Latest insights from Nielsen Digital Ratings has revealed that Aussies still care about social media brands, and use these platforms to source their online news, driving traffic skyward for a number of active sites.
June 2016 data revealed Facebook racked up a unique audience of close to 16 million compared to the previous month, while Twitter grew 11 per cent to 6.8 million, Snapchat recorded a six per cent increase to 3.8 million, and Instagram was up seven per cent to almost eight million.
But the real news was in the way Aussies are using these platforms to get to other places, as opposed to just hovering on their newsfeed.
Stacks of Aussies looked to social media for updates on the Federal Election, resulting in a 49 per cent increase in the number of people visiting the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) site – lifting the site’s audience to 3.7 million.
In the automotive manufacturer sub-category, seven out of the top ten car manufacturers reported double digit increases in unique audiences during June 2016 compared to the previous month.
The strongest unique audience growth month-on-month for the top 10 car manufacturers was recorded by Mazda (up 131 per cent), followed by Ford (up 77 per cent), Hyundai (up 46 per cent), Nissan (up 36 per cent), Mitsubishi Motors (up 15 per cent) and Holden (up 14 per cent).
There was also movement in the Current Events & Global News sub-category, which reported changes to unique audience rankings in June 2016. News.com.au retained the top spot with a unique audience of 5.5 million, while ABC news websites moved to second place ahead of smh.com.au.
Yahoo7 news websites moved up to fifth position with an increase of 6.3 per cent in unique audience in June 2016 from the previous month. The BBC jumped from tenth to seventh (up 13.6 per cent) and The Daily Telegraph entered the top 10 rankings with a 6.9 per cent increase in unique audience versus the prior month.
Check out the top 10 sites in the current events and global news sub-category for June 2016, ranked by unique audience figures.
| Name | Unique Audience (000) | Page Views Per Person | Sessions Per Person | Time Per Person (hh:mm:ss) |
| news.com.au | 5,463 | 47 | 12 | 00:59:41 |
| ABC News Websites | 5,003 | 20 | 8 | 00:22:16 |
| smh.com.au | 4,911 | 25 | 10 | 00:51:21 |
| Daily Mail Australia | 3,230 | 23 | 9 | 00:34:31 |
| Yahoo7 News Websites | 3,079 | 11 | 7 | 00:14:12 |
| The Guardian | 3,043 | 14 | 8 | 00:26:27 |
| BBC | 2,888 | 25 | 10 | 00:43:54 |
| ninemsn News Websites | 2,753 | 21 | 10 | 00:25:40 |
| The Daily Telegraph | 2,520 | 14 | 7 | 00:18:49 |
| Herald Sun | 2,519 | 20 | 9 | 00:33:02 |
