Facebook Becomes Most Popular U.S. Web Site

If you work for a business or own one, social media engagement is probably on your radar. The flow of marketing dollars toward the social Web continues unabated and is increasing exponentially. New data confirms that Facebook is a key platform that is changing the landscape of audience engagement and customer loyalty.

The site had a couple of traffic spikes during the holiday season that temporarily made it the largest site in the U.S., according to Hitwise. But for the week ending March 13th, the Web measurement firm reports, Facebook accounted for 7.07% of all U.S. Internet visits vs. Google’s 7.03%:

In early 2008, there were reports that traffic was plateauing, but that’s obviously not true anymore. The most recent surge seems to have begun shortly after Facebook introduced a new home page design in early February, and it accelerated after the introduction of Farmville in June — today the game has over 83 million active users.

Compared to the rise of social games on Facebook, there was little happening at Google to encourage traffic growth. Comscore still ranks Google ahead of Facebook — it’s the top site by reach (81% of the U.S. population). Facebook sits behind Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft at 53%, according to TechCrunch.

A recent study by Nielson Company showed that the average American spends 7 hours a month on the site:

And based on TechCrunch’s analysis of data from Gigya, 44% of social sharing on the Web is driven by Facebook:

Are you using Facebook as a marketing engagement tool? Please leave a comment and share your experience!

Tagged as: comScore, engagement, Facebook, Hitwise, Social Media, traffic