Belgians continue to massively use social networks. They spend a lot of time there every day. For the creators of these sites and applications, there are little secrets to keeping users on their platform longer.
Social networks are clearly part of our daily lives. Many people know a lot about it and, above all, use it. On average, Belgians spend 1h30 per day on these platforms, which is in no way below the European average of 2h15 per day.
Some, however, have become totally addicted and don’t hide it. “In general, I spend 8 hours a day there I think”tells us a regular user, interviewed by Aurélie Henneton. “TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Youtube, a little bit of everything. A little too much sometimes, I tell myself that I should stop and live my youth, but I don’t”she then tells us.
This dependence is sometimes felt to impressive degrees. “Sometimes it stops me from focusing on what I should be doing.”confirms another big consumer of social networks.
“A quasi-science”
Of course, these addictions are a goal for the creators of such applications, who take the means to keep you on the application as long as possible.“It comes out of quasi-science,” even recalls Xavier Degraux, Trainer and consultant in digital marketing and social networks. “It’s called captology, it’s taught to the engineers of these platforms whose objective is to keep you going as long as possible and to push you to certain actions”he explains. Depending on these actions, the platform and its technologies, the feed that you observe on your smartphone or your screen will be considerably different from that of your neighbor, for example.
-“And over time, as we become a little more worn out by these social networks, they need our interactions less and less to understand us, because artificial intelligence is there and it also allows us to these platforms, with the time we spend on content to identify, a little more about who we are”confirms our expert. Understand that AI helps engineers define your preferences, suggest content adapted to your habits and therefore keep you engaged for longer.
Clever as a process.
meta social networks Xavier Degraux
