Latest Stats, Facts and Trends on Social Media from Ryan Abramson

March 5, 2025 - Langhorne, PA - Ryan Abramson is an experienced marketing and communication professional with extensive work with marketing campaigns, leadership training, professional speaking and social media advertising.

Welcome to the Social Pulse, your go-to resource for staying ahead in the ever-evolving world of social media. This update delivers the latest trends, platform insights, and AI-driven strategies to help us refine our approach and expand our organic reach. From algorithm shifts to emerging best practices, we’ll break down what matters most—so you can focus on crafting impactful content and meaningful engagement. Whether it’s optimizing messaging, leveraging new platform features, or tapping into AI for smarter workflows, we’re here to keep you informed and inspired.

YouTube:

Launching a new AI tool for Shorts

From YouTube Blog: Need a specific scene but don't have the right footage? Want to turn your imagination into reality and tell a unique story? Simply use a text prompt to generate a video clip that fits perfectly into your narrative or create a whole new world of content. It’s that easy.

Stats: 2.5B users; Avg time spent per day on platform: 49 minutes

TikTok:

Potential new partners and buyers – current shutdown deadline is April 19, 2025

Stats: 2B users; Avg time spent per day on platform: 47 minutes

LinkedIn:

New measurement tools for impressions count

You can now see how many impressions your comments have received to gain insights on the impact within your LinkedIn community.  A comment impression is counted each time someone views your comment. This count is non-unique; if the same member views a comment twice, it is counted as two comment impressions. Your own views are also counted towards the impression count. (Source:LinkedIn Blog and SM Today)

LinkedIn Guide to Live Event Promotion: LinkedIn says that the number of live video events in the app increased by 15.3% in Q4 last year alone, underlining the steady growth of live engagement in the app.  LinkedIn has created a guide and framework to maximize live events on the platform. (Source and Guide: LinkedIn Marketing Blog)

Stats: 1B users; Avg time spent per visit to platform: 11 minutes

Instagram:

Instagram will no longer allow users to follow hashtags. This decision aims to tackle spam and irrelevant content often associated with trending hashtags.  While the hashtag feature remains available for categorizing content and aiding discovery via searches and the Explore page, this change signals Instagram’s shift away from hashtags as a primary discovery tool. The platform increasingly relies on advanced algorithms to personalize user experiences. (Source: Nap Cat)

Stats: 2B users; Avg time spent per day on platform: 32 minutes

X / Twitter:

X has launched a dedicated video tab for US users, replacing the Communities section after a year of testing. Video views have increased by 40% year-over-year, and the new tab provides a full-screen video feed. (Source: Swipe Insight)

Stats: 611M users; Avg time spent per day on platform: 30 minutes

Facebook:

New Meta policies on ads/boosts (Source: SM Industry Roundup)

Creative Diversification: With 60% of ad performance now driven by creative, diversification is more crucial than ever. If two creatives have a 'similarity score' of 65%+, the algorithm won’t recognize them as different creatives and will serve them repeatedly to the same audiences, leading to fatigue and performance dropping. This means we can no longer just 'tweak the background' or 'just change the copy overlay' when bulk-adding creatives.

Placement-Specific Dimensions: If you upload an asset with incorrect dimensions for a placement (e.g. Reel) or do not follow the 'safe zone' guidelines, Meta simply won’t deliver it, rather than displaying it incorrectly now.

Stats: 3B users; Avg time spent per day on platform: 32 minutes

Interesting Stats and Facts:

Television over Mobile: YouTube is the new television: More users watch videos on TVs than on mobile devices for the first time. (Source: SM Industry Roundup)

Algorithm Awareness: Gen Z possesses a sophisticated understanding of how algorithms curate their feeds, leading them to create content that maximizes visibility on various platforms. (Source: Global Newswire)

New and Emerging Platforms:

New platform:  Buzzfeed is creating its own platform called “Island” (Source: Buzzfeed)

New platform:  Instagram is considering a standalone Reels app (Source: SM Today)

Current Stats and Platform Use Info:

18-29 years – YouTube (93%), Instagram (76%), Facebook (68%), Snapchat (65%)

30-49 years – YouTube (94%), Facebook (78%), Instagram (66%), Pinterest (43%)

50-64 years – YouTube (86%), Facebook (70%), Instagram (36%), LinkedIn (30%)

65+ – YouTube (65%), Facebook (59%), Pinterest (22%), Instagram (19%)

Final Thoughts: Ryan Abramson

As brands become increasingly valuable as more and more people use them; engage with the information and share the value with friends and colleagues.  Social media is the place to grow legions of believers and create growth.  Let’s navigate the digital landscape together and make every post count!