Mobile social use climbs far faster than PC
Mobile social media use in France began to heat up in spring 2012 during the country’s presidential race. As politicians sought to gain advantages, especially on microblogs, they drew in more constituents, ultimately spurring greater social use on these newer platforms.
Social networks in France have since taken advantage of this increased mobile engagement, with Twitter and LinkedIn especially making significant strides. Between June 2011 and 2012, Twitter saw a 117% bump in mobile access in the country, according to data from comScore MobiLens. LinkedIn made an even bigger leap of 125% during the year.
The two social networks still remain far behind Facebook, which boasted 11.1 million mobile users in June. That’s more than seven times Twitter’s 1.5 million mobile users, while LinkedIn, with its niche audience of those connecting for work purposes, had only 442,000 mobile visitors. Growth suggests that these smaller networks are trying to capitalize on both their immaturity in the market and the rapid transition to smartphones and tablets already underway.
comScore also found in March that growth on all three social networks via the computer was far behind mobile. In particular, LinkedIn saw growth three times faster on mobile vs. the PC. Facebook’s growth disparity was even greater, but this also reflects Facebook’s pre-existing desktop ubiquity. Twitter notably had about half as many mobile visitors as those on the desktop.
eMarketer estimates that mobile social networks in France will grow by 50% once again in 2013, after a 107% gain in 2011 and 54% increase in 2012.
By 2014, one-quarter of France’s population will access social networks from their phones.
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