Teens – you’ve got to love them – are the future of the world as we know it. Just like we had a hand in forming ‘our world,’ the class of 2014 will put their mark on society – good or bad. Never before has a generation completely grown up in the mobile wireless age as they have. From the time they were old enough to talk they had access to computers, laptops, tablets, mobile phones and access to all kinds of social media. Niche decided to survey 7,000 of the class of 2014 to find out their social habits based on 50 popular Apps and websites based on frequency of use…and the results may sadden, puzzle, or enlighten you about their habits.
Some of the statistics will not surprise many adults, as we discover that we use many of the same applications and websites. YouTube has the most “widespread” usage of all the applications – as we go from a generation of readers to viewers, they would much rather watch a video than read about it. Instagram has the most “engaged” users and Facebook still has the most “daily” users with 87-percent saying they still use the social media sensation – many hate the invasion of privacy, but it is still tops in the survey. It may surprise you that 45-percent say that they do not use Twitter, although it has shown rapid growth over the past two years – most likely because a lot of celebrities use it on a daily basis. It comes as no surprise that 92-percent do not use the popular Linkedin application as it is more for job hunting and an older age group.
One of the most popular uses of a smartphone is messaging, which is done multiple times a day – the old standby, SMS messaging using the onboard application is the most popular means to text. Snapchat is used multiple times a day and 72-percent use Facebook messenger at some point during the day.
Watching videos is right up there with texting and as we mentioned earlier, YouTube, with 97-percent usage throughout the day is number one, although Netflix holds a solid second place at 71-percent. Hulu has only a 25-percent usage and Amazon Prime is only at 16-percent usage for the day…maybe their new Amazon Fire Phone will change all of that, yeah! Music is another area that was surprising – Pandora, at 77-percent, ranked number one in usage by teens. Spotify and iHeartRadio both tied at 31-percent daily usage. While Apple’s iTunes was a surprise in second place at 71-percent – possibly because of the popularity of Android devices. Pandora surprised me because of its lack of choosing particular songs or creating a playlist, although their music library is awesome.
It is amazing how fast and how much the teens of today have embraced the mobile craze, and while they may be somewhat unpredictable and use the App Du Jour, they are actually quite mainstream in their App usage. They use applications that people their age would be interested in – no big news Apps and no job type Apps – only messaging, video, and music seem to interest them at that age…there will be time enough for the others as they grow older. Please hit us up on our Google+ Page and let us know what type of Apps you use the most…as always, we would love to hear from you.
