Facebook attracts 60% of all US social networking traffic
Facebook now accounts for almost 60% of all social networking traffic in the US, according to new research by Hitwise.
The popular site increased its audience share by a substantial 194% year on year in September, while its competitor MySpace slumped to just 30% of overall social network visits, which is less than half of the 67% share it claimed in 2008.
Facebook also enjoyed audience growth of 3% month on month from August to September, compared to MySpace’s 3% drop over the same period.
However, the research found that users spend more time on MySpace than on Facebook – an average of 26 minutes a month compared to Facebook’s 23 minutes.
In terms of traffic share, the micro-blogging site Twitter only accounted for 1.8% in September despite an impressive increase in its share of visits, which are up by an incredible 1170% year on year.
However, Hitwise’s report doesn’t include access through third-party applications, such as TweetDeck, which are likely to account for a large portion of Twitter users.
Tagged received the third largest amount of visits in September, putting it just ahead of Twitter with a 2% share, while myYearbook slipped below Twitter with a 1% share.