The 45 Facebook Statistics that Every Marketer Must Know To Win in 2019

You know that Facebook marketing is important. But do you know why, or which elements of Facebook marketing will be the most valuable to you?

If you don’t, that’s ok. Marketing changes quickly, and Facebook even more so.

It’s hard to keep up with all the changes (which is why we have our Facebook updates post refreshed monthly), and it can be even more difficult to know what they all mean.

We can help with that.

Fortunately, there are a ton of case studies and plenty of data released regularly about Facebook, user behavior, and their impact on marketers and businesses.

We did the heavy lifting and selected the statistics you must know to plan your 2019 marketing strategy and achieve the success you deserve with your Facebook advertising.

Last year, we compiled a useful list of 22 of the biggest Facebook marketing statistics in 2017.

In this update, we’re going to take a look at 23 of the most important statistics in 2018, those that you need to know to plan your strategies in 2019. 

They are grouped into 5 main categories:

• Facebook Demographics & Usage
• Facebook General Marketing Statistics
• Facebook & Mobile Statistics
• Facebook Ads Statistics
• Facebook Video Marketing Statistics

Facebook Demographics & Usage

Understanding who is using Facebook and how will play an important part in deciding what strategies you should use.

Here’s the big demographic statistics to watch.

1. There are 1.49 billion daily active users on Facebook, as of September 2018.

Facebook is still seeing consistent growth in usage, meaning that there’s a huge chance to connect with a large portion of your target audience.

2. Facebook users are accessing the site or app eight times per day on average.

Even if this means they’re just opening the app and doing a quick scroll, you have eight chances per day to catch their attention and engage them, whether you’re reaching out via organic or paid marketing. Think about the number of things you do eight times per day, and you’ll have the trouble of making a big list here.

3. People spend an average of 35 minutes per day on Facebook.

With people on the platform for this long, this is more than just idle scrolling every time they log on. People are engaging, socializing, and making connections. We’ll look at how exactly they’re doing that a little later on.

4. Facebook has more than 150 million daily viewers on Stories.

While this may seem like only a small fraction of the overall number of users on Facebook daily, this is still a huge percentage, especially considering that the Stories feature is growing. I always recommend that my clients use Stories, just because it helps you fight organic reach and increases the likelihood that engaged audience members will see your content on a regular basis.

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Facebook General Marketing Statistics

We know there’s a huge opportunity for connecting with our audience, so now let’s take a look at several general marketing statistics that showcase some buyer behavior, marketer behavior, and more.

5. 39% of users will follow a Facebook Page in order to receive a special offer.

Most people will take specific actions because it benefits them in some way, and it turns out that getting something to like a Page is no exception. If you want to incentivize a big growth in followers, try running contests, hosting a sweepstake, or creating an official Facebook offer to drive a few more likes.

If you really want to grow followers aggressively, make sure you boost the post or turn it into a paid ad for maximum visibility.

6. 57% of consumers say that social media influences their shopping.

Out of that 57%, a whopping 44% said that Facebook was most influential.
This is due largely to the fact that we’re using social media differently than we used to. Many users are utilizing the site as a search engine and a research tool, and the ability to see a ton of social proof and reviews quickly after discovering a brand (whether through search or ads) is a huge asset.

7.  Facebook has a total of 80 million Pages for SMBs.

If you go to checkout the statistics from last year, you’ll see that’s a big increase; last year, there were only 60 million. This does, unfortunately, mean that the competition is fiercer and that more businesses are flocking to the platform. That being said, many small and medium businesses (and even larger ones) fail to engage their audiences properly; if you’re able to do so, you’ll be good to go.

8. The average organic reach for a Facebook post is 6.4% of the Page’s total likes.

The key phrase here is “average,” because brands with consistently lower-engaging content and less on-platform activity will see reach rates even lower. Still, it’s good to have a solid number as a guideline, and to know what to expect. 6.4% of your total Page likes is much lower than we’d want, but it’s also better than the 2% number floating around.

9. 200 million people have joined Facebook Groups that they derive value from.

Facebook Groups was the big thing of 2018. More groups are popping up, and we’re rapidly getting new features (including the option to create paid groups and some outstanding group insights). If your business is able to create a branded group that provides value and a sense of community to your customers, you’ll have a better chance to showing up in their feed and building a relationship with them on social.

10. 78% of American consumers say they’ve discovered products on Facebook.

That’s an enormous percentage, and it shows that people are willing to come across products and services that would be useful to them and purchase. They just need to see ad copy that’s engaging and directly relevant to them, and they might need to see ads from a company a few times before they convert.

