Socialbakers has released its latest "Socially Devoted" figures for Q1, and the results are a mixed bag. On the one hand, the average response rate grew 6% points quarter-over-quarter to 38%, after only improving by 4% points in the preceding 6 months. But on the other hand, that means that significantly fewer than half of questions posted to brands' Twitter profiles were answered. What's more, the average response time increased by 10%, from 6 hours in Q4 2012 to more than 6-and-a-half hours in Q1. Continue reading »
Fewer Americans are cutting their spending when compared to prior years, but most of those who are say that this is their "new normal," according to survey results from Gallup. Overall, 73% of Americans polled in early April said they have been spending either less (41%) or the same (32%) amount of money in recent months than they used to. While the 41% spending less is down from a high of 57% in February 2010, about three-quarters of those believe that this decreased spending will become a new normal pattern, rather than representing a temporary change in their spending patterns. Continue reading »
Americans may not be as keen to share personal and other content online as citizens in other countries, suggests a survey from Ipsos OTX. The study asked respondents to identify how much they share online - including status updates, feelings, photos, videos, and links. Across the 24 countries tracked, an average of 24% said they'd best describe their amount of sharing as either "most things" or "everything." But that figure dropped to just 15% among American respondents. Read more »
Graduation season is here, and Americans will shell out $4.6 billion to reward high school and college seniors, per results from a survey conducted for the NRF by BIGinsight. Gift-givers will spend about $94 on average, or $49 per recipient, down from last year's $100 average. Unlike other events and holidays tracked by the NRF, which have seen increases in spending this year, total projected spending on graduation gifts this year is down from last year's forecast of $4.7 billion. Read more »
