👑 YouTube, monarch of social media

Read time: 3 minutes

Hey Valentine,

Have you been spending much time on social media lately? What’s your favorite platform?

The Pew Research Center’s most recent survey into Americans’ social media habits says 83 percent of us have used YouTube. No. 2 on the list – that’s right, YouTube was No. 1 – is Facebook.

I might debate whether YouTube is actually a "social media," but there’s no doubt about its ubiquity.

If you missed any of this week’s Super Bowl commercials, where will you watch them? YouTube.
If you see a video on a local business website, it’s likely hosted on YouTube.
If you search Google for help on how to change the headlight bulb on a 2018 Hyundai Tucson, you’ll find the best help on YouTube. (An actual search made by an actual person – me.)
When I want to brush up on Google Analytics or Facebook Ads, the destination always is YouTube.

So many uses

And I’m just scratching the surface. You might watch television shows, movies or a weekly video podcast on YouTube. Your church might post a video of its latest service on YouTube.

It’s likely that if you’re scrolling through other social media, the video links you see will take you to YouTube. Yep, the 83 percent is starting to make sense.

How did YouTube become so popular? There are two angles to the story. For viewers, it’s where nearly all the video content is. Why is that? In large part because the people who make the videos can host them on YouTube for free.

Not only that, the platform:

Has easy-to-use production and editing tools
Allows creators to monetize videos through advertising
It’s easy to integrate with other platforms and websites
YouTube also has a powerful search engine (Google owns YouTube) so videos are discoverable with the search tool.

Not even 20 years old

In what seems like a short amount of time, YouTube was founded in February 2005 and purchased by Google in November 2006, YouTube is "everywhere."

YouTube wasn’t on the Pew Research Center’s list until 2018 when it debuted at number one. According to the survey, 73 percent of Americans said they used it in that survey. That same year, 68 percent of those surveyed said they had used Facebook – the same percentage as in the survey released in 2024.

More people are using YouTube, while the use of Facebook has been stagnant over the last five years. Something to think about if you’re marketing a small business.

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Until Next Time

The next newsletter arrives Feb. 27. Baseball spring training will be well underway by then. Pitchers and catchers report this week for many teams.

Some folks will have a three-day weekend coming up when bankers and government employees are off for Presidents Day (Feb. 19).

Some Facebook friends reminded me that today (Feb. 13) is Fastnacht Day, the Pennsylvania German version of Fat Tuesday. Fastnachts are just another version of fried dough made to use up the lard before Lent. A doughnut is a fair substitute.

As ever, be grateful. Be generous. Be patient. Love.

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Thanks for spending some of your time with me, . I appreciate you.

Mark

P.S. - This newsletter was created entirely by me, a human. If any parts of my newsletters are generated by artificial intelligence, I’ll disclose it here.

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