Talk about being timely. On the eve of the release of the movie The Social Network come highlights from a soon-to-be-released report about mutual fund firms' use of social media.

Of the 16 companies Corporate Insight monitors, roughly a third are using their social media profiles to engage with their followers on a regular basis, according to the report entitled To 'Friend' Is the Trend: Social Media and Financial Services Today.

The study, which will be out next month, reaffirms Vanguard's reputation as a social media trailblazer.

"Vanguard has been the social media pioneer within the asset management space and provides a model for the industry in its use of Facebook, Twitter and the company's 'Vanguard Blog,' which was one of the first introduced by a mutual fund firm when it launched in February," according to a press release issued by Corporate Insight on Thursday.

TIAA-CREF, for its part, "is the first and only firm in the asset management space to develop its own online communities, first with 'Myretirement.org' and, more recently, with the 'TC Listens' community."

So how many people "like" these firms? A quick check on Facebook shows that as of 3:10 EST, 13,043 people like TIAA-CREF and 9,652 people like Vanguard. 

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