SOASTA Survey: Social Media is Queen of Hearts for Single Americans on Valentine’s Day

40 percent of single Americans will send Valentine’s Day wishes on
Facebook, Twitter or Snapchat, compared to 28 percent of married
Americans, and the greater the household income, the more likely
Americans are to plan to send Valentine’s Day wishes

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–SOASTA,
the leader in performance analytics, today announced the findings of its
2016 Valentine’s Day Survey. Conducted online by Harris Poll in late
January 2016, the SOASTA study questioned 2,046 American adults aged 18+
and 1,158 American youths ages 8-18 to determine how Americans plan to
send Valentine’s Day wishes this year. According to the new research, 79
percent of youths and 71 percent of adults plan to send Valentine’s Day
wishes this year.

Adults – and Kids – Turn to Social Media for Valentine’s Day

SOASTA’s Valentine’s Day Survey revealed that many adults plan to turn
to social media to send Valentine’s Day wishes this year. Nearly 1 in 3
(32 percent) of adults who plan to send Valentine’s Day wishes will do
so through social media sites, including Facebook, Twitter and Snapchat.
Among those who plan to send Valentine’s wishes, Americans who are not
married (40 percent) are more likely to send Valentine’s Day wishes via
social media than married Americans (28 percent). Married adults are
more likely than the non-married to do so via traditional cards bought
in a store (62 percent versus 52 percent).

Of those who will send Valentine’s Day wishes this year, more youth (37
percent) plan to say happy Valentine’s Day via social media than with
handmade cards (36 percent). More girls (at 33 percent) than boys (25
percent) are planning to send Valentine’s Day wishes via social media.

Texting will also be a popular method for sending Valentine’s Day
greetings among both kids and adults this year. Thirty percent of youth
plan to send Valentine’s Day text messages, with teens ages 13-18 (44
percent) being more likely than tweens ages 8-12 (13 percent) to say
they will do so. To contrast, only 1 in 4 adults (25 percent) say they
plan to send Valentine’s Day text messages this year.

Battle of the Sexes

SOASTA’s research revealed that, while men (70 percent) and women (72
percent) both say they plan to send Valentine’s Day greetings, there are
differences in the methods men and women plan to use. Women are more
likely than men to turn to social media (29 percent versus 17 percent)
and texting (30 percent versus 19 percent) to express Valentine’s Day
wishes.

Nearly 1 in 5 (18 percent) adults who plan to send Valentine’s Day
wishes say they will send e-cards, according to the research.

Some men and women plan to skip Valentine’s Day greetings this year,
with 28 percent of women and 30 percent of men claiming they do not plan
to wish anyone a happy Valentine’s Day.

More Income, More Valentines

Additionally, the survey data revealed that household income may
influence whether or not Americans plan to send Valentine’s Day wishes.
Those with a household income of less than $50,000 (65 percent) are less
likely to plan to wish someone a happy Valentine’s Day this year than
those with higher household incomes of $50,000-$74,900 (73 percent);
$75,000-$99,900 (76 percent); or $100,000+ (78 percent).

According to the survey, adults with household incomes of $75,000 or
more (52 percent) are more likely to use traditional methods of sending
Valentine’s Day greetings, and the more they make, the more likely they
are to send a traditional paper card purchased in a store instead of a
text or greeting via social media than those with household incomes less
than $75,000 (36 percent). Conversely, Americans with household incomes
of less than $50,000 (28 percent) are more likely to send Valentine’s
Day greetings by text than those with household incomes of $100,000 or
more (18 percent). Americans with household incomes of less than $50,000
(25 percent) and $50,000-$74,900 (32 percent) are more likely to plan to
send Valentine’s Day greetings by social media than those with household
incomes of $100,000 (15 percent).

Few Americans seem to have time to make their own cards – only 12
percent of Americans say they plan to send handmade Valentine’s Day
cards this year.

“This week, millions of Americans are turning to online channels to get
ready for Valentine’s Day, and many of them will wait until the last
minute,” said Ann Sung Ruckstuhl, Chief Marketing Officer of SOASTA.
“This means digital businesses must be prepared for the influx of
traffic that comes with the holiday, or the user experience suffers.
Traffic spikes that accompany Valentine’s Day can cause websites to
crash, resulting in considerable lost profits and customer connections.
To avoid this, today’s digital businesses must continuously measure,
test and optimize their websites and mobile apps to ensure that
customers have the best possible experience.”

Survey Methodology

This survey was conducted online within the United States by Harris Poll
on behalf of SOASTA from Jan. 20-22, 2016, among 2,046
adults ages 18 and older and from Jan. 19-29, 2016, among 1,158 youths
ages 8-18. This online survey is not based on a probability sample, and,
therefore, no estimate of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.
For complete survey methodology, including weighting variables, please
contact Gaby Perez-Silva: gaby@soasta.com.

About SOASTA

SOASTA is the leader in performance analytics. The SOASTA platform
enables digital business owners to gain unprecedented and continuous
performance insights into their real user experience on mobile and web
devices in real time and at scale. With more than 100 million tests
performed and more than 200 billion user experiences measured, tested
and optimized, SOASTA is the digital performance expert trusted by
industry-leading brands, including 46 of the Top 100 Internet retailers,
six of the Forbes Top 10 media companies and seven of the Forbes Top 10
tech companies, including Apple, Target, Nordstrom, Staples, Home Depot,
Sears, Walmart, Etsy, Nike, Best Buy, Adobe, Intuit, Microsoft, DIRECTV,
Netflix and CBS. SOASTA is privately held and headquartered in Mountain
View, Calif. For more information about SOASTA, visit http://www.soasta.com.

Contacts

SOASTA, Inc.
Gaby Perez-Silva, 650-390-6700
gaby@soasta.com