Facebook's Momentum

In addition to its current audience of 845 million monthly users, Facebook also boasts engagement levels that surpass any other social networking site in the world, according to separate research from comScore.

Meanwhile, a growing number of large and small companies are using Facebook to engage their target audiences:

• Facebook is the top social platform among Inc. 500 companies, according to a study by the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth: 74% of Inc. 500 companies use Facebook to market their products and services, compared with 73% using LinkedIn and 64% using Twitter.
• Brand marketers continue to adopt Facebook, according to a survey from Awareness: 88% now have a Facebook Page for their brand, and another 6% plan to develop one in 2012.
• Facebook is a key marketing tool for SMBs (small and mid-sized businesses), according to research by MerchantCircle: 70% of local merchants use the social networking site for marketing, and 23% have used Facebook Ads.
• Facebook is the top outreach platform among event marketers, according to a survey from Constant Contact: Among those who use social media to promote their events, 88.8% use Facebook, compared with 66.0% using Twitter and 53.8% using LinkedIn.

About the survey: Findings are based on telephone interviews with more than 500 ad and marketing executives conducted by an independent research firm for The Creative Group in the first quarter of 2012. Some 375 of the respondents are marketing executives from companies with 100+ employees, and 125 of the respondents are ad executives randomly selected from agencies with 20+ employees.