I have been involved in social media for over 8 years and it is amazing to see the transformation of the world wide web, and how all of the more well known social networks have thrived, and grown dramatically in the 21st century.
This blog is slightly different to what I have done in the past, as I will be sharing facts and images from the latest infographic that I have created. You can see this in full here however, keep reading for a brief overview of each social network.
Facebook, otherwise known as “The Social Network” is the first platform to have over 1 billion users, an award winning film (171 awards to be exact) and the first billionaire founder. Regardless of it’s long time rivals; Twitter and LinkedIn, Facebook is still as popular, and profitable as ever. See below for some great Facebook Statistics.
At the tender age of 9, Twitter is a favourite amongst businesses and individuals alike (myself included). With close to 4,000 employees, Twitter was originally used for Odeo staff before being introduced to the internet in July, 2006.
Google+
Google+ was not Google’s first, second or even third punt at creating a social network. Fourth time lucky for Google, as it’s successful network that is just 4 and a half years old, has a film loosely based on working at Google, with references to Google+ called “The Internship”.
LinkedIn, created in 2002 makes most of its revenue from selling access to information about it users to recruiters. LinkedIn filed for an IPO in January 2013 and is available in 24 languages.
Instagram rapidly grew in popularity with over 100 million active users by April 2012 (18 months after launch). Instagram was bought by Facebook in 2012 for a record 1 billion acquisition and has flourished ever since.
The newest social network on this list, Pinterest was launched in March 2010. Pinterest is managed by Cold Brew Labs and funded by a small group of entrepreneurs and investors.
Who to watch out for
As always, there are social networks that are making a name for themselves. Ello was launched on March 18th, 2014 as a “new breed” of social networks as it does not sell user data, show advertisements or enforce a real-name policy. Ello raised $5.5 million in capital after reorganising in October 2014 and is dubbed the “network for creators”.
See the full infographic here.
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Invaluable. Really useful. Thank you so much!