While social media has enabled companies and people to communicate faster and more effectively, a recent study by Socialbakers shows that only 5% of Wall posts on brand Facebook Pages ever receive replies.

Socialbakers is an online statistics portal that specializes in Facebook Pages and applications. The service believes that a healthy response rate to Wall posts should be between 65% and 75%. Currently this metric has reached a shocking low at only 5%.

According to the study, telecommunication and airline brands had the highest rate of answered Wall posts at 26% and 28% respectively. The media industry has a shockingly low response rate at only 1% of Wall posts receiving replies. The automotive industry is just as disappointing with a response rate around 2.5%.

One of the worst things a brand can do on Facebook is to create a Page and then close the Wall to comments and feedback. “If you want to be social and enter social media, then be social and talk to your fans, have them ask questions, do customer care there if necessary,” explains Jan Rezab, co-founder and CEO of Candytech – a Facebook marketing agency.

It’s possible that brands in the industries mentioned above lack the manpower to regularly monitor and interact with fans across multiple networks, but this is something that community managers should actively be looking to change. There are a variety of tools available to manage Facebook Pages. With over 800 million active users, anyone neglecting a community on Facebook is missing out on a huge opportunity.

[Via: Econsultancy, Image credit: Derrick Tyson]