I know as soon as I finished my general ed calculus in college I never wanted to work with numbers again, but I couldn’t escape them! The world is controlled by numbers. From the economy, to sports, to business performance – you name it – numbers are associated in some capacity. However, when it comes to digital marketing; numbers, statistics, and analytics can be your best friend!  They allow businesses to better understand their social media efforts and improve the effectiveness of their campaigns. After all, there are over 2.23 billion people who visit Facebook every month, so even understanding the basics can help you get a leg up on your competition. Let’s dive into the numbers behind Facebook and how you can use them to your advantage.

As I said earlier, nearly 2.23 billion users log into Facebook every month! That is 30% of the world’s population on one site! To put that in to perspective, you would need 22,000 Michigan University Football stadiums in order to fit all of Facebook’s monthly users! In short, that’s a lot of people. Although, the sheer size of the platform doesn’t stop there.

Nearly 70% (227 million) of all Americans use the site on a monthly basis. With its nearest competitor being, Instagram, only obtaining 35% of the American population.  With Facebook having this large of a user base it is an amazing tool for businesses of all sizes to take advantage of, after all, it is free!

And let me tell you, businesses are definitely taking advantage of Facebook’s population resource!

According to Facebook’s second quarter results conference in 2018, nearly 80 million small and medium businesses have pages. This is a 23% increase from just the year prior. Because of the large amount of businesses on the platform and immense number of users, there is no surprise that it is effective as a marketing tool.

Over the course of 2018, 78% of American users have discovered and bought products from retailers on Facebook. Because of this opportunity for success, 98% of B2C and 89% of B2B businesses have ranked Facebook as their most important social media outlet. This can be attributed to the ease of use, number of users, advertising tools, and the ability to create dialogue with their customers.

In the pre-digital age customer service was much more challenging. However, with the creation of the internet, reaching out to customers and resolving issue, has become much easier. So much so that 59% of Americans think that social media has improved customer service efficiency for those businesses who are using it.

“We are all different, which is great because we are all unique. Without diversity life would be very boring.” – Catherine Pulsifer

Now we already know that businesses love Facebook because of the large amount of users, but what’s even more important is the diversity of those users.

With nearly 78% of Americans using Facebook every month, Americans make up nearly 10% of all Facebook users.

While you may think that is a lot, India’s user base is actually even greater, rounding out at 270 million or close to 12%.

The next closest Brazil, Indonesia, and Mexico rounding out the top 5 of largest amount of users.

In terms of the American user base the population is vastly diverse. According to Pew Research, of all internet users, 83% of women and 75% of men use the social network. Which tells you that no matter who you are trying to reach, they are more than likely on Facebook.

After gender demographics the site is broken down into age groups. While some younger people may say Facebook is “uncool” and they’re not using it, the numbers don’t li! With the largest group of users being 25 and under at 35%.

As well as 30% of its audience in the 25 to 34 age range.  However, most current teenagers don’t use Facebook. The 13 to 17 age group only makes up about 7% of the user base. Teens are more likely to use apps such as Instagram, Snapchat, and Youtube. Of course, the younger demographic is still going to be the chunk of Facebook’s users!

The older generations, however, are catching up. In 2018, American Facebook users over the age of 65 increased to 41%! Way to go, Grandma! Nearly doubling from the 20% in 2012.  The older generation has found the benefit in using Facebook, thus making it the most effective platform for businesses to reach their demographic.

Overall, Facebook is still a young man’s game. But as the rest of the world becomes tech savvy, the user demographics of Facebook are bound to become more even across the board. 

Nowadays, Social Media is the Easiest Place to go to Find Something. – David Nail

What is something that’s more valuable than money and more important than success AND we always wish we had more of it??? Time. We only have 24 hours in a day and let me tell you, people know how to spend time on Facebook!

The site makes up for 22% of Americans internet usage time, which is more than Google and Youtube combined. Because of this mass amount of time being spent on Facebook, there is a lot of information being shared every minute. 

Every 60 seconds, there are 400 new users created, 317,000 status updates, and 147,000 photos uploaded. Over the course of 24 hoursm the site generates 4 petabytes of data! That is enough data to fill over 6 million CD-Roms completely full. This amount of data is astronomical in comparison to the internet’s infancy!!

This can be attributed to users’ habits when it comes to the social platform. The average American spends 58 minutes on Facebook every single day. And with the average site visit ranging from 10-12 minutes, pages only have a few seconds to catch a user’s eye while they scroll.

With the introduction of mobile devices, Facebook can be accessed anywhere at any time. With nearly 90% of all users using a mobile phone or tablet to get on the site.  Because the power of the internet is at our fingertips, it’s hard to say no. Internet usage has increased exponentially over the years and there is no sign of it slowing down anytime soon.

“The goal is to turn data into information, and information into insight.” – Carly Fiorina

Because of these large sums of data being generated every day on Facebook. The site has implemented tools to help businesses make sense of it all.

The first of which being the Facebook Insights tool. Insights allows businesses and marketers to measure the success of their page. From likes, reach, engagement, and more! As well as learning more about your target audiences, demographics, geography, and buying habits. But most importantly, Facebook Insights allows pages to work with the Facebook algorithm instead of taking a shot in the dark and seeing how your content performs!

The insight page is automatically integrated into any business page. After clicking the insights tab at the top of your profile, it brings you to a page that is chalk full of data. The three main statistics that help give businesses a big picture view of their page’s performance is; page likes, post reach, and engagement.

Page Likes shows how many people have liked your page over a period of time. This is a great start to understand overall growth of your page.

Post Reach shows you how many people have seen your content. Having this information allows for businesses to hone in on what content is most popular with their audience. Engagement is the final metric located at the top of the Insights page. This shows likes, shares, and comments, as well as the number of people who saw the content. Engagement gives great insight on content performance and allows you to see if you social strategy is truly working.

Facebook is loaded to the brim with tracking tools that help beginners understand their contents performance. As well as having more in-depth tools for seasoned veterans to play around with.

While the amount of data that is available through Facebook may seem overwhelming at first, don’t be scared. Just taking a surface level glance at the numbers behind your Facebook page could yield impressive results. And if it does become too much be sure to reach out to us for help!