The latest monthly list of the Top 50 Branded Facebook Fan Pages is now available for January 2012, and several brands made impressive runs to kick off the year. While some brand grew slowly in the way I described recently on Mashable.com, many more brands bucked that trend and grew 5, 10, even 39% percent in one month.

Fastest Growing Facebook Pages

The fastest growing branded Facebook fan pages of January 2012, by percentage growth, are:

1. Nokia, which grew 39% and broke on the list at #50
2. Xbox, which grew 19% and moved up 3 spaces to #17
3. McDonalds, which grew 18% and moved up 1 space to #18
4. Google Chrome, which grew 15% and moved up 5 spots to #37
5. Mozilla Firefox, which grew 10% and moved up 1 spots to #46

Biggest Losers

As usual, those who lost ground in the chart did so despite adding fans. They just didn’t grow as fast as those around them on the chart. Those who fell the most this month include:

1. Monster Energy, which fell 3 slots to #20
2. Nike Football, which fell 3 slots to #35
3. Walmart, which fell 2 spots to #25
4. Reese’s, which fell 2 spots to #38; and
5. Taco Bell, which fell 2 spots to #42

Largest Branded Facebook Fan Pages, January 2012

Methodology

For more information on how we compile this list and which pages are included or not included, please see our main Top 50 page.

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President of Ignite Social Media, Jim Tobin, stopped by the NBC17 studio this morning to discuss Facebook’s recent announcement to go public. Watch the video below to learn what’s led Facebook to this momentous occasion and how going public might affect the other social networks like Google+ and Twitter.

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Continuing with the Facebook Fan Page series, I will be reviewing PlayStation’s efforts on Facebook.  Overall, PlayStation’s strategy on this channel is focused more on driving awareness of new PlayStation game releases than trying to raise awareness of the console itself.   Is it working? Lets take a deeper dive to see.

PlayStation Default Landing Tab: Find the Ring

To start with, the default landing tab for PlayStation is, “Find the Ring”, a previously held social media campaign to promote the game Uncharted 3.  Although it is always good to see marketer’s consider a post-campaign plan for a tab, I am a little disappointed that PlayStation chose this particular tab as its default landing tab. I would suggest that PlayStation consider a default welcome tab that could introduce non-fans to the PlayStation brand, and use current promotions around specific games to convert those users to Liking the page.

The Last of Us Tab

In  a tab called “The Last of Us”, users are prompted to Like the PlayStation Facebook page, watch the trailer for “The Last of Us”, and click “Submit” to receive a PS3 theme.  While I love that the brand used an exclusive angle to try to obtain new fans, I found it unfortunate that the tab allowed me to get a theme code without ever having to Like or watch the trailer.

Everybody Dance Contest

The  ”Everybody Dance Contest” is a  tab where Facebook fans can upload videos of their “Everybody Dance” moves for a chance to win a VIP trip to the PlayStation studios in London.  Sounds engaging at first glance, but the tab requires all users to connect and register before they can view entries or begin uploading their video.

With the high barrier to entry involved in video contests, I would suggest re-working the user flow so users can view videos and enter a video before asking for registration.  This quick fix is likely to help the contest receive more engagement from users who are willing to upload a video, as well as users who are more likely to watch and rate.

PlayStation Wall Engagement

On its wall, PlayStation consistently updates fans on the latest game releases, and does a good job cross promoting PlayStation blog content.  While these posts generate an acceptable number of likes and comments, I noticed that very few of the posts produce “Shares”.

For instance, only two of the last ten posts from PlayStation were shared, compared to 9 out of 10 Xbox posts being shared.  The difference?  Xbox seems to be varying content types on the wall and creating custom images to entice fans to share with their networks.  My recommendation would be that PlayStation should experiment with creating custom images and more open ended questions and see if the shares increase.

My overall takeaway?  PlayStation needs to focus its efforts on Facebook and consider tactics that help the brand stay consistent.  By creating a PlayStation branded Welcome tab, the brand could still promote different games and promotions but appear more consistent to the end consumer.  By testing and learning new forms of content, the brand may also increase social sharing.

What are your reactions to what PlayStation is doing?  Please share in the comments below.

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Facebook recently announced they are slowly rolling out a new ad type, allowing advertiser’s to reach users in the actual newsfeed.  These new units are now named “Featured Stories“, a move Facebook is trying to make to begin transitioning “Sponsored Stories” to “Featured Stories”. Here are a couple of things you should know about these new units.

Featured Units Function Similarly to Sponsored Stories

Right now, these “featured” sponsored stories units act a lot like Sponsored Stories, in that they are meant to amplify branded content to those who have liked the page, and raise awareness of the current activities of a fan to their network.  Facebook notes three scenarios in which a user may see a Featured Story:

• When a Page you like posts something new
• When a friend likes something (such as a Facebook Page or individual Page post)
• When a friend checks in somewhere, plays a game, or uses an app

Featured Units are Limited, For Now

Facebook has said they will try to limit the number of featured units to one per day per user, but has also hedged on this limitation, noting that users who visit their newsfeed more frequently may see more.  I personally feel Facebook is leveraging the limitation to avoid community backlash, while they are likely to rotate this featured unit to create more opportunities for advertisers.  This perceived limitation on these units will also likely mean these will cost advertiser’s a pretty penny.

