Given the rise in internet, smart phone and technology use generally, it’s an easy bet that what’s happening online is more important in your industry than it used to be, regardless of what industry you’re in.
Good bets are nice. Statistics are better. For those, I often to turn to Pew Internet.
Officially, Pew Internet is called the Pew Internet & American Life Project. According to its website, Pew Internet is “one of seven projects that make up the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan, nonprofit “fact tank” that provides information on the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world. The Pew Internet Project produces reports exploring the impact of the internet on families, communities, work and home, daily life, education, health care, and civic and political life.”
I have subscribed to email delivery of new report announcements for years. That’s how I learned this morning about the rising internet use by people who are family caregivers.
The email was short and included info of interest to anyone in the health industry trying to reach caregivers. For me, that was enough info today. When its an industry or user base I’m more directly interested in — either for myself or a client — I click from the email to the report and dig deeper. Regardless, I now know that the statistics at least exist.
No one wants a lot of emails, and many of us are increasingly unsubscribing to email clutter in our inbox. What keeps me on the Pew Internet list is something really basic: I know what I know and I know what I don’t know. What Pew offers is information that’s much more important than either and certainly larger in scope: The Pew data makes me look at data and think about things I didn’t know that I didn’t know. Information that never fails to inform the rest of what I know about online behavior specifically and changing human behavior generally.
Where do you turn for that?
