I find it almost impossible to interact with all the different social networking opportunties that are available. Recently Australia celebrated the eight hour working day.

Listening to an ABC reoporter talking about the history of the day I was lead to realize that not only was the idea to only work eight hours a day but to have eight hours recreation and eight hours sleep. This all makes sence to me. Following this advice would make my life more balanced.

One of the problems I have found with social networking sites is the amount of time it takes to interact, communicate and update each site. There is no way that I can be effectivly active on digg, stumbleupon, twitter, linkedin, facebook, bloglog, blog catalog, dropjack, sphinn and a host of other places that can provide me with a return on time invested.

Looking at the list of social sites in Australia through the eyes of hitwise I took the top 12 social sites and ranked them according to market share, age reach and lifestyle reach.The idea of this is to start giving me an idea of where best my time and effort should be invested. Hopefully I will be able to connect with people who I want and need to communicate with that will help me achieve my goals.

Australian social sites – Market Share
Which social networking site gets the most traffic from Australian visitors?
I believe that this is the first important metric. The more traffic the more potential there is to be seen. From the hitwise data, Facebook.com is the stand out winner.

Australian social sites – Age
Which age group can be found on which site?
As I have grown older I have noticed that my interests have changed. I am still me but different. When trying to connect socially with people I believe it is important to approach each group with something that resonates with them. Depending on who I am trying to reach socially I should choose where I spend my effort. If I am trying to talk to the 18 year olds Yahoo answers, if I am trying to talk to the over 55’s then twitter (Yes this did amaze me)

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Australian social sites – Lifestyle
What type of people visit what type of social networking site?
This is very similar to age as a consideration and is taken from the mosaic group clasifications. Different people have different expectations from life. They have different back grounds and respond in different ways. Understanding this and speaking their language will make the interaction so much more valuable. Twitter.com won in the priveldged prosperity catagory and orkut.com was the champion with students and young profesionals.

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If a social networking campaign is something you are aiming at or you just want to get connected, it is important to think about who and where your target audience are interacting. Once this has been identified use the social site that will give the most value for the time you invest.