“The Search Agency, a global online marketing firm and the largest independent U.S. search marketing agency, today announced wave II results of its 2012 Online User Behavior and Engagement Study, conducted online by Harris Interactive among 2,006 U.S. online adults from August 14-16, 2012. In addition to other findings, the study shows that, while Americans may be tweeting, searching and pinning to their hearts delight, they can’t pinpoint how some of the web’s most popular sites make a dime.Findings Include:

• We Know How to Post, but Not How They Profit – 70% of U.S. online adults know how to post on someone’s wall, but only 54% understand how Facebook makes money. Males demonstrated a higher understanding around Facebook’s monetization strategies at 57%, vs. females at 51%.
• Men Tweet, Women Pin – More online men know the character length of a tweet (37%) than online women (27%). When it comes to Pinterest, more women know what it means to “pin” something online (48%) than men (42%).
• Who is Padding Google’s Pockets? – 22% of U.S. online adults overall reported that they click on search engine ads (e.g. paid search links), but results showed great behavioral variances by region and age. U.S. online adults in the South showed the highest propensity to click on paid links (29%), nearly ten full percentage points greater than any other region: Northeast (20%), West (19%) and Midwest (17%). 30% of Americans ages 18-34 indicated they click on search engine ads, which is almost double the rate of Americans age 35 and older (18%).”