Facebook suffered a tremendous amount of negative publicity in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The company feared it would suffer reputation damage combined with a loss of users. Hundreds of millions of people continue to use Facebook as a communications tool. An assumption here is the social media company didn’t lose many users. Such an assumption isn’t based on facts. A recent research study indicates bad news for Facebook. According to Edison Research, millions of U.S. users are departing the social media platform.
The numbers must be positively frightening for Facebook’s corporate executives. Anyone who thinks a company the size of Facebook can’t collapse within a few months is mistaken, reports CNET. Look back at social media history. MySpace stood atop the social media mountain as both a pop culture and tech industry giant. NewsCorp purchased MySpace for billions of dollars. Today, MySpace is a relic of the past as the social media site has only a tiny fraction of its previous membership.
Once users tire of a social media profile, they depart. Users worried about how a social media company uses their private data, they may leave even faster. Facebook’s scandals established the dark truth that the company doesn’t safeguard private information.
Once negative press drives home reasons why not to trust Facebook, users won’t stay with the platform. And the numbers of ex-Facebook users is staggering. Edison Research reports their numbers now totals 15 million. The drop happened quickly. The users started leaving in 2017. So, not even a full two years passed. The upcoming bad press about the government levying a giant fine against Facebook might drive even more users away.
The 15 million users are ones based in the United States. The study didn’t look into the loss of users in other parts of the world.
Edison Research didn’t try to uncover the specific reasons why people are leaving, but the data privacy scandal seems a likely culprit. The research did point something else out. Politics may play a role in the decline as well. In a polarized society, users may not patronize a business that doesn’t share their political leanings.
Facebook realizing the losses must stop. Otherwise, the company will begin to suffer on the advertising dollars front. Fewer users mean fewer people clicking on or purchasing advertisements. Facebook won’t be able to survive if its revenue streams drop too dramatically. Look for the company to take drastic steps to curtail member losses.
Dil Bole Oberoi
