EXCLUSIVE: Radio is Australia’s top performing industry on Facebook, having been crowned the social network’s most engaging for 2013 by the inaugural Annual Facebook Performance Report.

The Online Circle study, which used its media analytics tool Social Pulse to analyse data from January 1 2013 to December 1, identified radio shows from across the Southern Cross Austereo (SCA) network as the most engaging.

Seven radio show’s Facebook pages made it into the list of Australia’s top 30 most engaging Facebook pages and all seven were SCA radio shows.

Six are from SCA’s Today Network with Triple M Sydney also making it into the list. The now disbanded Fifi & Jules show was rated as third most engaging local Facebook page overall, behind only Tourism Australia and parenting community Babyology.

Radio’s result puts it ahead of industries with much larger Facebook fan bases such as TV shows and tourism, and miles ahead of other media including news and magazines and metro newspapers.

Lucio Ribeiro, Social Pulse’s managing director, told B&T radio came out on top because the industry recognised Australians use Facebook to share news and current events.

“On the other hand, many brands are still struggling in an old and simplistic model, with a limited approach to content and without incorporating current affairs and topical subjects to their content,” Ribeiro said.

“If you analyse the top 10 most popular topics in Australia by users you will find 100% are around news.”

The airline, travel and tourism industry experienced the most growth on Facebook this year, followed by TV Shows, FMCG snackfoods, electronics and fast-food brands.

Those with the least growth included FMCG beverages, alcohol, banks and other financial institutions and, despite it being an election year, politics.

The report, which also includes the inaugural Social Pulse awards, identified Tony Abbott as the largest political Facebook page but the Australian Labor Party had the highest rate of engagement (18.7%).

Tony Abbott’s ‘Happy Father’s Day’ Facebook message received the most likes (49,365) and Abbott’s “Thank you Australia, we won’t let you down” post received the most comments (11,650).

Ribeiro described Facebook as a serious marketing channel, and one that “offers one of the greatest opportunities for next year”.

“Based on our research Facebook is far from being a saturated place for brands and still offers a huge opportunity for many industries and segments.”

“If you are not seeing the benefit of utilising social media and Facebook then the channel  might not be a problem as much as your strategy/people deploying the execution.

“Fine tune your target, enhance your content, professionalise the execution, define the path your consumers adopt to buy your services and or product and allocate a dollar amount to Facebook collaboration to the path.”

For brands seeking to boost their engagement Ribeiro said Social Pulse has identified a clear correlation between high frequency and high engagement.

He also said posts should be 80 characters or less, brands should use images where possible and marketers need to identify their brand’s optimal posting frequency using social media analytics tools.

“Imagine that you are talking to a person, not a whole group,” he said, adding that the best performers have found the balance between organic and paid content.

To download the full report and see the winners of the Social Pulse Awards 2013 click here.