Study: Different topics resonate on different social media platforms

Most business owners would be quick to paint all the various social media platforms with a single brush stroke. A recent study conducted by the Pew Research Center has found, though, that users of different social platforms enjoy different types of news.

For example, the study found Twitter users are more likely to be interested in technology-related stories. On the other hand, bloggers talk a lot more about politics. YouTube users make the most videos about international affairs.

The study also found a clear separation between what social media users and mainstream press were interested in. Blogs shared the lead story with mainstream press for only 13 of the 49 weeks in which the study was conducted. On Twitter, only four of the lead stories overlapped.

Unsurprisingly, news stories were also found to have a shorter shelf life on social platforms. While in the traditional press, 50 percent of the top stories transferred over to the next week, only a fraction of them remained among the top stories the next week on social platforms.

With hundreds of millions of internet browsers registered on social networking sites, emerging social media platforms are quickly becoming attractive places to market a business' products or services.