Contributors, Lurkers and Abstainers

According to a survey of web users in the USA, conducted by Rubicon Consulting, approximately 80 percent of the user generated content on the web, including comments and questions is produced by 9 percent of users.

• 65 percent of web users contribute 20 percent of online content, contributing rarely.
  
• 9 percent of web users are pure lurkers, never contributing any content.
• 17 percent are community abstainers.

This survey is of great importance to marketers. You may download the entire survey in PDF here or read it online and comment or bookmark the different sections. Start with the Introduction here,

With money for advertising becoming tighter, marketers will want to leverage their use of social networks and take advantage of the 9 percent of Internet users who generate most of the online content, including product reviews.

Tags: rubicon, consumer generated content, social networks