2.5 million LinkedIn members in the Nordic countries

The social network LinkedIn has grown to more than 135 million members and there are now 2.5 million members in the Nordic countries, according to statistics from Socialbakers.com. Sweden has the highest number of users, 862,000, but the highest penetration can be found in Denmark (14.62%).

linkedin statistics sweden denmark norway finland

More Americans find jobs via Facebook than LinkedIn
With its career focus, LinkedIn is often mentioned as an important social network for job hunting and recruiting. New statistics show, however, that more Americans claim to have gotten their current job through Facebook than through LinkedIn: 18.4 million compared to 10.4 million. Either way, social networks are increasingly playing a vital role in connecting the work force with available jobs.

Note: Iceland is not yet included in Socialbakers’ statistics.

Nordic communicators are lagging behind journalists in use of social media

PR practitioners and professional communicators at organizations and businesses are often experts in building good relations with journalists and other influencers that can help get their messages across to the target audience. Reading and monitoring traditional media has always been an essential part of the daily routines of PR professionals, we need to know who says what and where. With the strong growth in comsumption of social media, one would assume that most communicators had started to use social media by know, but according to a survey by Cision, there is still room for improvement.

Cision conducted a survey of journalists and professional communicators in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden about their attitudes to and use of social media. The survey revealed that journalists are becoming heavy users of social media such as blogs and micro blogs (like Twitter), especially in Sweden. As many as 42% of Swedish journalists and 26% of Danish journalists read blogs daily. In Norway and Finland the figure is slightly lower, 19% and 16%, respectively.

53% of Swedish journalists read blogs for research and 28% say that they blog as part of their work.

journalists-blogs-chart

Twitter is a lot more popular among journalists in Norway and Sweden, where one in four read it daily (27% and 25%). In Finland, only 4% read micro blogs daily.

17% of Swedish journalist write on micro blogs daily. When asked “how do you work with micro blogs?”, 36% said that they monitor what is written, 36% follow interesting people, 25% publish news, 21% build relationships and 21% read for research.

journalists-microblogs-chart

Among communicators, it is more common to read blogs in Sweden and Denmark, at least on a daily basis.

communicators-blogs-chart

Communicators in Sweden and Norway are the most frequent users of Twitter.

communicators-microblogs-chart

If we compare the use of blogs and Twitter between journalists and communcators in each country, we find that a larger percentage of journalists read blogs on a daily basis. This is quite interesting because it could signal that journalists are better connected to the blogosphere than professional communicators. And if as many as 53% of Swedish journalists read blogs for research (35% of Danish and 33% of Norwegian journalists) then communicators probably should put even more focus on building relations with bloggers.

denmark-chart

finland-chart

norway-chart

sweden-chart

Journalists are also more frequent readers of Twitter than communicators, with the exception of Finland. If for example 50% of Norwegian journalists read micro blogs at least weekly, why are only 32% of communicators doing the same? Shouldn’t they be out there to monitor and connect with influencers on Twitter? Well, I think so. Fortunately for communicators, there are people that they can turn to for advice, namely PR consultants (yes, people like me…). It turns out, not very suprising, that the individuals that uses social media most often are PR consultants. 52% of Swedish PR consultants read blogs daily, 50% in Norway and 35% in Finland (not enough responses in Denmark). As many as 61% of Norwegian PR consultants read Twitter daily, 34% in Sweden and 17% in Finland.

pr-blogs-chart

pr-microblogs-chart

Footnote: The report Cision Social Media Survey 2010 can be downloaded here.

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Police threaten Finnish blogger with libel claims

Free speach in Finland is under attack. Jani Uusitalo, a Finnish blogger was contacted by the Finnish police with a cease and desist letter which demanded he removed information from his blog about events at the elementary school of Korivaara. Uusitalo wrote about the headmaster of the local school who supposedly gave fundamentalist religious schooling to kids in the elementary grades (3-4). The headmaster contacted the police who demanded the information to be taken off the blog, which should be unconstitutional, only a court can order web pages to be shut down

Visit his blog for the full story in English. (Hat tip to Phil.)

Nordic media RSS feeds

I have compiled a list of more than 80 RSS feeds for Nordic media. Included are also press releases RSS feeds. I haven’t tried all of them and can’t guarantee they are working.

UPDATE: I have added 11 feeds for alternative publication Stockholms Fria Tidning. A reflection, how come that it is alternative media and the really big giants that are experimenting with RSS, but few players “in between”, like trade publications?

Sweden:

Beyan.net – Kurdish news

Dagens Nyheter – Top headlines

Dagens Nyheter – News

Dagens Nyheter – Business

Dagens Nyheter – Sports

Dagens Nyheter – Football

Expressen – News

Expressen – Sports

Expressen – Entertainment

Motornyheter FART – Cars and motor sports

Motornyheter FART – Cars

Motornyheter FART – Motor sports

Ny Teknik Technology trade publication

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Opinion

Stockholms Fria Tidning – “Inledare”

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Sweden

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Culture

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Calendar

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Reports

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Sports

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Stockholm

Stockholms Fria Tidning – “Synpunkten”

Stockholms Fria Tidning – TV/radio

Stockholms Fria Tidning – Foreign

Svenska Dagbladet Daily

Sydvenska Dagbladet Daily

Yelah.net “Radical digital news”

Norway:

Aftenbladet

Aftenbladet – News

Aftenbladet – Local

Aftenbladet – Norwegian

Aftenbladet – Abroad

Aftenbladet – Business

Aftenbladet – Politcs

Aftenbladet – Monitor

Aftenbladet – Commentary

Aftenbladet – Editorial

Aftenbladet – Sports

Aftenbladet – Culture

Aftenbladet – Magazine

Adresseavisen

Aftenposten

Aftenposten – News

Aftenposten – Norwegian

Aftenposten – Foreign

Aftenposten – Oslo

Aftenposten – Science

Aftenposten – Business

Aftenposten – Sports

Aftenposten – Elite Serie

Aftenposten – Premier League

Aftenposten – In English

Dagbladet

Dagbladet – Nyheter

Dagbladet – Sports

Dagbladet – Magazine

Dagbladet – Culture

Dagbladet – Friday

Dagbladet – Knowledge

Dagbladet – On your side

Digi.no

IT-avisen

itpro.no

Mobiltelefon.no

Teknisk Ukeblad

VG – Main

VG – Sport

VG – News

VG – Entertainment

VG – IT

Denmark:

Alt om København

Bizreport

Børsen online

Comon

ComputerWorld

CopyMagazine

Daily Rush

DR – News

DR – News (different feed)

DR – Sportss

Filmz.dk

Geek Culture

Netavisen Infopaq

Information

Ingeniøren|Net

MediaMac

Pressefotografforbundet

Sportenkort (10 latest)

TV2 Finans

TV2 Nyhederne

Århus Stiftstidende Netavis

Finland:

Helsingin Sanomat Daily, 5 latest headlines

Iceland:

Morgunbladid

Swedish press releases etc

Dagensbok.com

IBM – Swedish press releases

IT-universitetet in Gothenburg

Karolinska Institutet – News

Karolinska Institutet – Press releases

Skellefteå

Swedish Research News Blog