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Facebook & Mobile Statistics

The whole world is going mobile, and Facebook is no exception. Let’s take a look at a few statistics that reflect on what this means for marketers.

11. 47% of Facebook users exclusively use the mobile app.

Almost half of all users are only using the mobile app in order to access the platform, meaning that all of your content needs to be mobile-optimized. Look at creating more vertical videos, and keep long-form posts easily digestible with short sentences and paragraphs. And, of course, always ensure that any landing pages you’re sending people to is always mobile-ready.

12. 88% of Facebook users regularly access the site through mobile.

While only 47% of users are exclusively using the app, the majority of users use mobile at least sometimes. See the above for why this matters so much.

13. 96% of Facebook visits are made on smartphones; only 31.8% happen on desktop.

The fact that such a small percentage of Facebook visits happen on desktop is significant. That being said, sometimes longer duration periods of usage will happen on desktop, but you need to be ready to capture users no matter what platform they’re using.

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Facebook Ads Statistics

You knew we couldn’t have a post on Facebook statistics without including a section on Facebook Ads!

Here’s some of the latest research about how users are interacting with our ads and the impact you might see from them.

14. 26% of Facebook users who clicked on ads reported making purchases in one survey.

That’s slightly more than one out of four customers who click on your ad. This is relatively high click to conversion rate when compared to some other platforms, and it shows that there’s incredible selling potential if you’re able to connect with the right audience.

15. The average click-through rate (CTR) across all industries is 0.9%.

While the conversion rate can seem on the high side, that’s partially because CTR is so low on average.
Before you feel dejected, however, think about how many ads you scroll past and how many you click and convert on. It may not be a lot, but then you might become a loyal customer to a new brand you love.
Again, the key will be targeting the right audience and then just playing the numbers game.

16. A whopping 93% of social media advertisers are using Facebook Ads.

This shows how effective the ad platform can be.
The vast majority of advertisers would not be flocking to Facebook so religiously if they didn’t work or if they were “too expensive.”
If you aren’t getting the results you want, consider looking into the AdEspresso coaching calls so you can get on track and see success, too.

17. According to one case study, the most effective length for Facebook ad titles is four words, and link descriptions of 15 words.

I want to flag something here. This is a recent case study, and I think this is an OUTSTANDING place to start for most businesses. That being said, you shouldn’t follow this religiously, and instead, use it as a guideline to start testing.Your Ad copy will be highly subjective based on what you’re selling and who you’re selling to. AdEspresso’s Sarah Sal has written extensively about how storytelling in long-form copy can yield outstanding results will do well, and I always try to test different styles and lengths of ad copy when we’re working with new clients.

18. The average cost per ad increased 17% in 2018’s Q2.

This is a jump, especially because some small businesses find the ad system to be a little on the expensive side. This isn’t surprising, because even though new placements have opened up (see Stories Ads on Facebook and now the new marketplace ads), there’s so much competition. Fortunately experts don’t expect this kind of growth to continue, but for now, it’s what we’ve got.

19. Though ad costs rose, ad impressions have also increased by 21%.

Here’s the silver lining. Ad costs have gone up, but more people are seeing (and hopefully being impacted by) our ad campaigns. This speaks to the potential of Facebook Ads, and is a good reminder to keep testing different strategies, copy, and offers to see what works.

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Facebook Video Marketing Statistics

Facebook video marketing is incredibly important. This is easy to see from both these new statistics and a few from our 2017 post. Here are the biggest updates that you need to know.

20. One out of every five Facebook videos is a live broadcast.

Facebook live has continued to grow in popularity, and it’s still one of the most high-engaging strategies you can use on Facebook. Lives get more engagement than other video content on average, though most of it typically comes during the live broadcast.
For best results, make sure that you’re going live at peak hours when your viewers know you’ll be there.

21. 80% of users are annoyed when videos auto-play sound.

This coincides with the statistic below that shows that 85% of videos are played without sound.
People can deal with a little action catching their eye, but having loud sounds start playing when they didn’t choose to watch the video is another story– especially if they’re somewhere public. No one wants to have a tampon commercial start blasting out of their phone when they’re on the subway.

22. Caption video ads increase viewing time by an average of 12%.

Add closed captions to your videos. They’ll increase viewing time by ensuring that people can understand what you’re discussing even if they can’t or don’t want to enable sound, and they can help draw users in before they decide to play the sound or even start watching.

23. Nearly half the value of video ads is attained by users within the first three seconds.

You’ve got three seconds to catch their attention, as it turns out, the biggest impact that you have may be made in those same three seconds, too.
Really capitalize on that, explaining why customers should care and how you can offer value up front. This will make a difference and make your ad significantly more effective.

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Aaaaaaaand that’s it for 2018! 

Still craving a little more Facebook knowledge?

Let’s take look at 22 Facebook statistics from 2017 and what they mean for marketers compiled by Brad Smith.

The majority of these statists are still relevant and all show the importance of different aspects of Facebook marketing.

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22 Facebook Statistics You Need to Know in 2017

These stats will cover everything you need to know before you launch your next campaign, from audience demographics to Relevance Score to ad engagement.

Curious to see them all? Here they are:

1. At the start of 2017, more than 65 million local businesses had a Facebook page.
2. 79% of online adults use Facebook.
3. 42% of consumers do not follow brands on social media.
4. 42.2% of people like or follow a page so they can get an exclusive offer.
5. Every Facebook user has more than 1,500 stories competing for a spot in their newsfeed at any given time.
6. However, only about 300 of those stories are chosen to appear in the newsfeed.
7. 40.5% of people say they prefer ads that are directly related to their interests.
8. Ads with a Relevance Score of 3 cost about 73% more than those with a score of 8.
9. They are 167% more expensive than ads with a score of 10.
10. Ads with a score of 8 have a 77% higher CTR than those with a score of 3.
11. Ads with a score of 10 have a 158% higher CTR than those with a score of 3
12. 34.7% of people who unfollow a brand on Facebook do so because of low-personality or uninteresting posts.
13. 57.5% of people who unfollow a brand do so because of an excessive amount of promotional posts.
14. Shorter Facebook posts get 23% more interaction than longer posts.
15. Posts with photos receive 179% more engagements than other posts.
16. Videos are the most shared post type, with 89.5 average Facebook shares
17. The average number of videos posted by a page was 24 per month.
18. The average length of a Facebook video was 3 minutes and 48 seconds.
19. The average person only watched a Facebook video for10 seconds.
20. 85% of Facebook videos are watched with the sound turned off.
21. People are 1.5x more likely to watch video on a smartphone instead of a desktop.
22. Square video takes up 78% more space in a mobile newsfeed than landscape video does.

You can Jump straight to the one that picks your curiosity or keep reading! We’ve got one down and another 21 Facebook stats to go.

Facebook Users: Who is on your page?

Who exactly is on Facebook, to begin with?

The easy answer is pretty much everyone. Here are a few Facebook user statistics that may surprise you.

 79% of online adults use Facebook

For every five adults who use the internet, four of them are using it to check Facebook. This should give you a good idea of how many people are on Facebook. In a recent study, the Pew Research Center goes on to break things down a bit:

So, that’s the thorough answer to our prelim question.

But of course, all these people don’t like your business page specifically. Which has more to do with them than you.

42% of consumers do not follow brands on social media.

Some people just aren’t very liberal with their likes. Many of us tune out messages from brands we don’t recognize.

But that doesn’t mean you can give up. We’ll talk more about how to reach this group later.

First, let’s explore why your loyal fans clicked Like in the first place.

42.2% of people like or follow a page so they can get an exclusive offer.

They say it because it’s true.

Offering incentives to customers, like special deals for Facebook fans or access to online contests, increase your number of likes.

But that’s not the only way to attract fresh faces to your page. There are plenty of other things you can try, too.

Ever put up a winning post that really spoke to people?

Ever felt a small part of yourself perish as that post moved further down the page due to new posts taking up the top spot?

Well, get ready for a good old-fashioned resurrection.

Try pinning your greatest post to the top of your Facebook page, so new visitors will always see it.

Hubspot’s Facebook page pinned a fun video that really grabs a visitor’s attention:

Your whole goal with new visitors is to get something out of them.

You need a click, comment, like, or view. (Because you can use that to re-target them later.)

Pinning top content is literally the lowest hanging fruit you can imagine.

And the longer the post stays pinned to the top of the page, the more those numbers will grow.

Faking social proof at its finest.

Pinning posts can get newbies engaged with your cream-of-the-crop content straight away. But how do you draw said newbies in the first place?

Like a moth to a flame or a blinding light? (Except, without the whole bang, zap, dead, part.)

As the numbers said, many people hesitate to like a brand at all.

You can combat this by running your best ads for the people who need them most. Or, at least, are most likely to need them most. Lookalike audiences.

