Social media marketing agencies take note: YouTube will overtake Facebook as second-most-visited website on the internet this year, according to a new report from SimilarWeb. The change will mark the first time in several years that Google, Facebook, and YouTube have not occupied the top three spots, in that order.
On the surface, the news might seem like a blow to Facebook: traffic to its flagship site has plummeted from roughly 8.5-billion visits per month in 2016 to around 4.7-billion visits per month this year. Combined with a seemingly never-ending flurry of scandals and executive blunders, the steep drop in regular traffic feels like a bad omen for the social media giant.
Yet despite fewer users visiting Facebook.com each month, advertisers and social media marketing agencies continue to find success on Facebook and other Facebook-owned platforms. As both a marketing tool and a social media network, Facebook is evolving, not declining; the Facebook app, Facebook Messenger, and Instagram have never been more popular. According to SimilarWeb, Android users spend twice as much time on Instagram today as they did a year ago.
Facebook.com’s impending fall from the second- to the third-most-visited site on the web should not push advertisers to abandon the platform; rather, it is an indicator that users’ online behaviour is changing, and the company is changing with it. As monthly website visits drop, traffic will accelerate on various apps.
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