What are your thoughts on these new units?  I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

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Continuing the Facebook Fan Page Examples series, our latest installment is about Dr Pepper. With about 10.9 million fans on Facebook, Dr Pepper has a stronger Facebook presence than competing beverages like Mountain Dew (about 6.3 million), but falls behind powerhouses like Coca-Cola (more than 36 million) and Red Bull (about 22.5 million). Nevertheless, the brand has found some clever ways to engage fans and has created a strong Facebook following.

Dr Pepper Landing Tab: Wall

When users come to the Dr Pepper fan page for the first time they land on what is one of the less interesting parts of the page, the wall. This tab, which is a standard feature on all Facebook fan pages, gives Dr Pepper fans the opportunity to share their enthusiasm for the drink, and many of them do. But, by having the wall as its landing page, Dr Pepper loses the opportunity to immediately convey some of its more dynamic messaging to fans.

TEN MAN’MENTS

Dr Pepper’s TEN MAN’MENTS tab is more interesting, introducing fans to a new product the brand is obviously very excited about, Dr Pepper TEN. Through this tab, fans can access an app that allows them to single out friends who have broken Facebook MAN’MENTS such as “Thou Shalt Not Post Furry Animal Videos.”

This app is a smart use of social media marketing in that it allows fans to express their enthusiasm for the product while simultaneously engaging their friends with Dr Pepper messaging.

Cooking with Dr Pepper

The Cooking with Dr Pepper tab continues this fan engagement by allowing them to share recipes they’ve created using Dr Pepper. Not only does this tab promote fan involvement, it also provides useful information and encourages users to think of Dr Pepper as more than just a beverage.

Dr Pepper Football Promotion

Dr Pepper’s Football Promotion tab leads fans to the brand’s $1,000,000 Tuition Giveaway, which also does a lot to add fans’ voices and faces to the Dr Pepper’s Facebook presence. This promotion lets college students submit videos explaining why they deserve to win tuition money from Dr Pepper. Then, other fans can vote for their favorite videos.

Dr Pepper’s Facebook Content Strategy

Dr Pepper updates its Facebook wall with new content about once or twice a day. This content includes links to videos, photos, reminders about the brand’s Facebook promotions and general updates promoting the brand.

And, fan response to these posts is significant – each post receives thousands of likes and hundreds of comments. Dr Pepper does a good job of engaging fans through clever questions or just by posting images that show the brand has a sense of humor.

Fan Engagement: Dr Pepper vs. Monster Energy

We decided to compare Dr Pepper to competitor Monster Energy, a beverage we looked at earlier in this series. This comparison shows that, though Dr Pepper has fewer fans, most of its posts received a greater fan response than Monster Energy’s posts. The posts that garnered the highest engagement rates were those that showed the brand’s quirky sense of humor with clever images or questions like, “If Dr Pepper had a middle name, what would it be?”

What does that mean? Through its social media efforts, Dr Pepper has continued its long tradition of positioning itself as a quirky, fun brand. Monster Energy, on the other hand, has done a good job of attracting fans with its focus on extreme sports, but has not engaged those fans at the same level as Dr Pepper.

What do you think about Dr Pepper’s Facebook page? Let us know by posting your comments below!

http://www.ignitesocialmedia.com

For two years now, I’ve been tracking the Top 50 Branded Facebook Fan Pages by size. We typically do this every month, and we’ve also ranked them by the impressions they generate, by how many friends their fans have, by percentage of active fans, and by how often they post.

From 2009 to 2010, we saw 19 new brands come on to the Top 50 list. In 2011, the list stabilized, and only 6 of the Top 50 are new.

The Top 50 Branded Facebook Fan Pages of 2011 versus 2010

Biggest Winners, Biggest Losers

Of those that were on the list both years, these brands moved up the most during the year:

1. Burberry, up 17 spots to #30, growing 177%;
2. Target, up 11 spots to #39, growing 124%;
3. Xbox, up 10 spots to #20, growing 114%
4. Playstation, up 8 spots to #12, growing 144%; and
5. McDonalds, up 7 spots to #19, growing 83%.

Special shout out to MTV, which was also the 2nd fastest grower on last year’s list (gaining 23 spots). This year, they climbed all the way to Number 5, growing an impressive 126%.

Of those that were on the list both years, these brands fell the most during the year:

1. Down 9 spots each are Zara, Victoria’s Secret Pink, Google Chrome and Mountain Dew;
2. Down 8 spots each are Starburst, Reese’s and Taco Bell; and
3. Down 7 spots each are Starbucks Frappuccino, Walt Disney World and Lacoste.

Something may have changed at Dr. Pepper this year. In 2010, they were the fastest growing brand, moving up 25 spots on 698.5% growth. This year, they fell 6 spots on 45% growth.