These are tailor-made Facebook audiences made up of people who share important traits with your current fanbase. The only major difference is that they’ve yet to take the plunge.

With lookalike audiences, you’re not targeting randoms who’ve never heard of you. You’re only targeting customers who are likely to be interested in your product.

You can stand out to these people right away by acknowledging the fact that they may have no idea who you are. Yet.

Fashion company Tobi does this well:

(Yes, I’m up with the fashion game. Don’t judge me.)

This ad displays another great benefit of lookalike audiences: you can use them to offer exclusives only to the hard-to-get leads you’re trying to draw in.

Facebook Demographics: Who finds your ads relevant?

Maybe you didn’t know that:

Every Facebook user has more than 1,500 stories competing for a spot in their newsfeed at any given time.

That’s a lot. Right? Too many, in fact.

Which is why…

Only about 300 of those stories are chosen to appear in the newsfeed.

Those 300 are the “relevant” posts, according to the Facebook algorithm.

But that word “relevant”… what exactly does it mean in Facebook-speak?

Many many things. For starters, it means an ad or post is connected to someone’s interests.

Why does that matter?

40.5% of people say they prefer ads that are directly related to their interests.

That’s more than double the amount who would prefer to see unrelated ads.

When people see ads that speak to what they care about, they engage.

And engagement matters on Facebook.

It increases your ad’s Relevance Score, for starters.

A higher Relevance Score means you’re paying less for engagement with your ad.

But how much less? Get ready for a data-dump:

Ads with a Relevance Score of 3 cost about 73% more than those with a score of 8

(Much too much.)

They are 167% more expensive than ads with a score of 10

(Multiply that against your Cost Per Lead.)

Ads with a score of 8 have a 77% higher CTR than those with a score of 3

(Getting warmer.)

Ads with a score of 10 have a 158% higher CTR than those with a score of 3

As you can see from the graph above, even one extra point can increase CTR significantly.

So how do you increase your Relevance Score?

First, check what your Relevance Score is in the first place. It could be 10, for all you know.

It could also be less than 10. A lot less. (It’s most likely a lot less than 10.)

And if it’s lower than you were hoping, your next step is to ask why.

Don’t assume that Relevance Score is a direct reflection of your ad copy. Even the best-written ad can get a low score if it’s run for too broad of an audience.

Exhibit A: this ad.

When we ran this ad for a broad audience, Facebook gave it a whole 2.9 points.

Little did the folks at Facebook know we were testing them.

And the test continued when we narrowed down the audience. Now, the ad only ran for users who had visited the our site in the past 90 days.

And the results were dramatic.

The Facebook custom audience increased the ad’s relevance across the board.

One of the reasons Facebook custom audiences work so well is because they allow you to make your ads more specific.

People don’t like to be treated like a name on a giant list. By narrowing down your audiences, you can say specific things in your ad that only apply to a small group.

You gots to segment.

The result: an ad that speaks to an individual and not the whole wide world.

Here’s an example from Best Buy:

This ad retargets customers who abandoned their cart. It’s giving them the final push they need to convert. It’s not generic. And that’s what makes it effective.

Great tactic, but unfortunately, not all of your ads will be retargeting ads like this one. In these cases, it’s helpful to have buyer personas.

Good buyer personas. Detailed buyer personas.

Try filling out this very detailed template from Blogger Sidekick to see if your buyer persona has what it takes:

Know your customers better than you know yourself. Turn bits and pieces of basic info into a guide on that customer’s feelings and thought process during the buyer’s journey.

Those feelings could be very different for your different personas. Use that to your advantage.

By playing to those unique feelings in each ad, you can create a campaign that’s relevant from start to finish.

Facebook Ads: What makes an ad interesting?

There are two sides to every Like button.

When someone clicks the Like button the first time, that means Like.

But when they click it a second time, that means Unlike.

Confuses me too.

Convincing customers to Like your page is a day one thing. Convincing them to not unlike your page is an every other day thing.

34.7% of people who unfollow a brand on Facebook do so because of low-personality or uninteresting posts

(Show some sass, people.)

57.5% of people who unfollow a brand do so because of an excessive amount of promotional posts

That’s why it’s your job to make every post and every ad as interesting as possible.

Easier said than done? A little bit. Not everyone will find the same posts interesting.

That said, there are some tricks that’ll never fail you. That’s why cliche sayings like “less is more” exist.

Speaking of which:

 Shorter Facebook posts get 23% more interaction than longer posts.

If interaction measures how interesting a post is, the results are unanimous. Longer posts just aren’t as interesting as shorter ones.

