It’s clear why less people are seeing the updates you post on Facebook. During the World Cup, your content was competing for news feed space with 3 billion engagements generated solely from the tournament.
There are now over 1.28b people and 30m brands using Facebook each quarter. With increased competition for exposure, businesses, especially small businesses with a smaller ad budget, are going to have to get creative to continue expecting exposure from the social network.
Despite declining reach and a more competitive landscape for business, Facebook outperformed market expectations. Lets dig into 25 updated data points, 9 new updates, and what small businesses need to know from Facebook’s Q2 earnings call.
25 Statistics Small Businesses Should Know From Facebook’s Earning Call
- 30 million businesses now have a Facebook Fan Page.
- 19 million businesses have optimized their Fan Page for mobile.
- Businesses are paying 122% more per ad unit on Facebook than they did just a year ago.
- 1.5 million businesses now spend money on Facebook ads.
- 399 million Facebook users only use Facebook on mobile each month.
- 829 million people use Facebook on a daily basis, an increase from 802 million last quarter.
- 654 million people use Facebook on mobile on a daily basis, an increase from 609 million last quarter.
- 1.32 billion people log on to Facebook at least once each month, an increase from 1.28 billion last quarter.
- 63% of Facebook users engage on a daily basis.
- 1.07 billion people use Facebook on their mobile device each month, an increase from 1.01 billion last quarter.
- The average Facebook user spends 40 minutes a day on the platform.
- 12b messages are sent per day through Facebook.
- Facebook messenger is used by 250 million people each month.
- Instagram is used by 200 million people each month.
- Businesses spent $2.66 billion on Facebook advertising, an increase from $2.27 billion last quarter.
- Mobile advertising revenue represented 62% of advertising revenue during the second quarter of 2014, a 41% increase year over year.
- Facebook users bought $234 million dollars worth of virtual goods and gifts on Facebook over the last quarter.
- Facebook engagement topped 1 billion during the world cup.
- Twice as many people now watch videos on Facebook in their feed compared to just six months ago.
- The majority ($1.175B) of Facebook’s revenue comes from US and Canada with Europe in a close second at $757 million.
- Facebook made an average of $6.44 from US and Canadian users in Q2 compared to $.86 from the rest of the world (total revenue divided by total user base).
- Facebook made $1.39 billion in net income during the second quarter of 2014.
- People search 1 billion times per day on Facebook.
- From June 12-July 13th 350 million people joined the conversation on Facebook related to the world cup generating 3 billion interactions (posts, comments, and likes).
- 80% of the top apps on iOS and Android use Facebook Login.
For additional reporting and 6 new strategies small businesses can leverage as a result of Facebook’s earning call, join Nathan Latka on Tuesday July 29th for a live webinar. (Space is limited)
Register by clicking here: heyo.com/earningswebinar
9 Updates That’ll Transform the Facebook Experience Over The Next 4 Months
- “Save” on Facebook, allows you to save what you discover on Facebook to explore it later.
- Facebook released “mentions” for public figures allows for quicker communication with your fans and other public figures while on the go. Currently, 800m people have liked public figure fan pages.
- Facebook acquired LiveRail to continue developing the future of video advertising for publishers and marketers.
- Facebook has made a release to improve the ranking algorithm for videos people and pages are uploading directly to Facebook. The algorithm considers how many people watched the video and how long they watched it.
- Facebook has released Slingshot, the second app from Facebook Creative Labs. Slingshot allows you to quickly share everyday moments with lots of people at once.
- Facebook has poached David Marcus, the former CEO of Paypal, to be VP of messaging products. When asked on the earnings call if David would be focused on payment initiatives, Mark replied: “There may be some overlap”.
- Facebook recently released the “Buy” advertising unit which will allow businesses to sell directly through a status update. When Mark was asked if Facebook was looking to sell goods, he replied: “We will continue doing work in payments. We still view ourselves as partner to others in payment space rather than trying to compete directly with that. Our main business is advertising.”
