Some Rewards of Social Media Marketing

04/20/2009

Eighty-eight percent of marketers admit to using some form of social media to increase awareness of their businesses, according to a recent study by Michael Stelzner, sponsored by the Social Media Success Summit 2009. Interestingly enough, 72 percent of those polled stated that they have only been using the marketing method for the past few months or even less. The study was originally conducted in order to learn more about why businesses are using social media marketing in order to promote themselves. One important finding of the study was that the four most widely used tools used in this process were: Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

The survey began with measuring how much of a part social media played in the average company’s marketing strategy. The survey revealed that business owners are more likely to adopt some form of it than are employees working for a company that is not their own. The 30-39 age group was determined to be the most likely to use it and constituted 92.8 percent of those polled. The largest segment of those using social marketing was determined to be entrepreneurs with 30.2 percent claiming they are just getting started. However, the most experienced group was the small business owners (29.3 percent) which had been using the medium for years.

The survey also showed that these businesses have been investing a sizable amount of time in social media, with 64 percent spending 5 hours or more each week and 39 percent spending over 10 hours each week. An interesting finding by the study was that there was a direct link between the amount of time spent on social marketing and how long the company has been utilizing it. Those who are just beginning to use it typically put in 2 hours a week, while companies who have been at it for months are more likely to devote 10 hours a week.

The respondents in the survey claim that their number one benefit from utilizing social media is the fact that it garners attention for their businesses, something that Stelzner refers to as the “all important eyeball.” These efforts are seemingly paying off as most businesses owners who use them, 81 percent or so, state that they have reaped serious results. Also important is the secondary benefit of increasing web site traffic and growing marketing lists. In fact, two thirds of those asked stated that their traffic improved by investing as little as 6 hours a week in social marketing.

Finally, marketers were asked about which social media tools they were most interested in learning about. The winners in this case were social bookmarking sites and Twitter. The owners of small businesses were the group most interested in utilizing social bookmarking sites. Those most likely to use Twitter were those over the age of 40, which is actually consistent with other studies which have concluded that those over 40 are more likely to use the tool. Twitter is also on the top of the list for those who are just getting started, or want to invest less than 6 hours a week.

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