Love it or loathe it, social media is having a huge impact on our lives. 

Research from earlier in the year shows that up to 74% of the UK population use social media, with Facebook being the single biggest social media platform used in both the UK and around the world.  A PEW Research report from Sept 2013, shows that 71% of all online adults use Facebook.

In December 2013, Facebook claimed to have over 31m users in the UK.  Figures from Twitter show 15m UK users and growing.  Whilst data from LinkedIn noted that they passed 10m users in 2013, which whilst lower than the previous two, is much more Focused on professional and business communities.

So how (or perhaps more importantly), are we using social media to improve and grow the learning opportunities, training & development that we offer individuals, or which our organisations offer to employees, students and stakeholders?

Do we use social media as a tool to deliver the same old content, or are we creating new environments where our learners, instead of the teachers/subject-experts, take centre stage?

Social media allows instructors and learners to easily share information and materials, opinions, views and comments, with the platform giving us a structure around which to organise it all.  But it can also help us to give learners more control over the direction of their learning.

Here's a quick guide to what the main platforms include:

Facebook
Closed or open groups, allow us to share information & materials (text, pictures, videos, etc.)  and have discussions about course-related issues, and any questions learners might have.  Growth rates may be slowing, and if you are going to use the platform, have a look at your demographics.  Current growth looks to be coming from an older age bracket, with younger users moving to other platforms.  However, the current market coverage makes it tempting to use.

Twitter
Can be used to connect learning communities or smaller classrooms over a specific topic or event, sharing highlights, making statements, uploading pictures, etc. Create an account, use a #hashtag and your learners can join in.  Caution with Twitter though, the majority of users read, but don't necessarily interact with other users.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn has thousands of discussions and groups where instructors, educators and “influencers” share views, problems, developments and how-to tips.  And there's an added value compared to the previous platforms as learners can actually see others professional profile and accomplishments, something that can add a bit of kudos to those taking part.

Google +
They're a bit cagey with their user numbers, but there's no doubt that Google+ is becoming increasingly popular, and with the established userbase of Gmail, Docs and Youtube, you can be certain they will continue to grow.   Google + is getting some good write-ups from eLearning people, with video integration, Hangouts and communities all being noted as strong components of their social media platform.

The list of platforms seems to grow on a monthly basis, with the likes of Pinterest, Instagram, Snapchat and WhatsApp all competing for users and content.  So we've got loads of choices for a social learning platform, but how are we using them, how should we be using, should we be using them, and what happens if we don't use them whilst our learners expect us to use them.

Here's a few more stats to give a flavour for how social media is being adopted:
As of September 2013, PEW Research reported:
71% of online adults use Facebook
17% use Instagram
21% use Pinterest
22% use LinkedIn

Whilst Business Insider found:
“Social” is now the top Internet activity: Americans spend more time on social media than any other major Internet activity, including email.
Social-mobile rules: 60% or so of social media time is spent on smartphones and tablets.  
Facebook attracts roughly seven times the engagement that Twitter does, when looking at both smartphone and PC usage, in per-user terms. 
Snapchat is a smaller network than WhatsApp, but outpaces it in terms of time-spend per user. 
Pinterest, Tumblr and LinkedIn made major successful pushes last year to increase engagement on their mobile sites and apps. The new race in social media is not for audience per se, but for multi-device engagement. 

So with so many options, how are we supposed to know how to proceed with “social” in our learning.  This (along with a number of other topics) is something which the Alliance will be looking at during the Learning Essentials Conference on 31st October.

References:
http://wearesocial.net/blog/2014/02/social-digital-mobile-europe-2014/
http://www.slideshare.net/wearesocialsg/social-digital-mobile-in-europe
http://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-users/
http://www.pewinternet.org/fact-sheets/social-networking-fact-sheet/
http://www.businessinsider.com/social-media-engagement-statistics-2013-12
http://elearningindustry.com/the-role-of-social-media-in-elearning