Simply Measured says 98% of top brands now have a Facebook fan page, with 60% posting at least one time per day. However, the frequency of posts is much less effective in engaging fans than a brand’s content strategy.

Visual content is by far the primary driver for engagement on Facebook, with photos accounting for 95% of total engagement. Overall, photos posted by top brands average more than 9,400 engagements per post, while video posts average more than 2,500 engagements.

Over the past few months, Facebook has made significant changes to benefit brands and users, including redesigning its News Feed to improve how visual content is displayed, and introducing clickable hashtags that allow brands to provide additional context with their posts. While 20% of posts now include hashtags, Simply Measured saw no measurable change in how hashtags influence engagement. These posts perform as well as posts without hashtags, suggesting that people are not yet discovering brand posts by their tags.

The Simply Measured Facebook study evaluates brands and verticals in the Interbrand 100, identifying key trends and strategies shaping the way companies engage with consumers through social media. Key findings include:

° Length of Posts Matter. Analysis of more than 500 status updates from the top brands shows that the longer a status update is, the less engagement it typically receives. However, if a status update is too short (less than 50 characters) it may not be long enough to capture viewers’ attention or provide the necessary context to drive engagement.

° Not Allowing Fans to Post on Walls Hinders Engagement. 29% of top brands do not allow users to post on their wall. For these brands, engagement on their page is limited to likes, comments and shares on brand posts, resulting in 15% less engagement than brands that do allow user posts. This is despite the fact that brands that don’t allow user posts have 71% more fans.

° Top Brands Take Different Approaches. The top 10 most engaging brands average 19.8 million fans (more than twice the 7.9 million brand average) and average 2.5 posts per day. A large variance exists in the number of times brands post, demonstrating the different approaches brands take to serving content.

° Facebook, MTV and Coca-Cola Top the List. Facebook claims the top spot with 93 million fans, followed by Coca-Cola and MTV with 68.6 million and 45.8 million fans, respectively. When it comes to overall engagement, only MTV made the leader list, following behind Disney, Ferrari and Intel.

° Automotive Brands Dominate the Top 10. Automotive brands are taking advantage of their fans passion for high quality car photos, posting more frequently than other brands and receiving nearly twice the Interbrand average per post engagement. Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Harley-Davidson and Audi USA all rank among the top 10 in engagement.

To analyze any Facebook profile for free, visit: http://simplymeasured.com/freebies.