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Millionares flocking to Facebook
Rich people sign up more, use social network less
By Sarah Jacobsson Purewal | PC World | Published 10:00, 23 October 10
Millionaires sign up for Facebook more often than do regular Americans, but have surprise, surprise less time to use it, according to a quick poll by SEI.
SEI polled 46 "wealthy individuals" (read: more than $5 million in investible assets) about their social networking usage and discovered that 70 percent of them are users of Facebook and other social networking websites. An August report from Pew Research Center says that only 61 percent of Americans over age 18 use, or have used, a social networking site.
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SEI takes this data to mean that social networking sites are the domain of the rich: "Wealthy individuals are engaged with social media even more than the rest of the American public," said David McLaughlin, Senior Managing Director for the SEI Wealth Network, "As a company that prides itself on innovation, we're pleased to see this constituency adapting to and even embracing changing cultural trends."
McLaughlin might be speaking prematurely... after all, these Ritchie Riches are not exactly wasting away hours stalking ex-lovers on Facebook. In fact, only 17.4 percent said they had enough time to visit the websites daily. The other 52.6 percent presumably have better things to do, such as investing their millions and/or making more. By contrast, the Pew study says that 38 percent of the "average Americans" use social networking sites daily.
So, rich people have less time to waste on the internet than do average people. Colour me shocked.
If you're curious as to what sites these wealthy individuals are visiting in their free time (51 percent said their accounts are for personal use, not business use), here's the breakdown: of the social media users, 50 percent are Facebook users and 37 percent are Youtube users. About 35 percent are LinkedIn users, but we'll assume those are not "non-business" LinkedIn accounts.
