Avatar Social Network has recently passed SL Universe in Alexa traffic rank, making it the leading dedicated platform for avatars to discuss virtual world topics.
“Now of course at the moment it may not mean much,” Avatar Social Network founder Arkad Baxton told Hypergrid Business. “But if it’s maintained or get even higher then it’s safe to say that Avatar Social Network truly is getting an active interest among virtual world residents making it slowly but surely the most popular social network for avatars and gamers.”
Avatar Social Network does even better when compared to its direct alternatives — Second Friends, SLX Connect, Moolto,  SL Space, and 2ndhub. In the chart below, the top blue line is Avatar Social Network, and the other social networks are far, far below, except for 2ndhub, for which Alexa didn’t see enough traffic to even put it on the chart.
Avatar Social Network began an active outreach and marketing campaign this summer, which included press releases and announcements sent to influential sites, and — disclosure notice — advertising on Hypergrid Business.
The platform also rewards users to post, in the form of credits that can be converted to virtual money at ATMs in Second Life, InWorldz, or Island Oasis.
How accurate is the comparison?
Neither Avatar Social Network nor SL Universe releases their traffic statistics, and Alexa is known to have some regional and demographic biases. Plus, Alexa itself says that rankings below 100,000 — which all the sites are — are not reliable.
However, if all of these platforms have similar demographics, then the Alexa comparison should be somewhat reasonable.
According to SimilarWeb, a new competitor to Alexa, SL Universe gets 280,000 visits a month, and Avatar Social Network gets 65,000. But SimilarWeb is extremely inaccurate for Hypergrid Business traffic numbers — we wish we had 120,000 visits in August, but we only had 27,000.
Quantcast puts SL Universe’s traffic numbers at just 22,700 people a month, but doesn’t have any data for Avatar Social Network.
Other networks
Of course, when it comes to avatars and social networks, Facebook — despite its problematic real names policy — is the platform of choice. Second Life, for example, has over 375,000 likes on Facebook, and there are a number of small Facebook groups dedicated to particular aspects of Second Life. SL Art, for example, has more than 3,000 members. SL Fashionistas has more than 4,000. And SL Metaverse Creations has more than 7,000.
Then there’s Google Plus, which has recently dropped its own real name policy.
Second Life has more than 9,000 followers and 4 million views on Google Plus. And there are smaller — but growing — mini-communities for virtual worlds on Google Plus, as well. Such as Second Life and other Virtual Worlds and OpenSim Virtual, both with over 800 members. SL Builders and Designers has more than 500 members.
Other social media platforms are used by avatars as well, including Flickr, Pinterest, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn.
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