Facebook First For UK Online Video Use

Facebook is the number one site in the UK for uploading video content and second to YouTube as a destination to watch online video, according to digital research firm Global Web Index.

Its survey of 2000 UK consumers asked where they were watching online video, what they were watching and how often they were going online to find video content.

Of those canvassed 40% said they had uploaded video to Facebook in the past week, with 38% indicating YouTube. The next best site was Google (6%).



“Facebook is the place to share video in the UK,” says Tom Smith, director of Trendstream, which compiled the data with Lightspeed Research. “It resonates with the broader mass market because it’s where friends and communities find each other and connect through personal videos. YouTube is less about building community, more about broadcasting content which doesn’t motivate as many people.”

More people visit YouTube to watch online video however. Facebook is ranked second in GWI’s research and BBC iPlayer third.



“Open, socially driven platforms where anyone can upload and share content are always going to be bigger in scale than professional platforms like iPlayer,” Smith says.

Smith says the research reveals that people’s motivation for sharing content is primarily social and driven by personal content rather than professionally created content of which music video sharing is the most prominent category.

They are not trying to get across an opinion or duplicate the role of broadcasters so they are not necessarily a threat to broadcasters.” A small percentage of online video users, 10%, are driving the bulk of viewing activity. “There is a similar hardcore niche of users uploading the majority of video content.”

GWI’s research also covered 14000 users in other European countries revealing that Facebook is also dominant in France (23.4%) and Italy (29%), performs quite well in Spain (18.9%) but not in Germany (6.7%), or Russia (1.9%).