Social networks in Russia, summer 2014: numbers, trends, forecasts

    We present the data of the June study of the cycle " Social networks in Russia today: numbers, trends, forecasts ." This is the fourth regular publication of relevant data on the penetration of social media by region of Russia, the age-sex structure of the authors of the messages and the degree of their activity, this time based on the results of the first half of 2014. In addition, for the first time in a series of studies, unique data on the emotional state of users of social media are published.
    image



    The growth of Internet penetration in the regions of Russia continues - 59% of the adult population of Russia use the Internet (68.7 million people) [1]. Semiannual audience growth amounted to 2.2 million people. 80% of the daily audience of the Russian-language Internet are active in social networks [2].

    VKontakte occupies the first place in the popularity of social networks, the attendance of which in May 2014 grew to 52.1 million people, the second place is occupied by the Odnoklassniki social network with a monthly audience of 40.8 million people.

    image

    * Data on Twitter is extrapolated based on the audience for the day and week. The

    following research shows data on “talking” users who openly express their position by publishing open content on social media. In May 2014, there were about 35 million such active authors in Russia. They generate about 32 million messages per day. Active authors of public content make social networks an actual indicator of public moods, allowing them to catch the "living" social problems in their infancy.

    As for the volume of content posted daily on social networks, VKontakte also holds leadership positions here. In second place by the number of messages is Twitter.

    image

    * Classmates - data on the Top 100,000 groups

    ** Facebook - lower rating

    It should be noted that the primary use of VKontakte is specific to the Russian audience. Short messages that people around the world prefer to post on Twitter, many Russian authors post in the status format of VKontakte.

    Portrait of the authors of social networks


    Brand Analytics data for Russia is presented for May 2014. Authors are users who have written at least 1 public message per month.

    In contact with

    The monthly VKontakte audience in May 2014 amounted to 52.1 million users, of which 18.1 million were active authors. 58.8% of active VKontakte authors are women. In the context of the age structure of the authors, young people from 18 to 24 years old predominate - 39% of the authors.

    image

    VKontakte is geographically most popular in St. Petersburg, with Moscow occupying the second place by network penetration.

    image

    No.RegionAuthors% of population
     Total in Russia18 100 00012.42%
    1St. Petersburg1,711,23434.03%
    2Moscow2 867 00123.93%
    3Sevastopol79 89020.81%
    4Murmansk region157 65120.20%
    5Republic of Karelia124,46819.54%
    ...
    81Jewish Autonomous Region6,2613.63%
    82Karachay-Cherkess Republic12 9302.74%
    83The Republic of Dagestan68 9652.34%
    84Chechen Republic23,2971.76%
    85The Republic of Ingushetia6 1431.39%


    Classmates

    The audience of Odnoklassniki network in May 2014 amounted to 40.8 million users, of which 2.5 million are active authors. The largest part of the active audience of the network - 63.5% - is female. As for the age structure in Odnoklassniki social network, a group of 24-34 years prevails among active authors.

    image

    Classmates are more popular in the regions of Russia: the greatest penetration is recorded in the Sakhalin region, Khabarovsk and Trans-Baikal Territories.

    image

    No.RegionAuthors% of population
     Total in Russia2 568 1001.76%
    1Sakhalin Oblast17 0473.46%
    2Khabarovsk region43,6283.25%
    3Transbaikal region34,2373.13%
    4Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug - Ugra44 1452.79%
    5Jewish Autonomous Region4,8172.79%
    ...
    81Leningrad region9 7180.55%
    82Tyva Republic1,4870.48%
    83Republic of Tatarstan (Tatarstan)18 4550.48%
    84Vologda Region5,3460.45%
    85Republic of Karelia2 7050.42%


    My world

    The May audience of the network amounted to 25.9 million users, of which 2.3 million Russian authors showed public activity. The female audience classically prevails here (the proportion of women in the total number of active authors is 59.7%). In terms of age structure, My World is characterized by the most uniform distribution. The categories from 25 to 34 years and from 35 to 44 years (22% of users each) lead with a slight advantage.

    image

    In terms of penetration of the "talking" audience, My World prevails in the regions (the Chelyabinsk region takes the first place in penetration), although Moscow and St. Petersburg are also among the five leaders (2nd and 5th places, respectively).

    image

    No.RegionAuthors% of population
     Total in Russia2,291,1001.57%
    1Chelyabinsk region147,0754.22%
    2Moscow402 3923.36%
    3Khabarovsk region41,6793.11%
    4Primorsky Krai55 0332.83%
    5St. Petersburg135,9992.70%
    ...
    81Tyva Republic1 1080.36%
    82Republic of Kalmykia9830.35%
    83Chechen Republic4,0650.31%
    84The Republic of Dagestan7 7090.26%
    85The Republic of Ingushetia6210.14%


    Facebook

    The Russian Facebook audience in May 2014 amounted to 23.4 million users, of which million are active authors. Here, the predominance of female active audience is fixed at 54.2%. By age distribution, Facebook is dominated by authors 25-34 years old - 40% and 35-44 years old - 29%.

    image

    Twitter

    The Twitter audience in May 2014 amounted to 8.3 million users, of whom 1.7 million were active authors. Among the active audience of Twitter, active female authors also prevail - 54.2%. The geographical section demonstrates the greatest public activity of residents of two capitals - Moscow and St. Petersburg.

    image

    No.RegionAuthors% of population
     Total in Russia1,728,5001.19%
    1St. Petersburg161 7613.22%
    2Moscow377 1113.15%
    3Chukotka Autonomous Okrug1,2842.53%
    4Kaliningrad region18 7661.97%
    5Novosibirsk region48 9011.80%
    ...
    81Kabardino-Balkarian Republic1 9360.23%
    82The Republic of Ingushetia9550.22%
    83Karachay-Cherkess Republic8760.19%
    84Chechen Republic2 1820.16%
    85The Republic of Dagestan4 4750.15%


    Livejournal

    The monthly audience of LiveJournal in May 2014 amounted to 18.3 million users, of which only 180 thousand authors published posts. At the same time, LiveJournal is the most “male” resource: the proportion of men in the total number of authors was 53.5%. As for the age of the authors, only 4% of them are under 25 years old, while groups of 25-34 years old and 35-44 years old prevail, the share of which is 41% and 35% respectively.

    image

    The emotional state of social media users


    A portrait of active authors of social networks would not be complete without studying their emotional state [4]. In May 2014, My World became the most positive social network (84% of positively colored messages), followed by VKontakte with a slight lag (82% of positive messages). Social networks Odnoklassniki and Facebook are in the middle of the ranking with the same share of positive content at 74%. Most of the negative was recorded on Twitter and LiveJournal (a third of all publications have a negative tone). It cannot but rejoice that positive emotions prevail in all social media.

    image

    Actual trends of summer 2014


    In general, the trends of summer 2014 in social media continue the winter trends. The penetration of various networks is geographically heterogeneous: VKontakte and Twitter prevail in Moscow and St. Petersburg, while Odnoklassniki and My World are more popular in the regions of Russia. Social media continues to capture more and more users on their networks who actively create content: they talk about themselves, discuss news, and also do reviews on various goods and services.

    However, in some social networks, the portrait of active authors in the summer of 2014 changed. So, compared with the winter of 2013-2014, the share of male authors on Twitter increased, while in LiveJournal the proportion of authors older than 45 years increased - 12% to 21%. The “talking” audience of the My World network, on the contrary, is younger - here the share of authors older than 45 years has decreased from 29% to 16%.

    The most pleasant news was the result of a study of the emotional state of active authors of social media. Despite the stereotype that a negative atmosphere reigns in social media in Russia, it turned out in practice that positive messages prevail in absolutely all social networks.

    The study “Social Networks in Russia, Summer 2014” in presentation format can be downloaded on SlideShare here .

    [1]FOM, February 2014

    [2] TNS Web Index, February 2013

    [3] Percentage of active authors - the number of authors divided by the number of residents in the region. Unique authors who wrote at least 1 public message per month were taken into account

    [4] Methodology: Russian-language messages were analyzed expressing the emotions of the authors in the first person in the present tense. So, positive messages were identified with expressions like “I love”, “I adore”, and negative messages were identified with “I hate”, “annoys me”, etc. The sum of positive and negative emotions in each social network is taken as 100%. To determine the messages that meet the above criteria for a specified period of time, 420 million messages from 35 million authors were analyzed.

    Also popular now: