By Christopher Heine, ClickZ, Apr 30, 2010

5Share

Facebook disclosed via a blog post on Wednesday that 50,000 sites have installed its new social plug-ins, such as the “Like” and “Recommend” buttons. The types of companies already employing the plug-ins vary, while their use of profile data is also nuanced.

Sites that have implemented the plug-ins – mostly the Like button – range from large publishers WashingtonPost.com and NYTimes.com, to the name-brand Levi’s, to gaming portal IGN.com, to small bloggers and retail upstarts. Some big players are already seeing positive results.

ABCNews.com has reportedly seen a 250 percent jump in Facebook referral traffic since launching the plug-ins last week. Jonathan Dube, VP of ABCNews.com, told PoytnerOnline.com, “We’ve opted to place the Facebook recommendations higher than the most popular recommendations, and the reason we’ve done so is because we believe that recommendations from people who are friends of yours are probably more likely to be stories that you’re interested in than a general ‘Most Popular’ list.” [read rest of article here]