A study of frequent social media users finds that nearly 75% either sometimes or very often or all the time use corporate Web sites to engage in, follow or share information or news. The survey, by TEKGROUP and Western Kentucky University, which used social media tools to solicit survey participation, polled 545 people from April 15-May 30 of this year. Other findings include:
• Almost 75% of survey respondents indicated they frequently (32%) or sometimes (42%) visit a corporate Web site after learning of a news story through social media channels, with roughly half of all respondents saying they sometimes (32%) or frequently (18%) use social media tools to fact-check corporate Web sites and press releases.
• For those actively participating in social media new-gathering and distribution, it seems social media is viewed about the same (41%) as traditional news sources for reliability and accuracy, with only 10% of respondents labeling social media as much less reliable or accurate.
• The most popular social media tools for tracking news and information is Twitter (60%), followed closely by Facebook (53%), with respondents indicating they use these tools all the time. Surprisingly, blogs (24%) and sharing sites, such as Flickr and YouTube, (18%) are not used regularly for social news tasks.
Source: TEKGROUP International Inc.