Canada Loves Facebook

The State of the Social Media Empire in Canada

Facebook Searchers Lead the Way

According to Google Insights, Facebook is the number 1 most searched for term in Canada today. In fact, since September 2007, Facebook has been the most searched for term on Google, surpassing the previous leader by average, lyrics. Perhaps there was a day when searching for lyrics on Google may have passed the time during those long winter months, but now that day belongs to the social networking site, Facebook. 

2008 is the Year of Facebook

Facebook’s meteoric climb among Canadian searchers using Google started in September 2006, when Facebook opened up their service to everyone, and not just to students with school email addresses. It certainly looks like 2008 is the year of Facebook, and Canadian Search Marketers had better stand up and take notice, if they haven’t done so already.

Follow the Red line of Facebook, in 2008 it’s nowhere but up on Google.

New Brunswick Really Loves Facebook

Regionally Facebook is usually the second most popular term behind a local city or province. Whitehorse for the Yukon Territory, Edmonton for Alberta, Vancouver for British Columbia, PEI for Prince Edward Island, and interestingly Facebook is the most searched for term in New Brunswick, in the last 7, 30, and 90 days, as well as the last 12 months. New Brunswick, out of all the provinces and territories, really does love the social networking site, in a big way.

Facebook is big in the UK

A similar success path can be mapped out for Facebook as a search term in the UK, only it has taken until July 2008 to surpass the leading search term for all UK searches as of late, The BBC. Just so Canadians don’t feel so bad about searching for lyrics (instead of something more info-pomp like the British Broadcasting Corporation), searchers from the United Kingdom also favour searching for games, where this search term had been duking it out for top spot with The BBC.

Facebook and the US

What is extremely curious to note, and frankly a little surprising, is that Facebook hasn’t even cracked the top 5 most searched for terms in the US. In fact, it only cracked the top ten 90 days ago - and it sits at the number seven spot, over the last week of reporting. You may find this striking, with a company so rooted in the USA, as Facebook is. However, I believe this just indicates how massive the overall search volume is on Google for the United States, and points out a nation that stll relies heavily on MySpace and Yahoo for their everyday online needs. It may be too early to predict, but it is quite possible that Facebook will not dominate the American search sphere for another two, three or perhaps five years. In the meantime, Search Marketers can hone their Facebook optimization monetization on Canadians (and the Irish, Scottish, Welsh, and Brits).

Food for thought.

CMA