TrackSocial quantified this in a recent study. The graph below illustrates their findings.

Note the 1500+ point difference in response score between “tiny” posts (0 to 70 characters) and “large” posts (231 characters or more).

70 characters may seem a little light. But with the right words, you can keep all the important info in your content while cutting half the characters.

Start by editing out unnecessary words. For example, change “you can submit your application online” to “apply online.” Anywhere you can cut a word, get snipping.

(Meet concision: the most important lesson you’ve never learned.)

Meanwhile, you can also make your posts more interesting by posting about the things people are already interested in.

Create content that relates to your business and a trending topic.

There won’t be a clear connection between your company and every trending topic, but when there is it, take advantage of the opportunity before it slips away.

For example, Target doesn’t make a specific post for every individual product they sell. However, they do highlight products that they know people care about, like Taylor Swift’s new album:

(Yes, I’m also a Swiftie. Quit hating.)

It can be tricky to figure out what to post. But thankfully, it isn’t tricky to figure out if you failed or not. If something isn’t getting the engagement, move that strategy to trash and switch it out with some surefire ways to make your posts interesting.

Chances are, you’re already familiar with some of them. For example, you know to post pictures when you can.

Posts with photos receive 179% more engagements than other posts.

However, videos still reign supreme.

Facebook Videos: How popular are they?

Let numbers talk the talk.

Videos are the most shared post type, with 89.5 average Facebook shares.

Of course, videos are complicated. They deserve their own subset of stats.

That subset is brought to you by Business 2 Community. They analyzed 500 pages that posted Facebook videos in the first three months of 2017.

Here’s what they found:

The average number of videos posted by a page was 24 per month.

The average length of a Facebook video was 3 minutes and 48 seconds.

The average person only watched a Facebook video for 10 seconds.

So Facebookers are missing a good deal of these videos.

Lengthwise. And sound-wise.

85% of Facebook videos are watched with the sound turned off.

Consumers are watching your video during college classes and office meetings, after all. Having the sound on would just be rude.
And very conspicuous.

Desktops tend to be conspicuous as well, which is why so many of us watch Facebook videos on our phones:

People are 1.5x more likely to watch video on a smartphone instead of a desktop.

In light of that last handful of stats, check out these best practices to spice up your next video post.

First things first: optimize for mobile.

The Jane Goodall Institute recently ran a test on their Facebook page to find out which mobile video format sparked the most engagement. They created the same video in both square and landscape formats, and then they tested them against each other.

The square video won this round. By what we like to call “a landslide.”

It received twice the likes and thrice the shares as the landscape video.

Square video takes up 78% more space in a mobile newsfeed than landscape video does.

Here’s an eye-catching square video from New Scientist:

Make sure your video has enough space to shine in the newsfeed by putting it in a square format.

Now that you’ve got the format covered, it’s time to talk about time.

You don’t want your fans to miss the best part of your video. And they probably will, if they’re scrolling away with more than three minutes to go.

Just as text posts are best kept short, shaving time off your video is essential to getting your entire message across.

Don’t tackle too many things at once, though. Focus on one story per video to make sure your viewers actually watch it until the credits roll.

Toms has mastered this concept. Every so often, their page posts a “We Are What We Do” video. These videos provide short stories about one person who relates to the company:

Typically, they’re short. As in, 15-seconds-short.

One of the ways Toms keeps the videos so short is by including the bare minimum of info in the video. Then, they link to explanatory pages in the text part of the post:

Note that they also include a quote in this area, instead of including the quote only in the video. This way, Toms makes sure that even the people who watched without sound will see the quote.

You may also choose to include subtitles in your video.

Finding the right font, font size, and font color to ensure your subtitles are legible can be tricky. One way to get around this is to leave a space for subtitles at the bottom of the screen, like this CollegeHumor video does:

As a result, the subtitles are easily visible and the message of the video is clear.

Even to those viewers stuck in a boring meeting.

Conclusion

Facebook is essential for marketers and businesses of all sizes and from all industries.

Even with organic reach declining, both organic marketing and on-platform advertising offer huge potential to help you effectively connect with your audience in meaningful ways.

Users are still engaging with the platform regularly and enthusiastically, and they’re increasingly using it to find community instead of just getting updates.

If you keep that in mind, you’ll be able to adapt alongside the platform as it evolves and continue to see results, no matter how fierce the competition gets.

What do you think? Did any of these statistics surprise you? Which statistic will influence your campaigns the most? Share our thoughts and questions in the comments below!