Dynamite in small packages: the Engaged Elite as an Facebook emerging niche market

Social networking sites, such as Facebook, have gained immense popularity as communication platform. Generation Y’ers have a strong need to engage and connect – both digitally, and in person. This paper examines the Facebook behaviour of Generation Y by means of a self-administered, campus-intercept survey of 383 university students. The purpose of this paper is to determine whether various clusters of Generation Y Facebook-users could be identified on the basis of their Facebook behaviour and usage. All multi-item constructs were subjected to an exploratory-factor analysis and a two-Step Cluster analysis. Three clusters, labeled ‘Engaged Elite’, ‘Neutral Masses’ and ‘Facebook Floaters’ were revealed. The results indicate that Facebook remains a feasible communication channel to initiate and engage in a number of marketing activities. However, the focus should not be on ‘pushing’ content and information, but rather on engaging the users – and to facilitate sharing between users across their networks