Latin Americans are world’s most-engaged Social Networkers.

Latin Americans are the world’s leaders in social networking, an online phenomenon that is changing the way people communicate. Spending an average of 375 minutes per user per month on social networking sites, Latin Americans are far more engaged in online social communities than North Americans, whose 249 minutes per user ranks second in the world(1). While big social networks like Facebook and Fotolog are still built and financed in San Francisco and New York, increasingly the consumers who make or break global digital networks are found in Latin America.

Latin America’s avid social networkers are leading a global trend: active memberships in social networking sites worldwide are expected to reach more than 230 million in 2007(2); visitors to social networking sites increased by 34 percent last year to 530 million (approx. 2 out of 3 Internet users); and almost half of the top 10 most-visited websites are social networks(3). Latin America’s high level of engagement has made the region’s users the key to global success for emerging websites:

— 42 million unique visitors per month to social networks(4).
— Visitors to social networks grew by 16% from November 2006-June 2007.
— With 75% of all unique visitors going to social networks, Brazilians lead Americans (64 percent) and have earned a reputation as early adopters of global online trends(5).
— Latin American users spend the world’s highest average number of minutes online(6).

“Latin America has a well-deserved reputation for social networking, so it’s unsurprising that Latin Americans embraced Fotolog first and created the critical mass that made the site the world’s 13th most-trafficked website with 16 million members worldwide, 16.6 million unique visitors and 4.2 billion page views per month according to Comscore and Google Analytics,” said Cyril Zimmermann, CEO of Fotolog’s parent company, Hi-Media. “Our annual growth rate of almost 85% across the region is a reflection of how Latin Americans
are influencing the global Internet and social networking in particular.”

(1) Comscore
(2) Datamonitor Expert View (October 2007)
(3) Comscore Digital World: State of the Internet Report (March 2008)
(4) Comscore
(5) The Wall Street Journal
(6) Comscore
(7) Fotolog

Skip to content