By Melanie Torres
It seems like just yesterday when MySpace was all the rage and Facebook was that cool new platform for college kids. Fast forward ten years later and now Facebook rules the world… and MySpace, well, let’s just not talk about that.
Not only does Facebook support over 1.7 billion users but it also has made some smart and powerful acquisitions that have proven to bring the company huge success. Back in 2012 people were blown away at Facebook’s $1 billion acquisition of photo sharing app, Instagram. Then just two years later they decided to one up their previous purchase by spending a whopping $19 billion on messaging app, WhatsApp. Shortly afterwards, Facebook rolled out their first stand alone app, Facebook Messenger and watched as over 200 million users downloaded the app within just a few months of it’s release.
Do you see a trend here? Hint, it’s one word.
Mobile.
Facebook is BIG on mobile, and for good reason! With the rise of smart phones, consumer mobile use for social media, messaging, photo sharing, and purchasing have been on the rise. In fact, 60% of social media time is spent on smartphones and tablets! With Facebook now at the helm of the four leading mobile applications in the world, the company packs a pretty hefty punch:
- Facebook (web): 1.7 billion users
- WhatsApp: 700 million users
- Facebook Messenger: 500 million users
- Instagram: 300 million users
Not only is the size of each of these companies huge but the growth and engagement has been phenomenal on each. Below is a chart from Statista that depicts the impressive growth of WhatsApp:
And take a look at the top five most ENGAGING social platforms on both web and mobile:
Bottom Line? Facebook has proven to be a force to be reckoned with over 40 acquired companies and a market capitalization of $177.78 billion! We frequently get questions about whether or not social media is a trend, and our answer is always to “not get married to the platform”. It’s absolutely true that individual sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and SnapChat may not be here to stay, but if we had to put money on it we’d say that Facebook isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
If you want to learn how to leverage your Facebook page into the powerful marketing tool it can be, sign up for our “Facebook for Business: Get Started” Workshop on February 3rd in Tampa, FL. You’ll learn:
- The difference between profiles and Pages
- How to set up a Page
- What and when to post
- Effective calls to action
- Promotions and contests
- The Edge Rank algorithm and how to make it work for you
- Using Facebook Insights to measure your effectiveness and improve your program
- Facebook advertising and promoted posts
Learn the basics of making Facebook effective for you. Seats are limited, so get your ticket today!