This sophisticated, discerning generation demands to be treated with respect.

London, December 9th, 2010

Decode’s latest study, Decoding Digital Friends, conducted in the UK, USA and Canada, and released today, busts many myths about young peoples’ social media use and reveals some new truths.

The study shows that social media is used more than other means of communication, but, contrary to popular myth, Gen Y’s connect regularly online with fewer than 60 people. Robert Barnard, founder and CEO of Decode Inc, the global consultancy specialising in Generation Y – 15 to 35 year olds – says, “We should not confuse Facebook friends with real friends. Gen Y has an impressive database of contacts in the hundreds on average, but the influential part of the network is about 10% of that.”

Face-to-face friends are just as important to people as they ever were and most digital communication revolves around events that happen offline. It is not the case that Gen Y has ‘digital worlds’ which remain entirely separate to their ‘real lives’.

“When it comes to social media’s role in purchase decisions, a striking 50% of Gen Y said they were influenced to purchase based on a familiar brand recommendation,” said Robert Barnard. The study also reveals that Gen Y relates to brands online in very special ways. “Life stage changes are prime motivators, more important than age”, he adds. It is critical for brands to be invited into social networks rather than being seen as unwanted party crashers.” Close friends and particularly family members remain influential in purchase decisions. However, brands that are known to Gen Y may be even more influential.

Robert Barnard points out, “Being influential in social networks is all about attitude as well as behaviour. Companies should learn from individuals when it comes to online etiquette. Decode’s Buzzfluence Index ™, based on both attitudinal insights and social network distribution, enables insights into how the most influential young people think and behave. It is a highly valuable tool for companies seeking to create or improve online strategy and gain insight into the digital worlds of young people”.

High “buzzfluencers” are equally as likely to be male as female, but there are some notable differences based on what life stage people are at. Students and young parents show a higher propensity to influence.

The platforms that Gen Y uses all the time are shrinking in number. Facebook tops the list, with more than 80% all-the-time use, Youtube comes next at just over 50%, MSN Messenger follows at around 37% use. Twitter has crept up to 16% all-the-time use in the UK – much higher than the USA and driven by university students. MySpace has dropped back substantially to less than 9% all the time use. One other trend of note is that blogging has decreased to just under 18% regular use, although 30% of people read blogs.

The top three popular digital brands for Gen Y based on a standardised list of 86 brands are Google, the BBC and Tesco. The least popular are banks and other financial service companies.

Another popular myth is that young people post large amounts of personal information to public platforms without considering the consequences. Decoding Digital Friends study has shown that young people are hyper aware that they are presenting a ‘face’ to the public. They constantly edit the information they share and are skilled at managing their profiles.

Ends

Details on the study:
Conducted August/September 2010
Total sample size across three countries (UK, USA, Canada): 4612 15-34 year old social media users
Method: web based survey using panel respondents

For more information please contact Decode.

Also, Decode CEO Robert Barnard presented data from this study at LSS ’10 in November. Here’s his presentation:

He will be sharing new findings and insights from fresh research into how young people (I thinks this is defined by those under 25?) are using social media and how many friends they really have…

Here’s a detailed outline of what you will hear on Thursday:

Decoding Digital Friends

When we decided to tackle the subject of digital friends at Decode, it was because we were frustrated with the usual myths about young peoples’ relationships with the online world. Myths such as:

• Young people all have thousands of digital friends who are as important to them as friends they see face to face regularly.
• The vast majority of young peoples’ communication is now online.
• Young people are very social online and post all sorts of things about themselves to everyone without thinking about the consequences.

The Decoding Digital Friends study revealed the real truth behind social networks and young people. It involved a quantitative stage with a 25-minute questionnaire given to 3000 respondents, followed by a qualitative stage including online diaries and online dialogues.

Robert will explore insights such as:

While social networks appear large at first glance, ‘real’ friends remain a small component of the whole.

Changes in life situation often cause changes in network dynamics as ‘distant’ friends become close friends and vice versa.

Young people are very aware that they are presenting a ‘face’ to the public. They constantly edit the information they share and are skilled at managing their profiles and avoiding context collision.

Brands must seek permission before attempting to join young peoples’ networks. A brand can make the individual a best friend, but should not expect the individual to ever view them as a best friend.

These insights will be explored with reference to case studies and findings from Decode’s syndicated study.

Finally, Robert will introduce Decode’s Buzzfluence Index ™. The index is based on both attitudinal insights and information regarding the level of online contact. It enables us to find out which young people have most influence and how these high influencers think and behave. It is a highly valuable tool for companies seeking to create or improve online strategy and gain insight into the digital worlds of young people.

We have now posted up most of the videos that we took at LSS ’09 on our YouTube channel – 34 videos in total so far which is over 5 hours of quality video – http://www.youtube.com/localsocialsummit.

Please note that some of the ‘credit’ screens are not complete and are missing some of the names of panelists. There should be full details within  the description on YouTube or you can view the final LSS ’09 agenda here – http://www.localsocialsummit.com/lss/final-agenda/.

Here’s a list of the sessions currently on YouTube:

• Session 1 – Parts 1 to 5: Keynote Presentation – Decoding Generation Y – Who really has digital friends? – Robert Barnard, Founder of Decode
• Session 2 – Parts 1 to 6: Panel – Social Media Marketing  – The Rules are Changing
• Session 3 – Panel – Mobile – The Future of Apps is Bright. Panel 3 videos are not up yet, should be ready in a the next couple of days:.
• Session 4 – Parts 1 to 5: Afternoon Keynote – Making sense of the networked audience: The case of Facebook – Dr. Bernie Hogan is a Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute.
• Session 5 – Parts 1 to 5: Panel – Local Gets Social – The Impact of User Generated Content and the Promise of Real-Time Search
• Session 6 – Parts 1 to 9: Panel – Local Content & Monetisation – A View from  Europe
• Session 7 – Parts 1 to 4: Lab: What does the Perfect Local Media Company Look Like in 5 Years Time

No videos of the Hitwise Goes Postal presentation.  But you can watch and listen to this as a great Webinar here – https://admin.na6.acrobat.com/_a799316515/p44796378/.

Also, no video of the The Opportunity of Social Media presentation but the slide deck is available here – http://www.slideshare.net/LocalSocialSummit/lss09-the-opportunity-of-social-media-amino-tech.

Suggested highlights from the YouTube videos include:

From Session 4 parts 1 and 2. Part 1 is what I am calling the “death of distance” segment and Part 2 which is the “paradox of conveince” segment.

• Session 4, part 1 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxXBJnJAatk
• Session 4, part 2 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bz9EuGzLYM

From Session 5 parts 2 and 3 as this is where we start to get an interesting  debate around both the definition and value of real-time search.

• Session 5, part 2 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-E3ydmxQ-8
• Session 5, part 3 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n75qbjAP_9M

More about the real-time search debate (what is it and is it useful for local-social) can be found here on Search Engine Land and Screenwrek.

In true social media sharing style we have put all the presentations up on the LSS Slideshare account.

We think most attendees will agree that two of the highlighst for the day were the keynote presentations which you will find below… Video and audio podcasts to following a few days as well…

• Keynote: Making sense of the networked audience: The case of Facebook
  - Dr. Bernie Hogan is a Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute

• Keynote: Decoding Generation Y: Who really has digital friends? – Robert Barnard, Founder of Decode

• Mobile panel is now 11.40am
• Local Gets Social is now 2.10pm
• Local Content & Monetisation is now 3.50pm

All times are GMT. Full schedule see below…