Last week it was announced that Facebook surpassed Google as the number one most visited website in the US. A Facebook fan page is still a popular option for businesses to reach their consumers on Facebook and AllFacebook.com lists a number of ways to monitor your Facebook page’s traffic whilst Webdigi.co.uk provides step-by-step instructions on how to set-up Google Analytics on your fan page. According to the article Webdigi has managed to successfully install Google Analytics on their fan pages and can track visitor statistics, traffic sources, map overlays and so forth.

Even though creating a fan page is the easiest way to get your business started on Facebook another option to engage with users on Facebook is to build an app. The top Facebook apps can be seen on AllFacebook.com and it’s the apps that add value to users that are the most popular. A recent study has shown that people are 67% (on Twitter) and 51% (on Facebook) more likely to purchase products from brands they have interacted with on social media.

In the last few months Facebook has implemented a number of new changes. The latest update is to Facebook’s search function which reminds of Google’s predictive search. It has been rumoured that Facebook will add location sharing but no official announcement has been made yet by Facebook. With more than 400 million users, it doesn’t look like Facebook’s popularity is going to decline anytime soon! What do you think of their new search function and Facebook’s plans to add location sharing?

Firebug
As a Firefox extension Firebug is useful to view, edit and inspect HTML, CSS and JavaScript on any web page in real-time. The extension allows you to filter and search for specific errors, download it from GetFirebug.com.

HTML Validator
HTML Validator is a Firefox Mozilla extension that will highlight the number of errors on a HTML page when you are browsing websites.

BrowserShots
BrowserShots is a free, open-source service where you can submit your web URL and see how your website will be presented in a number of browsers.

Xenu’s Link Sleuth
This free extension scours websites for broken links and when these links are fixed it will make it easier for search engines to crawl your website. Among others Xenu’s Link Sleuth will indicate which images don’t have alternative text, show you the sizes of all the images on your website and identify duplicate titles.

Word-of-mouth: Traditional still beats online
According to “Spurring social users to search” in-person word-of-mouth still tops online word-of-mouth and in-person referrals are more likely to direct a user to search for the recommended product or service online. Furthermore the report indicates that 30% of younger users (age 18 – 34) will search for a product online after seeing an “online referral” on a social network like Facebook compared to only 20% of the respondents in the 35 – 54 age group. This article provides an interesting look at the power of traditional word-of-mouth compared to online referrals and is a must-read for brands that use social networks to build brand awareness.

Twitter User Statistics
A recent study done by Barracuda Labs show that most Twitter users aren’t “active users”. The study analysed approximately 19-million Twitter accounts and according to them only 21% of Twitter users are active. An active user is defined as a user that has tweeted at least 10 times, has at least 10 followers and follows at least 10 people. The study show that 51% of Twitter users follow less than five people and 73% of Twitter’s users have tweeted less than 10 times. The conclusion: the updates on Twitter are coming from about 25% of Twitter’s user base. Download the full report from Barracuda Labs’ website for further statistics and information.

Facebook to add location sharing service
According to insiders Facebook users will be able to see the current location of their friends from April 2010. This new service has been in the making for about a year, according to the New York Times, although no formal announcement has been made by Facebook. According to Facebook they have more than 400-million active users and 50% of those users access the network at least once a day with 100-million people logging on from their mobile phones. It will be interesting to see how Facebook users receive the new service, read the full article for more information.