Twenty years ago, losing your phone meant one of two things: either your house burned down, or some jerk ripped the whole thing off your kitchen wall. In those days, telephones were corded catastrophes, good for nothing except making phone calls. Of course, today a phone is so much more—a texting device, a calendar, a computer, a music player—every important (aka comfortable) aspect of the human experience is packed into this device the size of a notecard. But what happens when you lose it?

Facebook recently conducted a study in this field. The site found that people are attached—almost slavishly—to their phones. There are 51.2 million annual posts to Facebook about lost phones, each receiving, on average, twice the comments normal posts receive, and, in addition, these comments tend to be 56% more positive than normal comments. Even more telling, most “lost phone” posts come from mobile devices, presumably replacements or loaners from friends. When ones falls, another shall take its place—immediately!

What does it all mean? Facebook’s conclusions are rather humorous—the company calls for people to use a “lost phone” moment to come together into a community, and encourages companies to use this moment in unfortunate phone-losers’ lives to reach out to them and “be modern day Samaritans.”

Facebook’s conclusion sounds more like a nonprofit pitch than actual business advice. People do care about their phones—with passionate intensity. What this study really means is that you need to take advantage of mobile marketing—this is where your audience is spending most of their time. Increase your company’s presence on mobile sites or fall behind.

See Social Media Today for more.