- Facebook will slowly release ads on Instagram focused on mobile engagement. Instagram could eventually generate $800 million to $1 billion in annual revenue, according to some analysts.
- Look for Facebook to introduce organic ways for brands to engage with consumers on WhatsApp and Instagram prior to Facebook inserting ads on those platforms. On the earnings call, Mark made the reference to Facebook adding the pages feature in 2006 to facilitate business to consumer engagement prior to releasing ads.
For additional reporting and 6 new strategies small businesses can leverage as a result of Facebook’s earning call, join Nathan Latka on Tuesday July 29th for a live webinar. (Space is limited)
Register by clicking here: heyo.com/earningswebinar
The Future of Social Marketing for Small Business Owners:
- Mobile engagement levels by consumers are increasing rapidly year over year. Advertiser demand for mobile ad units continues to be strong. As Facebook becomes a must buy across a broader set of advertisers, and given the company is limiting supply, there is significant room for pricing increases going forward. Takeaway: Ad unit costs increased 122% year over year. This is a concern for small business owners who don’t have huge budgets and is a reason small businesses should focus on building their email list from social traffic as fast as they can.
- Look for Facebook to continue advancing their messaging products with the addition of David Marcus from Paypal. It’s likely that David will blend the assets generated from the WhatsApp acquisition with his knowledge of online payments to create the worlds most transacted platform for peers to pay their peers. This will not be a method for consumers to pay brands. Rather, Facebook is betting on the “consumer-to-business” transaction play via their new “Buy” ad unit. Takeaway: Look for continued experiments around commerce within the messaging products.
- Zuck’s rule (that content sharing will double year over year) continues to play out as evidenced by 3 billion interactions during the World Cup alone. With a finite area of space in the newsfeed, and the supply of newsfeed content doubling year over year, small businesses who don’t have million dollar marketing budgets will need to find cost effective ways to create compelling content in order to break through the noise. Takeaway: Be creative with your content or suffer continued decrease reach.
- Commerce on social media is a space many social media companies are fighting for, including Twitter, Linkedin, and Facebook. With the test of the Facebook buy now button, brands can rest assured that they’ll be able to give social commerce a go within the coming months. I believe this ad unit will be incredibly expensive and targeted at big brands with million dollar ad budgets to start. The trouble is, I don’t see this ad unit ever being viable to a small business once Facebook rolls the unit out for all marketers. Takeaway: With limited ad unit availability, and big brands’ ability to pay more than a small business, expect to these ads to be dominated by the Fortune 500. They’ll be extremely expensive and only present in the newsfeed.
- Small business should continue focusing on building their own assets using Facebook as a means to drive traffic. The highest value asset a small business can build from Facebook is their email list as evidenced by Amy Lombard with Mixed Bag Designs last month. With her reach declining on Facebook, Amy tried a Facebook contest that asked users to enter their email for a chance to win her new bag design. Amy’s campaign attracted 1799 viewers and 582 decided to enter their email. Amy now uses the 582 new emails to sell more bags. Takeaway: Build your email list.
In summary, Facebook is looking to connect everyone, understand the world, and grow the knowledge economy. For small business owners with limited time and budget, continued focus on building small, organically grown communities on Facebook is the best route.
Use these communities to grow the relationship with your fans and then collect emails so you’re growing your own personal asset that you can use regardless of the reach decline that will inevitably continue over time on Facebook.
For additional reporting and 6 new strategies small businesses can leverage as a result of Facebook’s earning call, join Nathan Latka on Tuesday July 29th for a live webinar. (Space is limited)
Register by clicking here: heyo.com/earningswebinar
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Thank you for sharing how Facebook can be the marketing tool it has become for us.
Joseph,
Glad you enjoyed the article. Boom Care Squad – Aida Ingram
Hi Nathan, Awesome Article! First time I heard about this. Thanks for giving us this nice information about Facebook Q2 Earning.
Nathan,
We are glad you enjoyed it… Boom Care Squad – Aida