Falling Off the List

This year’s list does not include any of these 6 brand who had been on last year’s list. We said goodbye to:

1. Puma (had been 48)
2. Buffalo Wild Wings (had been 45)
3. 5 Gum (41)
4. Nike (49)
5. Forever 21 (44)
6. Chick-fil-a (46)

Every fan page we track grew in 2011, but those that fell simply didn’t grow as fast as the rest of the group.

For the full methodology, please see the original post.

Any surprises on this list for you?

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At Internet Summit 2011, I presented Secrets of the Top 50 Facebook Fan Pages, which provided a data driven analysis of the 50 largest Facebook fan pages, which I’ve been tracking now for more than 20 months.

I was able to do this analysis using social media marketing software from Expion, which allows me to receive data from virtually any Facebook fan page, regardless of whether or not we have admin rights to that page. The only exception would be “private” content, which might include pages with an age gate (like alcohol pages) or content that is geo-targeted.  So a big thank you to Expion for the data.

While the entire presentation is embedded below, I wanted to point out some of the more interesting findings after the embed. If you just want to get to the $12m for MTV, skip to the end, or slides 16 and 17 of the deck.

Certain Industries Seem to Have an Advantage

The Top 50 fan pages are remarkably grouped. Specifically:

• 14 are Packaged Food/Drinks
• 12 are Fashion Apparel Retailers
• 9 are Technology
• 7 are Entertainment/Recreation
• 6 are Food Establishment/Chain
• Only 2 are Other

Combined They Are a Force

To get into the top 50 branded Facebook fans, you have to have at least 5.8 million fans. The average page in the Top 50 has 14 million fans, and the largest page in the Top 50 (Facebook) has almost 55 million fans. Combined, they have 700,570,095 fans as of this study.

During the 60 days studied, the brands posted 3,579 times.

Average Brand Posts to Facebook Per Month

On average, the brands in the Top 50 posted 35.79 times a month. Assuming they are posting on business days (22 of them a month), that would suggest they post once or twice a day (average of 1.6 times per day).

This varies widely, though, with Entertainment brands posting 65.93 times a month and Packaged Food and Drink brands only posting 27 times a month. This may make sense, as entertainment sites have scads of good celebrity gossip to share with their fans.

The Top 5 posters (NatGeo, MTV, Xbox, iTunes and Walmart) grew 50% faster in a 90 period studied than the bottom 5 posters, so it seems that (not surprisingly) having an active page makes it easier to grow.

Facebook Wall Posts Drive Serious Impressions

When we looked at the estimated impressions crafted by the pages that get the most (MTV, YouTube, iTunes, Red Bull and NatGeo), we can pretty quickly see that they are getting serious volumes of impressions. From their wall posts and fan posting to the wall alone (not including tab impressions, we see the following:

• MTV generated 1,218,758,994 impressions in 60 days. (Yes, billion, with a B.)
• YouTube generated 640,093,006 impressions in 60 days.
• iTunes generated 422,886,740 impressions in 60 days.
• Red Bull generated 400,573,254 impressions in 60 days.
• NatGeo generated 374,453,923 impressions in 60 days.

Now, how did I calculate impressions for pages that I don’t control? Wasn’t easy, but Expion helped a lot. Here’s the math:

Impressions = ((FB Fans x Posts) x 16%) + (Fan Actions x Avg. Friends/Active Fan) x 12))

In other words, I took every post they did and calculated 16% of fans would see it (from a Facebook published study I read) and then took all the fan actions and calculated that 12% of their friends saw the post (from that same study).

Since coming home from the Summit, I’ve tested this methodology against 9 separate pages that we run for brands. While there is variability (some were low, some were high), overall the analysis suggests that this method was very conservative when compared to actual Facebook data provided through Facebook. If that were to hold for these pages, the impressions number would be significantly higher than what I estimated.

What I found is that the best pages in terms of performing were getting 57x more impressions than the bottom 5 pages, even among this group of elite pages. This shows the importance of quality newsfeed management.

Impressions Have a Dollar Value

If you believe that one purpose of advertising is to drive positive impressions among a group with a propensity to buy, then it’s logical that impressions among Facebook fans and their friends would be similarly valuable.

Using a CPM (cost per thousand impressions) of $10, which is quite realistic for a highly targeted online media buy, you can then value each of these pages work on their newsfeeds. And we find that, together, the Top 50 pages generated $84,600,000 worth of impressions from their updates in only 60 days. This equates, of course, to $42.3 million a month.

The largest share of that value went to MTV, whose 12 billion impressions are valued at $12,187,589.

(I’m going to go out on a limb and bet that MTV didn’t pay someone $6m per month to update their channel, so I’m assuming the ROI of updating the newsfeed, by this metric at least, is incredibly strong.)

I was personally pretty impressed by this metric. Not sure if MTV has ever done a similar analysis, but in an era when advertising budgets are often being cut, social contributing in this significant way can only be a good thing.

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