( Mashable ) -- The new-this-year-yet-somehow-already-ubiquitous Facebook Like button has been around just long enough to generate some interesting numbers relating to Facebook users and web traffic . The button , which launched in April at f8 , Facebook 's developer conference , is now present on roughly 2 million sites around the web , from sports sites to news organizations and many other kinds of publishers . A media analytics lead on Facebook 's Developer Network Insights team crunched some numbers and found that Facebook Likes not only generate interesting data about the `` likers '' ( a.k.a . Facebook users who are also active on your website ) themselves ; this data also speaks volumes about clickthrough rates , time on-site and other engagement metrics . Stats about people . On average , a Facebook user who `` likes '' your content has more than double the number of friends than does a typical Facebook user . This could mean the user is more `` social '' or more influential ; on the other hand , it could mean the user is an attention-seeking narcissist . While it 's fatuous to read too much into that statistic , the number does show that the average `` liker '' is more active from a social-web standpoint . An even more interesting stat about the likers is that they click on five times more links to external sites than the typical Facebook user . If clickthroughs are what you 're looking for from your social media strategy , this is good news . Here 's a stat just for news sites : The average Facebook user who `` likes '' content on a news website is 34 -- that 's about 2 decades younger than the average newspaper subscriber . We 've known for some time that the future of journalism and social media are , at this point , inextricably linked ; this stat provides a little hard evidence for that conclusion . Stats about traffic . Most website owners are aware that Twitter refers a ton of traffic . It 's meant to be a content-referral network , so link-sharing and clickthroughs are a given in many cases . The Facebook `` Like '' button , however , might be bringing Facebook closer to competing with Twitter in the area of referral traffic , though . Since the button launched and was integrated on millions of sites , many publishers are reporting large increases in traffic specifically due to this kind of social plugin . ABC News reported a 190 percent increase ; Gawker 's traffic shot up by 200 percent ; Sporting News said their site traffic was up by a shocking 500 percent ; and NBA.com said that Facebook had become their second-largest referral source . Facebook relays messages from publishers saying that these users `` are more engaged and stay longer when their real identity and real friends are driving the experience through social plugins . '' As an example , NHL.com reported that pages per user was up by 92 percent , time on-site was up by 85 percent , video-viewing increased by 86 percent more videos and overall visits went up by 36 percent . Clearly , Facebook is only part of social media referral traffic , but it 's becoming a larger part as the network grows and users become accustomed to interacting with third-party and external content from within the comfort of their social graph . © 2011 MASHABLE.com . All rights reserved .
The like ##ness is now present on roughly 2 million sites around the web . User who ` ` likes '' your content has more than double the friends than a typical user . Button brought Facebook closer to competing with Google in the area of referral services .