We’ve been hearing a lot about the US Census Bureau lately, with the national census underway. However, the Census Bureau doesn’t just emerge, cicada-like, every 10 years. They’re collecting and analyzing data about the US population all the time.A brief look at Census info from October 2009 pertaining to Internet usage provides some interesting observations:
--68% of individuals access the Internet from some location (either inside or outside the home),
and 31% of US households have no Internet usage at home. It may be hard for us to imagine in 2010, but yes, roughly one-third of Americans are not on the Internet at all.--Demographically, the groups with the lowest percentages of Internet access and usage at home are blacks, Hispanics, those over 55, and those with a high school education (or less).
--However, among those groups, the percentages with Internet access somewhere other than home are still relatively high (blacks 68%, Hispanics 64%, 55 and older 63%, high school graduates 66%). The lowest number in this category is for those who are less than high school graduates—only 41% of that group has Internet access outside the home.
--73% of the unemployed have Internet access.
--Interestingly, Alaska has both the highest percentage of individuals with Internet access somewhere (79%) and the lowest percentage of individuals with Internet access at home (57%). Apparently, lots of Alaskans access the Internet outside the home. The Census Bureau doesn’t mention how Alaskan employers feel about that!
It's hard to believe that a sizeable portion of Americans—about one-third—is not online. These are important stats to remember when creating your next marketing campaign. As online marketing is a great tool, but traditional (non-online) methods still serve a valuable purpose and shouldn’t be overlooked or discarded. These stats show that in order to reach the majority of prospective customers, a fully integrated marketing campaign would have the biggest impact.
