Sites like Buzznet and iMeem have been moving fast as social networking sites not named MySpace continue to make gains as they pull in users looking for alternatives online.
There’s plenty of action in social networking beyond MySpace, despite the overwhelming 80 percent market share it holds. Out of the top 20 social networking sites tracked by Hitwise, a couple of lesser-known websites have been rapidly gaining ground.
Hitwise’s superlative research director LeeAnn Prescott blogged about the change from January to February in social networking traffic tracked by the firm. Both iMeem and Buzznet, with heavy focuses on music, more than doubled their traffic in the month.
Overall, Prescott wrote that market share for social networking in general rose 11.5 percent month to month. In year over year movement from February 2006 to February 2007, social networking traffic gained by 87 percent.
Only Facebook with 10.3 percent and Bebo with 1.18 percent scored market shares greater than one percent while following MySpace and its commanding lead. Xanga (0.87%) filled out the top five places.
“The category is still growing at a rapid pace, and the growth of these newer sites shows that it hasn’t yet plateaued,” said Prescott. New figures soon to arrive from Hitwise will show MySpace driving more than one in four visits upstream to the next nineteen sites in their top twenty.
At MySpace, traffic was up 10.2 percent from January to February; year over year brought an increase of over 107 percent as people continue to seek out the site in greater numbers.
