In New Zealand, as elsewhere in the world, social media has become one of the most significant venues where consumers spend their time.
According to 2023 research (Meltwater/We Are Social), 81.4% of Kiwis are active social media users and they spend an average of 2 hours and 15 minutes on social media networks each day.
If you’re wondering which social networks are currently the most popular in New Zealand, wonder no more. Facebook is the most popular by a country mile, with Instagram winning the hearts and minds of younger audiences.
Check out this roundup of recent statistics which highlight the performance by age group of the key social media.
Facebook remains the largest social media platform, with over 3 billion monthly active users globally, and reaching 3.3 million users in New Zealand.
Instagram performs well with younger audiences. If your target market is under 35, you really should be actively marketing on Instagram (see our Instagram Marketing course to see how best to go about that). With 2 billion monthly active global users (and attracting 2.5 million NZ active users), it is particularly popular among millennials and Gen Z. Instagram’s features, such as Stories, Reels, and shoppable posts,
Instagram is also a favorite tool for Influencers, who have become a significant part of social media marketing activities.
TIKTOK
TikTok came from nowhere to surge during the Covid years. It first found a rabid following with bored teens trying to entertain themselves but has since blossomed across a wider cross-section and now reaches 1.93 million NZ social media users. We do offer a TikTok course and details about TikTok are also included in our Social Media Marketing course.
Pinterest performs really well with female audiences, especially those interested in lifestyle content such as fashion, home decoration and travel. We don’t currently offer a Pinterest course but we cover the network in detail in our Social Media Marketing course.
X (TWITTER)
After a period of some neglect, Twitter regained some traction, at least in notoriety, under the new leadership of Elon Musk. Even so, it’s not quite the phenomenon in NZ that it is in the US and elsewhere. Again, we don’t currently offer a Twitter course but we do cover the network in detail in our Social Media Marketing course.
LinkedIn is of course a social network for business people. Whilst in the past it’s been regarded as primarily a place to post your CV in the hope of finding a job, it’s moved on well beyond that and has become a major networking tool, especially for B2B marketers and sales people, with 2.8 million New Zealand users. If you aren’t taking full advantage of LinkedIn, you’re really missing out. For now, we’ve paused our LinkedIn course but we do cover the network in detail in our Social Media Marketing course.
YOUTUBE
YouTube isn’t actually a social network in the strictest definition of the term, but it does compete with the other social players for both audience and advertising, so we’ve included YouTube data here by way of comparison.
If you’d like to know more about YouTube, you’d find it covered in our Social Media Marketing course. Alternatively, if you’d like to know more about using online video for marketing purposes (including YouTube and the other social media outlets), take a closer look at our Online Video Marketing course.
SOCIAL MEDIA TRENDS
The above information depict social media at a particular point in time. But how has the medium been performing over recent years?
Whilst individual networks have ebbed and flowed in popularity (and Instagram has shown significant growth over the past several years), they’ve always lived under the shadow of Facebook, which has consistently dominated the NZ social media environment for the last decade (since it took over the crown from Bebo in 2009).
Whilst the demographic makeup of Facebook audiences has evolved over time (in particular, with younger audiences slipping away as their parents joined the social network), Facebook has hovered above the 2.5 million unique visitors per month mark for the last decade.
Oh, and that total unique audience clocked in at 3.3 million in 2024, so Facebook continues to lead the social media sphere in New Zealand.
If you’d like to learn more about Social Media Marketing in New Zealand, check out our online training courses:
All our courses are developed specifically for New Zealand conditions and are freshly updated for 2024.
Here are the current courses (click on the links for more details about each course):
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SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING COURSES
The Principles & Practice of Social Media Marketing
For those new to Social Media Marketing: this is a thirteen-part eCourse providing a comprehensive introduction to Social Media Marketing, from the Basics to detailed instructions on how to build and run a Social Media Marketing programme.
For more details of the Social Media Marketing online course, please click here.
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We also have a course that will help you master both of New Zealand’s most powerful social media:
By far the most powerful social media channels for NZ marketers these days are Facebook and Instagram.
That’s where the audiences are, and that’s where YOU need to be.
Of course, there’s rather more to Facebook and Instagram marketing than making a few posts or taking a few pretty pictures and hoping to reach large numbers of your target audience.
Effective social media marketing requires the right knowledge, tools, tips and techniques to help you get noticed and to encourage your audience to engage with you and your brand.
That’s where we can help.
In recognition of the combined strengths of Facebook and Instagram, we’ve taken the best of our popular Facebook and Instagram courses, and blended them together into a powerful thirteen-part Complete Facebook and Instagram Marketing online training course.
This combined course will bring you up to speed with what’s required to make your social media marketing on Facebook and Instagram really work for you in 2023.
Check out the details of our Complete Facebook and Instagram Marketing online training course by clicking here.
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How to Prepare an Effective Social Media Brief
Even if you don’t intend to become directly involved in social media yourself, you may still need to understand the principles, practices and opportunities of social media — for example, if you need to brief someone about running a social media campaign. This programme is designed to provide you with the insights necessary to prepare an effective brief.
For more details of the How to Prepare an Effective Social Media Brief programme, please click here.
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Writing for the Web course
Effective writing has become an absolutely core competency when communicating online. Not just any writing, however. Different media require different approaches. The headline that might have looked wonderful in the newspaper probably won’t fit within the constraints of Facebook or Instagram character counts.
Oh, and you’ll probably want to know how to make best use of AI writing tools such as ChatGPT, Jasper AI and the many other AI enhancements for online writing.
Our Writing for the Web course covers the key elements you need to know to communicate effectively to online audiences.
For more information about our Writing for the Web course, please click here.
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Online Video Marketing course
Online Video is now New Zealand’s most popular broadcast medium, with YouTube alone reaching more than half the country on a daily basis (according to research by NZ On Air).
And online video is a powerful way to communicate your brand story, explain your value proposition, and build relationships with your customers and prospects.
Remember the old cliche that a picture is worth a thousand words? According to an estimate by Dr James McQuivey of Forrester Research, one minute of video is equal to 1.8 million words.
So let’s cut to the chase. It’s well past time for you to upskill yourself in online video marketing. That’s why we have a course on the topic, which covers both standard and vertical videos (landscape, square and portrait) and also some of the AI tools that have sprung up to make video creation easier than ever.
For more details of the Online Video Marketing course, please click here.
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AI for Marketers
As you will no doubt have noticed, Artificial Intelligence has developed a more and more prominent role in marketing in 2023, across social media and search and indeed all aspects of digital marketing.
We’ve been building AI coverage into all of our courses but we also have a dedicated AI for Marketers online training course which will help you master a wide range of AI tools to do what previously had to be done more manually.
For more information about our AI for Marketers course, please click here.
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DIGITAL MARKETING
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Certificate in Digital Marketing
This comprehensive Digital Marketing course is designed for marketers at any level (from junior to senior) who want to acquire comprehensive training in all aspects of Digital Marketing based on the latest technologies.
This online course draws on the latest developments in Digital Marketing, covering key competencies and new and emerging technologies.
For more details of the Certificate in Digital Marketing online course, please click here.
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Digital Marketing 101
Digital Marketing 101 is a 26-part online training course designed for students who may know very little about Digital Marketing, touching on a wide range of Digital Marketing topics over a six-month period.
For more information about Digital Marketing 101, please click here.
