NCAA March Madness on Facebook: Which Bracket is Most Popular?

March Madness has arrived—the time when Bracketology becomes an accepted form of science. Analysts and fans alike continue their last minute dissections, searching for something that could signal an upset (we’re looking at you Syracuse). Users of Facebook are no different, taking to the platform in hordes to discuss each team and hurl a few well placed insults at their peers from other schools. Freecast has taken advantage of the interest on Facebook, and partnered with TNT, TBS, TruTV and CBS to stream all the games live onto Facebook.

So, who is interested in March Madness on Facebook? We dove into our Facebook campaign data to find out.

Kony 2012 on Facebook: Breaking Down Invisible Children’s Reach

Over the past week, Facebook, blogs and the twittesphere have all been buzzing about Invisible Children’s new viral video campaign, Kony 2012. The Invisible Children non-profit began with a simple, but difficult concept — make people care about Joseph Kony, the Ugandan warlord who routinely kidnaps and uses child soldiers to maintain his power. The organization’s campaign goal was clear: make Kony famous (or rather, infamous) by creating a video so compelling, that hundreds of thousands of people would join the cause.

One week and 70 million views later on their 30 minute video detailing Kony’s regime, Invisible Children by all means achieved their goal. To put this feat into perspective, the Old Spice Guy took 5 months to reach the same level of YouTube views.

So, who are these new found supports? We dove into our Facebook campaign data to find out.

2012 Academy Awards on Facebook

Tonight the 84th annual Academy Awards, more commonly known as The Oscars, will be televised live in more than 100 countries. Viewers across the world will tune in to see who The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences selects as this years award winners.

War Horse, Moneyball, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, The Help, The Tree of Life, The Descendants, and The Artist are all up for Best Picture of the Year. Other most anticipated awards of the night go to best Best Actor and Actress in a Leading Role, with this years Oscar nominees including Brad Pitt (Moneyball), Gary Oldman (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy), George Clooney (The Descendants), Jean Dujardin (The Artist), Demian Bichir (A Better Life), Meryl Streep (The Iron Lady), Rooney Mara (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), Michelle Williams (My Week with Marilyn), Glenn Close (Albert Nobbs) and Viola Davis (The Help).

We tapped into our Ad Engine’s Facebook campaign data to see who would win if Facebook users across the United States had their say:

Super Bowl XLVI on Facebook: Giants vs. Patriots Players [Infographic]

We knew from our NFL playoff infographic published last month that America is a Patriot’s nation on Facebook. With Super Bowl Sunday finally here, we wanted to dig deeper and pit the New York Giants and the New England Patriots’ coaches and players against one another on the social network in a position-by-position breakdown. We tapped our Facebook advertising software for the data, and Patriots players trump in buzz on Facebook for every position we examined:

NFL Playoff Weekend: It’s a Patriots Nation, According to Facebook

This Sunday televisions across America will be set to watch the NFL conference finals, with the New England Patriots and Baltimore Ravens facing off followed by the San Francisco 49ers and New York Giants. Who are Americans cheering for this weekend? We turned to Facebook data from the Nanigans Ad Engine to find out, creating the below infographic:

Facebook Predicts the New Hampshire Primary Winner

Culminating with two Republican debates over the weekend, one of which was hosted by Facebook, there has been some serious campaigning over the last few months in our neighboring state of New Hampshire. The first in a series of nationwide Republican party elections, the New Hampshire primary garners considerable press coverage and is viewed by many as a strong indicator of how candidates will perform over the course of the entire campaign.

With New Hampshire voters flocking to the polls throughout today, we turned to Facebook and our Ad Engine to predict the winner, as judged by interest in the candidates on Facebook by New Hampshire residents. The result:

As political polls and analysts also predict, Mitt Romney comes out on top in our Facebook analysis (note: Romney has a summer home in New Hampshire). He is also the only candidate who comes close to competing with President Obama on Facebook, the presumed Democratic candidate that will run alongside the winning Republican candidate in the 2012 Presidential Election. A runner up, with approximately half the reach of Romney, is Ron Paul. Newt Gingrich falls in third place, with a quarter of the interest Paul enjoys. Rick Perry, Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum round out the bottom three in the race.

Momentum

Which candidate seems to have the most momentum across the United States? In September we looked at each candidates’ interest base on Facebook, and below shows growth since:

2012 Golden Globes: Which Best Motion Picture Nominees Win on Facebook?

The Hollywood Foreign Press Association just released their official list of nominees for the 69th Annual Golden Globe Awards. Since the formal 2012 Golden Globes won’t be held until January 15th, we decided to turn to Facebook to determine the winners today. We pit the Best Motion Picture nominees for Best Drama (6 films) and Best Comedy/Musical (5 films) against one another to see which have captured the hearts and minds of Facebook users in the United States.

And if Facebook were the judge, Bridesmaids would win the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture – Comedy/Musical, hands down.

50 Best Places to Work in 2012: Which Wins in Popularity on Facebook?

Glassdoor, an online career community with company and job information such as salaries and reviews, just released their 4th annual ranking of the 50 Best Places to Work. The ranking is unique in that it is generated based on reviews by the people who know about what it’s like to work at these companies best — their employees. We were curious how these companies’ popularity compared on Facebook, and below are the top 15 companies from the list with the largest net and popularity on Facebook:

All of the top 15 companies with the greatest Facebook reach are consumer facing, with business facing companies like Bain & Company and McKinsey & Company (ranked #1 and #2 best places to work by employees, respectively) not making the list.

Mobile Game Popularity on Facebook: Angry Birds, Crime City & More

70-80% of all mobile downloads are games, with analysts projecting the industry to hit $54 billion by 2015. Mobile game developers captured $87 million in ad revenue in 2010, and that’s expected to grow tenfold in the next four years. We looked at the top gaming apps right now for the iPhone, and were curious how their popularity translated into Likes and interests on Facebook.

Angry Birds by Rovio has been a top mobile game for a year with multiple apps releases, and love for the game is definitely reflected on Facebook: