March 15th, 2007
Social network traffic up 11.5 percent; MySpace still dominates
According to Hitwise, the US market share of Internet traffic to the top 20 social networking sites grew by 11.5 percent from January to February 2007, to account for 6.5 percent of all Internet traffic in February 2007. Perhaps unsurprisingly, MySpace is still the heavyweight in a market made up of featherweights, with an 80% share. Facebook is MySpace's closest challenger with 10% of the market.
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Market Share of US Internet Visits to Top 20 Social Networking Sites
February 2007* |
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| Rank | Name | Domain | Market Share |
| 1 | MySpace | www.myspace.com | 80.74% |
| 2 | www.facebook.com | 10.32% | |
| 3 | Bebo | www.bebo.com | 1.18% |
| 4 | BlackPlanet.com | www.blackplanet.com | 0.88% |
| 5 | Xanga | www.xanga.com | 0.87% |
| 6 | iMeem | www.imeem.com | 0.73% |
| 7 | Yahoo! 360 | 360.yahoo.com | 0.72% |
| 8 | Classmates | www.classmates.com | 0.72% |
| 9 | hi5 | www.hi5.com | 0.69% |
| 10 | Tagged | www.tagged.com | 0.67% |
| 11 | LiveJournal | www.livejournal.com | 0.49% |
| 12 | Gaiaonline.com | www.gaiaonline.com | 0.48% |
| 13 | Friendster | www.friendster.com | 0.34% |
| 14 | Orkut | www.orkut.com | 0.26% |
| 15 | Live Spaces | spaces.live.com | 0.18% |
| 16 | HoverSpot | www.hoverspot.com | 0.18% |
| 17 | Buzznet | www.buzznet.com | 0.18% |
| 18 | Sconex | www.sconex.com | 0.14% |
| 19 | MiGente.com | www.migente.com | 0.11% |
| 20 | myYearbook | www.myyearbook.com | 0.11% |
| Note - data is based on custom category of 20 of the leading social networking websites ranked by market share of visits, which is the percentage of traffic to the site, based on Hitwise sample of 10 million US Internet users. The percentages represent the market share of visits among the websites within the custom category. | |||
| Source: Hitwise | |||
Whilst it's hard to envisage anybody stealing MySpace's crown, Friendster, which pre-MySpace was dominant, now has a measly 0.34% share — reminding us that MySpace's pole position is theirs to lose.
The fastest movers and shakers were both social networking sites that specialize in building communities around music and other media — Buzznet (up 148.4%) and iMeem (up 145.7%). Other fast growing sites include Hoverspot (up 19.6%) and Bebo (up 17.8%), which both compete more directly with MySpace.
Related post: Social network ad spending in the US could top $2 billion by 2010
Steve O'Hear is a London-based consultant, educator, and journalist, focussing on the Internet and all aspects of digital technology. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
