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Best Social Media Stats and Market Research of 2010 (So Far)

Wednesday, September 8th, 2010

Data junkies, stats addicts, web trivia buffs rejoice — here are a deluge of social media, search and other marketing research facts and figures from 50 articles and blog posts published so far in 2010.

How are marketers planning to allocate budgets this year? What percentage of Fortune 100 companies are on Twitter? Which social networking site is used by 92% of senior marketing executives? What social media tool helps small business double their reach on Twitter? How do B2B social media marketing practices differ from B2C companies? What percentage of web searches stop after page one of the results? How much do small businesses spend on search engine marketing? How many journalists also maintain blogs?

Find the answers to these questions and many, many more here.

Social Media Statistics

Study: Spending On Email, Social And Search Rising by MediaPost Online Media Daily

Despite the fact that more than half of marketers responding to an ExactTarget survey planned to to either reduce their overall marketing budget for 2010 or keep it flat, 54% planned to increase spending on email marketing and 66% planned to increase expenditures for social media “even though about 80% of those acknowledged the difficulty in tracking ROI in the medium.”

National Survey Finds Majority of Journalists Now Depend on Social Media for Story Research by Cision

A national survey of reporters and editors revealed that 89% use blogs for story research, 65% turn to social media sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn, and 52% utilize microblogging services such as Twitter. While the use of social media sources by journalists is growing rapidly, the reliability of such information remains an issue, as “the survey also made it clear that reporters and editors are acutely aware of the need to verify information they get from social media.”

Social Media Not Preferred Recommendation Resource by MediaPost Online Media Daily

In a study asking consumers to rate the most influential sources of information for their purchase decisions, 59% said “personal advice from friends or family members,” followed by 39% search engines, 36% articles in newspapers or magazines, online articles 28%, email 20% and social media 19%. Three caveats: first, though low, the influence of social media is growing. Second, social media and search are rated more influential by younger buyers and high-income consumers than by other groups. Third, the survey was heavily consumer-oriented; b2b figures would be different. The key takeaway — companies can’t put all of their marketing eggs in one basket, but need to balance budgets across several areas including email, social media, organic SEO, paid search and offline campaigns.

Social Media: Everybody’s Doing It, But For Different Reasons [Charts] by Pamorama

While 28% of U.S. adults say they give advice about purchases on social networking sites, only 17% say they seek out such advice when making buying decisions. “70% of social media users between the ages of 18-34 regularly use Facebook more than other sites such as MySpace, Twitter, and Classmates.com,” and women use Facebook more than men.

Senior marketing execs see their companies moving to social media in 2010 by The Viral Garden

In a recent study of high-level marketing executives, 70% plan new social media initiatives in 2010. 92% said they personally use LinkedIn, versus 56% on Facebook. While 28% planned to use internal resources to launch new initiatives, 25% turn to social media consultants. The two most important criteria when hiring a social media consultant are examples of previous work and recommendations; number of Twitter followers is the 12th-most important factor.

Social Media Users’ Interests and Expectations Vary by Network [Stats] by Pamorama

Another notable Pam Dyer post, this one summarizing a study from online advertising network Chitika which shows that Twitter is the best place to share news: 47% of the outbound traffic from Twitter goes to news sites, vs. 28% from Facebook, 18% from Digg and an imperceptible share from MySpace. Digg is the most technical; 12% of its outbound traffic goes to technology sites, vs. 10% from Twitter and 7% from Facebook. And for what it’s worth, Pam points out that “celebrity/entertainment is the only genre in the top 5 of all sites.”

What Type Of Social Media Ads Are The Most Effective? by MediaPost Online Media Daily

According to a recent study from Psychster, “Among the seven most common formats, sponsored content ads — in which consumers viewed a page that was “brought to you by” a leading brand — are the most engaging, but produced the least purchase intent. Corporate profiles on social-networking sites produce greater purchase intent and more recommendations when users can become a ‘fan,’ and add the logo to their own profiles, than when they can’t. And ‘give and get’ widgets are more engaging than traditional banner ads, but no more likely to produce an intent to purchase.”

Study: Americans’ Social Net Use On The Rise, But Services Not Entirely Wasted On The Young by MediaPost Online Media Daily

Nearly half of all Americans are now members of at least one social network, double the proportion of just two years ago. While social network use is highest among the young, it’s not exclusively their club: two-thirds of 25- to 34-year-olds and half of those aged 35 to 44 also now have personal profile pages. 30% of social media users access a social media site “several times a day,” up from 18% in 2009. Also, nearly half (45%) of all mobile phone owners send text messages on a daily basis.

Deciphering Shady Social Media Stats by Social Implications

Yes, Facebook is a big deal, but there is no way it “controls 41% of social media traffic” as was reported in a post on Mashable back in April. Jennifer Mattern rips the statistical methodology behind this reporting to shreds and reminds us all of why it’s important to be skeptical of social media statistics that don’t sound quite right.

