Global media powerhouse Universal McCann have been undertaking and publishing a major international social media study 2012 documenting web behaviours, preferences and trends over the last few years.  We’ve shared the results of previous iterations of the social media study which have highlighted things like the meteoric rise of social media and that video is clearly the preferred social media activity.

Social media study 2012: How brand websites are losing out to social

Wave 6 (social media study 2012 in the series of 6) was released a few days ago, and takes in the experience of nearly 42,000 daily internet users in 62 countries.  As always, there are interesting and useful findings.  Here are just a few of the highlights:

• People are spending more time than ever on social networks
• At the same time, people of all age groups are abandoning brand websites – this is a significant trend
• They are favouring social networks – and the social networks they choose are dictated by the different needs they are fulfilling and the country they are in
• Businesses now need to connect with their customers and prospects across many platforms – as there are so many ways to connect – and no one way is the right way

You can view the original social media study 2012 by downloading it here, in summary on slideshare, or take a look at Universal McCann’s press release about it.