the site is unable to support the continued expansion, or raise enough revenue through advertisements to maintain it.

Scott said...

Eli-Yes there are programs that do this and they can target their ads. Think Digital, Act Analog.

Anonymous said...

I dont agree with the older demographics on Facebook...I dont agree with the younger demographics either. I personally think that although Facebook is a great networking tool and its a great new way to meet people, I dont think its appropriate for the older or younger demographic. I think its weird that my friends parents have Facebook and I think its also weird that my friends 10 year old siblings have Facebook. I think when I graduate college I will deactivate my account.

Anonymous said...

Yes, this will certainly have an impact on the material that I put on my Facebook page. There was a time when the "social networking" aspect of Facebook was dedicated almost solely to flirting and looking at ridiculous, funny or outright embarrassing party pictures.

It's clear that these purposes were what the original core group of users liked most about. Now it is getting bogged down with too many things that Facebook has lost its identity. The paranoia being creating by "old people" joining the Facebook community is forcing us to be extremely careful now of the pictures and content we host on our personal pages. Great! Now I gotta worry that my Grandma is gonna see me sloppily groping that hot undergrad at a Heaven and Hell costume party?

And no I don't want to Join Your Group, Become a Zombie, or Aid Your Cause -- stop spamming me!

I want a site that brings it back to the basics: flippin' through pics on a Sunday afternoon from Saturday night's party just to see those ridiculous drunken videos, embarrassing photos and -- who knows? -- maybe some possible nipple slips.

Anonymous said...

I think this might not be such a good thing for facebook's core users(the college community)but it might benefit facebook in that an older base of users might help generate more revenue. I also think that as years go by Facebook will figure out a way to extract revenue from the many college graduates who currently use the social networking site.

Anonymous said...

Although Facebook has emerged as the “most successful” social networking site I am tentative to say that it is definitely going to be what people are using in 7-odd years when they play on the internet. As we think back in time to the past social networking websites, Friendster, Xanga, all were “ditched” for a newer cooler cleaner versions of very similar websites. I simply don’t know if people are still going to be attracted to Facebook in the future because of the way perceptions change. There is a chance that the massive increase among “older” people on Facebook could effectively alienate college age people from a place they once felt so comfortable in. Also, 35-54 year olds spend far less time on the internet than college age Facebook users do so while the older segment may be joining I am unsure of whether they will be nearly as active.

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