When it comes converting customers, social advertising is the best at it, according to a new study by Aol Platforms in which 500 million clicks and 15 million conversions were analyzed in the first quarter of 2014 to determine how and where users made purchasing decisions. The best platform on social media By and large, the study showed that YouTube was key for not just introducing products, but influencing purchasing decisions, too.

According to CEO of Convertro, Jeff Zwelling, this is no happenstance. Google’s search results give key preferential treatment to YouTube video results. “YouTube’s own search volume and preferential positioning on Google’s results help drive large amounts of traffic, of course. But when you get to YouTube, the content is rich, descriptive, and usually helpful,” said Zwelling.

The infographic below delineates the purchasing funnel from product introduction to the last stage prior to a product being sold. YouTube shows to be strongest at the last stage, and Twitter appears to be the least effective of the social networks for influencing purchases.

Source: VentureBeat