In just over six short years, Facebook (FB) has gone from a small niche site for Harvard students to a Web juggernaut with over 500 million active users. As of January 4, 2010, more than 100 million of those users were U.S. based.
Today, people of all ages, education level and economic status flock to the social media site to share their thoughts, photos and of course, their Likes.
With such broad appeal and an ever-growing reach, FB can offer an interesting glimpse into our cultural zeitgeist.
For example, Lady Gaga and Eminem appear to be the two most popular musicians among FB users overall. Except for Michael Jackson, these singers have the most Facebook users Liking their "pages" — approximately 25 million each. So we wanted to know which consumers brands have the most FB fans? What we found was eye-opening.
Sure, we expected Coke and Starbucks to be in the top 10, but a few others caught us by surprise. Take Converse. It's in the top 10 list not once, but twice. And mega-brand Nike? Nowhere to be seen. Then there's Skittles at No. 5. A yummy treat no doubt, but c'mon chocolate lovers! Surely, there's a chocolate bar out there that could best "the Rainbow."
Join us as we dig deeper into the top 10 consumer brand pages with the most Facebook Likes.
[To create our list, we browsed the All Facebook Pages list* and skipped any actors, musicians, television shows, movies or other non-product pages. In addition, we did not include Facebook, YouTube, iTunes or Windows Live Messenger.]
1. COCA-COLA
No. of Likes: 21,357,836
The Coca-Cola Company has a Web presence on Twitter, Flickr & YouTube, but hasn't bothered to join the Facebook party yet. Have no fear, superfans "Dusty" and "Michael J." to the rescue. According to the Coca-Cola page, "Dusty loved Coca-Cola and was in search of The Coca-Cola Fan Page on Facebook. He couldn't find one that felt official enough, so he set out to create his own. With the help of his friend Michael J, they created this Page." in doing so, they managed to score Likes from more than 20 million FB users, putting it solidly in first place as the No. 1 Liked brand on our list.
2. STARBUCKS
No. of Likes: 18,972,288
On the Starbucks page, folks give a shout out to their favorite beverages: "Peppermint Mocha!", "Caramel Frap!" and so on. It also offers an app called Starbucks Check-In which lets you use FB to check in at any Starbucks unlocking virtual holiday treats to share with friends. Further, you can reload a friend's (or your) Starbucks giftcard right on Facebook. WalletPop, however, thinks Starbucks could be a little more active on its status posts, why let an audience of 18+ million go to waste?
3. OREO
No. of Likes: 16,138,569
At first, it puzzled us how Oreos landed the spot as the No. 3 consumer brand on all of Facebook. No. 3, really? Then, we took a look at the Oreo page. Voila! Kraft gets it. The page is interactive, engaging and substantial. Fans can post their photo to get a chance to be featured as the "Fan of the Week", it shares recipes and posts status updates that routinely get over a 1,000 comments back in response. Well done, Oreo Facebook Page. Well done.
4. DISNEY
No. of Likes: 15,472,915
If you add all of the Disney pages together, this FB favorite would come out on top. While this Disney page alone was Liked by more than 15 million users, there's also the Disney Pixar page (6.8M), the Disneyland page (6.6M) and countless others. The main Disney FB page does a great job of cross-promoting all of these other pages too. Something must be working. On Dec. 5, 2010, Disney announced that it reached 100 million page Likes across its entire Disney Facebook network.
5. SKITTLES
No. of Likes: 14,544,182
The tone of the Skittles page is irreverant and lighthearted. It doesn't take itself too seriously and even carries its sassy voice through to the usually boring Info page, where it explains: "The Rainbow wants you to have fun on this page, but you've gotta remember a few things before you start your jibber jabberin': No bad languages and rude gestures, capiche? ..." Fans eat the Skittles' posts up. Liking or commenting back in droves on every random musing posted.
6. RED BULL
No. of Likes: 14,511,400
Running neck and neck with Skittles — with more than 14 million Likes — Red Bull's page is also robust and engaging. The page features contests, games and frequent posts from Red Bull on its wall.
7. CONVERSE ALL STAR
No. of Likes: 12,133,996
Surprise, surprise ... if any sneaker were to make it onto the list of the top 10 brands you Like, we would have bet good money that the honor would go to Nike. But, no, the crown goes to Converse. Fans of this Converse All Star page seem to dig sharing pics of their Chuck Taylors. We saw over 14,414 fan-submitted photos uploaded so far.
8. VICTORIA'S SECRET
No. of Likes: 10,824,003
Well, this one is no shocker. Coming in at No. 8 is the Victoria's Secret page. Two words: Slick and sexy. With a very polished and professional looking FB page, it sure looks like someone's Social Media marketing team has been working overtime. With plugs for its gift cards, Fashion Show, smart-phone apps and daily Wall posts, Victoria's Secret makes sure to maximize its facetime with its 10+ million FB fans. We give the intimate apparel company an A+ for making the most of the free eyeballs.
9. CONVERSE
No. of Likes: 10,249,110
The second Converse page in the top 10, it appears to be nearly the same as the other Converse All Star page with similar offerings. Perhaps, it wanted to catch fans searching on both terms: Converse and Converse All Star? Like the other, this page is overflowing with user-submitted photos and videos.
10. PRINGLES
No. of Likes: 8,632,621
Oh, humble Pringles, rejoice. It was not Lay's or even Ruffles, but you o'tubed one that made the top 10. With polls and interactive wall posts, Pringles goes out of its way to engage its fans. One of the most interesting functionalities of the Pringles page is the Overshare Button that lets you bust on friends whose posts are too dull or fall under the "TMI" category ... too much information!
* Number of Facebook Likes as of Dec. 27, 2010