Although Latin America makes up only 8.2% of the world’s population, they are the second largest consumer of social media. The online behavior of Latin Americans is evolving right along with the rest of the world, but in many cases, a bit faster. The most popular social network by Latin America users is Facebook, while the most popular social network by time on site in Latin America is Orkut.
Latin American Social Media Statistics
- Argentina and Brazil are currently among the world’s leading countries for Google+ usage.
- Latin America has 118 million Facebook users with Bogota, Buenos Aires, and Mexican all holding top ten positions on this particular social network.
- One-quarter of time spent online in Chile and Argentina is expended on social networks.
- Latin America has 8.6 million LinkedIn users.
- Users in Argentina spend 9 hours per month on Facebook; this is second only to users in Israel who boasts the top slot for user engagement.
- There are over 55 million Twitter users in Latin America.
- 14% of all Facebook users are Latin American.
- Orkut is still the leading social network in Latin America by choice even though some statistics might show otherwise. Orkut has been a dominating social site since 2006.
Recent studies conducted by Synthesio show that social medias are also beginning to take on significant potential for agencies, consultants, and brands in Latin America.
How do Latin Americans Use Social Medias?
Although Latin Americans, like any other global population, uses social media to maintain cultural, regional and familial ties, the Synthesio study also shows the other elements most enjoyed by Latin American social networkers.
A social network named Sonico was created in 2007. This site was displayed in only Spanish or Portuguese. Unfortunately for Sonico, US competitors quickly overwhelmed it when they introduced their sites in the proper language formats.
Are Politics a Factor?
A ComScore survey showed that in April 2010, the Venezuelan audience on Twitter increased by 4.8% when Hugo Chavez joined the social network himself. The Brazilian campaign for president in 2010 also caused a frenzied deluge on social networks when candidate and subsequent winner, Dilma Roussef, acquired the services of the same web agency that had represented President Barack Obama during his 2008 campaign. The day that Roussef made an appearance on TV to send a message to her compatriots, Twitter messages peaked at over 90,000 during the period of 24 hours.
In the past year, Latin America’s social networking markets have seen an 88% gain in user engagement. Statistics like this should show us why it is so vital to incorporate social media marketing into every advertising campaign created for anything from the smallest startup, to the world’s largest enterprises.
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