Everywhere you look at the moment Facebook is in your face. But not for the right reasons.
Talking to you via your TV, at the bus stop, in your newsfeed even – Facebook is desperately begging for your forgiveness and trust.
On the share market, Facebook recently experienced the worst stock drop in US history losing $120 billion in market value despite revenue increasing.
So, is Facebook worried?
On face value, yes.
A genuine blow for Facebook was the very public case of the Cambridge Analytica data breach, which is still ongoing, that caused worldwide concern about users’ data privacy online.
Online security has always been a lingering thought for most but when it was revealed that your data could have been taken without the need to grant permission, the resulting betrayal was irreparable for many.
But Facebook is part of most of our lives; our work, our communications, family, so it was far from a mortal blow for Facebook.
However, there were reports that up to 1.8 million Australians deleted their accounts.
The same effect has been had all around the world. In America, for example, 9 per cent of the population reportedly deleted their Facebook accounts.
For other social media networks this has opened the door for opportunity.
Facebook remains the top-contender boasting 15 million monthly active users in Australia as of last month, matched only by YouTube.
Visual content has been a consistent trend the last few years and particularly within the last 12 months in Australia. Longer format videos in the form of 'vlogs' makes up the large majority of time spent on both platforms as they complement each other well.
Operating within the visual content trend and relishing in the Facebook scandal, SnapChat saw tremendous growth in the last six months growing from 4 million monthly active users to 6.3 million.
The younger audience (18 and below), have little interest in Facebook but plenty of interest in SnapChat as well as Instagram.
It’s important to note that Instagram has remained steady with its 9 million monthly active users over the last six months – perhaps SnapChat is set to re-enter the limelight?
Moving ahead to LinkedIn, an additional 300,000 monthly users in Australia joined over the last six months, a trend that’s emerging out of the millennials who are now entering the workforce and used to a social media-style layout in order to find work and create industry connections.
So, despite Facebook experiencing potentially It’s most threatening crisis yet, it is still simply too large and involved with our lives to suffer too greatly – yet.
For the other social media platforms, it’s been an enjoyable period of growth in the Australian market and an even better opportunity and reminder for competitors to encourage online security and to reassure their users that they are safe on their platform.
But for now we sit and wait as the Facebook woes takes their slow, natural course.