Social media sharing company Shareaholic recently released data showing the explosion of Facebook referral traffic on mobile. According to the study, the traffic from September 2012 to September of this year grew by a whopping 253.25%. This mobile traffic growth contributed to Facebook’s overall referral traffic growth for the same period.
Consistent with Facebook’s Findings
The growth in Facebook’s overall referral traffic from September 2012 – September 2013 is 58.81%. This growth and the growth of mobile referral traffic are both consistent with Facebook’s figures, released earlier this year.
Facebook users went up 54%, from 488 million in March 2012 to 751 million in March 2013. User likes also increased by 67%, going from 2.7 billion likes generated daily in August 2012 to 4.5 billion likes in May 2013. The number of content items shared increased drastically, going from 2.45 billion content items shared daily as of August 2012 to 4.75 billion in May 2013 – a 94% increase.
Over Half of Referral Traffic Growth Attributed to Mobile
The study also shows that more than half of the 58.81% increase in Facebook’s overall referral traffic. Facebook’s overall growth increased by 3.84 percentage points, with Facebook mobile alone growing 1.98 percentage points. You can see the breakdown of traffic referrals in the graph below.
These results further show why Facebook’s third-quarter earnings are going up. Mobile ads contributed 49% of the $1.8 billion advertising revenue Facebook made in the third quarter of the year.
What This Means for You
These recently released findings mean multiple things for you as an online marketer:
- If your site is not yet optimized for mobile, it’s important that you optimize now. Moving to responsive design, ensuring that the elements of your site work for different mobile platforms, and implementing local SEO properly will help improve your visibility in mobile devices.
- Optimizing for Facebook is also very important. Make sure the information you present on your page is updated, and that all images tie in with your site. Have a sound content strategy in place, and interact more with the people who visit your page. Creating reasons for them to come back like surveys, discussions, and contests also help draw in more audiences – and Facebook’s audience is growing.
- Utilizing Facebook Ads can be a great way to funnel your audience to your desired landing pages. The numbers showing Facebook’s earnings from mobile ads show how many clicks these ads receive.
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