Western Europe Second Life propensity

Western Europe Second Life propensity. In other words, which countries in Europe are more (or less) likely to be active users of Second Life compared to the others?

We know that Western Europe is leading the way in Second Life adoption and this trend is continuing on an active user and registered account basis. However, looking at these totals in isolation only tells part of the story because countries across Europe have different population sizes as well as broadband penetration. So, propensity index analysis is used to assess the active user %s against the overall broadbrand population %s in order to calculate a comparitive index score. Scores over one indicate that country has an above average propensity compared to others to use Second Life. The graph below shows the index scores.

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Second Life usage per active resident

Second Life usage per active resident. An active resident in SL is someone who has logged in for over one hour in a month. On an overall basis, active residents were in SL for 42.7 hours in June. When looking at usage per active resident on a country and regional basis, some interest patterns emerge.

The graph below shows hours per active resident for the top 40 countries represented in SL.

Clearly some major differences between countries. Both the US and Canada have very high usage (over 50 hours per month). This is explained by the fact that people spend more time in Second Life the longer they have been registered – these two countries drove the initial take-up of accounts because of where Linden Lab is located and SL originated.

Whats of interest here as well is high usage from the Netherlands – in fact the highest out of all the countries with 52.4 hours in June. The dynamics of virtual worlds is clearly impacting people in this country more than others. Germany also appears to have this characteristic.

Exploring the factors behind average usage per month is easier when aggregating countries into regions, as shown below. Continue reading →

Age ranges and gender analysis

Age ranges and gender analysis. What’s often of great surprise to marketers when they first learn about Second Life is the average age of a resident. Compared to MMOGs which have a much younger audience profile, SL has an average resident age in the early thirties – one of the key reasons why companies view SL as an important new marketing channel.

In fact, SL has penetrated much older age ranges, as the graph below shows. This is based on end of June data.

Looking at age ranges on an overall basis, the resident population of SL got older from May to June. This is of particular good news to B2B organisations.

• The oldest group (45 year old +) grew 4.5%, accounting for 12.2% in June
• Next oldest (34-44) increased by 2.5% to 21.7%
• The highest group in total numbers (24-34 year olds) accounted for 38.2% of total residents in June, falling slightly (by 0.6%) from May
• The youngest segment (18-24) dropped 3.1% to 26.5% Continue reading →

Metrics for registered and unique accounts

Metrics for registered and unique accounts. At the end of June 2007, total registered accounts was 7.73m, an increase of 869k from May. This represents a monthly growth of 12.7% compared to 14.9% from April to May. So, a slight slowdown in growth explained largely by seasonality – a similar slight slowdown in growth occurred during the summer of 2006. However, the ongoing growth of circa 1m new registered accounts continues.

This now appears to be the trend, which as a result brings down the actual growth rate %’s as the total base grows.

Total unique accounts/residents broke through the 5m mark in June, reaching 5.22m, an increase of 19.5% from May (853k new uniques). This compares to an increase of 16% from April to May. The following graphs show monthly additions and growth rates.

Looking at the relationship between total registered accounts and unique residents also sheds a lot of light onto the types of people using Second Life. This post explains the types of individuals interacting with SL from a technology adoption perspective. The graph below shows total registered accounts per unique resident.

In the period prior to brand adoption of SL, the average number of accounts per unique resident was in the 1.25 – 1.3 range. This coincided with the Innovator group being the main element of consumer type.

However, as shown clearly in the graph, from May 2006 onwards (as brands started to enter SL), this metric started to go north quickly, shifting from 1.3 up to the 1.58 range.

This is explained by the entrance of Early Adopters into SL. These individuals began to use SL in two different ways, hence explaining the increase in avg accs and the requirement for more than one avatar account. Continue reading →