Dark Social: The Dominant Force In Online Sharing [Infographic]

A recent report from Radium One shed some light on the concept of "Dark Social", the dominant but seldom discussed force in online sharing. This term was coined back in 2012 but what does it actually mean? Radium One defines it as "social sharing that occurs in private digital communication tools such as email and instant messaging".

It's important to mention that Dark Social refers to web traffic stemming from sources that cannot be tracked by analytics software. It occurs when users share content or links via communication platforms including emails, instant messages and forum posts, representing three times the social sharing activity of Facebook.

Even though the majority of advertisers focus on activities occurring "in the light" through platforms including Facebook and Twitter , Dark Social accounts for the majority of online shares. The infographic below shows that it accounts for an impressive 69 percent of global shares, compared to Facebook's 23 percent. In North America, it's slightly less but still impossible to ignore at 59 percent.

*Click below to enlarge (charted by Statista)