Burson-Marsteller‘s “2010 Latin America Social Media Study” shows that only 49 percent of Latin American-based companies are using one of the most popular social media platforms – Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or a corporate blog – versus 79 percent of corporations globally. B-M analyzed 160 companies across countries such as Argentina, Brazil, and Chile. The results were compared to the findings of the firm’s February study the “Social Media Global Check Up Study.”

The most popular social platform is Facebook, with 39 percent of companies having one or multiple pages on the site. Twitter was second with 32 percent. However, the companies are missing a chance to communicate with their audiences. Fifty-five percent of the analyzed Facebook pages have comments from “fans” and 53 percent of the companies studied have tweets about them posted online.

The countries with the highest number of companies on at least one social media platform are Mexico and Venezuela; those with the least are Argentina and Puerto Rico.

Despite the lack of participation, Latin American companies have nearly twice the number of average followers as companies around the world – 2,626 followers versus 1,489 followers respectively.