Two-Thirds of Americans Use Facebook, Only 5% Trust Its News

By Inspiringly

Two-thirds of U.S. adults have an account with Facebook and 74 percent of users visit the social media platform on a daily basis, according to data from surveys by Pew Research Center.

Only YouTube boasts higher percentage of social media users with 73 percent of respondents using the social video channel. About a third of Americans use Instagram, followed by social networks like Pinterest, Snapchat, LinkedIn, Twitter, and WhatsApp.

According to the survey, around 45 percent of U.S. adults get news on Facebook compared to 18 percent on YouTube.

Twitter and Instagram provide news to 11 percent and 7 percent of American social media users, respectively. Meager 5 percent of users get news through LinkedIn and Snapchat.

Infographic by Inspiringly

Social media, however, is a trustworthy source of news to just 5 percent of online Americans who say they trust “a lot” the information they get from social media sites.

About 33 percent of those surveyed reveal they have “some” trust in news on social media.

Just above one-third of Americans have trust in social networks as news source but one should bear in mind the data is from a survey conducted in March 2017. Since then, the ongoing data privacy scandal around Facebook probably forced much more people to distrust news on social media and social networks as a whole.

In contrast, 85 percent of online users trust local news organizations for news, followed by friends and family with 76 percent and national news organizations with 72 percent.

With growing number of online users distrusting social media news, businesses should re-focus their efforts on providing useful content in their field of expertise only. Furthermore, you should take into account the changing trust in different online channels you use to communicate your branding message.

Fake news and the increasing number of social bots used to boost online popularity are backfiring for many businesses who are after quick popularity on social. Conversely, those who invest in organic growth and delivery of meaningful content will reap the benefits as users are turning their back on automated content and filler topics.

Actually, excessive blogging and distribution of repetitive and useless content may well hurt your brand and repel visitors. We are slowly entering the mature stage of social media when you cannot fool everybody into clicking on your links embedded within content that is not of high quality.

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