Social Media Revolution by YouTube

Social media stats in video form. Some of the numbers shown here lend themselves to the skepticism recommended in the post above, but all are documented so take `em for what they’re worth. There are more Gen Y’ers than Baby Boomers, and 96% of them have joined a social network. 80% of companies are using LinkedIn as their primary tool to find employees. 80% of Twitter use is on mobile devices. YouTube now hosts more than 100 million videos and is the second largest search engine. 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations when making purchase decisions; just 14% trust advertising. More than 1.5 million pieces of content (videos, photos, blog posts, links etc.) are shared on Facebook daily.

New Chart: Survey Says Inbound Marketing Budgets on the Rise by HubSpot Blog

In a study of 231 (likely a bit more social media-savvy than average) companies, 88% planned to maintain or increase inbound marketing budgets in 2010. 85% view company blogs as “useful,” while 71% said the same for Twitter (up from just 39% in 2009). More than 40% of respondents reported acquiring at least one new customer from Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook or their company blog in the past year.

Social Media: What a Difference a Year Makes by ClickZ

Erik Qualman updates some statistics from 2009, showing how rapidly this landscape is changing. If it were a country, Facebook would the third-largest on earth, up from fourth-largest in 2009. 80% of companies use social media in some manner for recruiting; of those, 95% use LinkedIn. 50% of mobile Internet traffic in the U.K goes to Facebook. And my favorite: “The ROI of social media is that your business will still exist in five years.”

Look Ma, No Hands: More Than Half Of Companies Say They Are Using Social Media With No Strategy by MediaPost Online Media Daily

Among companies who say they are using social media in a recent Digital Brand Expressions survey, only 41% said they had a strategic plan in place to guide activities, and only 69% of those (28% of all social media-using companies) have set up metrics to measure the ROI of social media activities. Worse, on 29% of firms with a plan in place (12% of the total) had written social media policies in place for employees.

52 Cool Facts About Social Media by Danny Brown

Two-thirds of comScore’s U.S. Top 100 websites and half of comScore’s Global Top 100 websites have integrated with Facebook. Twitter adds 300,000 new users and gets 600 million searches daily. LinkedIn has more than 70 million members worldwide — including executives from every Fortune 500 company. More than half of YouTube users are under 20 years old, and let’s hope they live long lives: it would take 1,000 years to watch every video currently posted on the site. 77% of Internet users read blogs, but only 14% of blogs are published by corporations.

Twitter Statistics

Twitter Demographic Report – Who Is Really On Twitter? by PalatnikFactor.com

Who’s really using Twitter? According to this report, 44% are between 18 and 34 years old. A slight majority (53% to 47%) are female. Just over a quarter of tweeters qualify as regular users, accounting for 41% of all traffic, but the 1% classified as “addicts” account for a third of all tweets. Twitter users tend to be readers of TechCrunch, Wired magazine and CNN.com, but also (ugh) PerezHilton.com — so make what you will of that.

2009 Twitter Demographics and Statistics Report by iStrategyLabs

The largest cohort of Twitter users (47%) are in the 18-34 age bracket — but the second largest (31%) are 35-49 years old. 74% of twitterers have no kids at home. Almost half are college graduates and 17% have post-grad degrees.

Twitter Usage In America: 2010 Statistics and Ad Agency New Business by Social Media Today

While many executives still dismiss Twitter as a waste of time, recent research suggests it is one of the most valuable social networks for business. Awareness of Twitter has exploded; 87% of Americans said they were “familiar with” Twitter in a poll taken earlier this year, versus just 5% in 2008. Although only 7% of Americans maintain an active Twitter account (vs. 41% who are on Facebook), Twitter users “are far more likely to follow Brands/ Companies than social networkers in general. 51% of active Twitter users follow companies, brands or products on social networks. Twitter users frequently exchange information about products and services.”

Facebook Statistics

Facebook: Facts & Figures For 2010 by Digital Buzz Blog

Interesting, though slightly out of date (Lady Gaga’s page is listed as 9th-most popular) Facebook infographic. Half of all Facebook users log in on any given day, and more than 35 million update their status. More than 100 million users access Facebook through their mobile phones. The US and UK have the highest number of Facebook users, but the #3 country? Indonesia.

Report: 6.8% Of Business Internet Traffic Goes To Facebook by All Facebook

How are employees using the Internet at work? A recent study concluded that almost 7% of all business web traffic goes to Facebook, twice as much as Google (3.4%) and well ahead of Yahoo! at 2.4 percent. DoubleClick got 1.7% of all business traffic due to its massive online banner advertising network. In terms of bandwidth use, YouTube takes the single biggest share at 10%, followed by Facebook at 4.5% and Windows Update at 3.3%.

The Ultimate List: 100+ Facebook Statistics [Infographics] by HubSpot Blog

Men and women both average about 130 friends on Facebook, but men there are more likely to be (or least claim to be) single (33% to 26%) while women using Facebook are more likely to be (or at least say they are) married, engaged or in a relationship (47% to 41%). The three most “liked” types of food pages are about ice cream, milk or chocolate. Facebook pages that use the words “collaboration” or “blogger” have on average three times as many fans as pages about SEO or optimization. Pages about movies and TV shows generally get the highest number of “likes” while those devoted to government and public service get the least. Within the U.S., Washington DC and South Dakota have the highest percentage of residents with Facebook accounts (one of the very few phenomena they have in common), while New Mexico has the smallest percentage of its population (10.3%) on Facebook.

Social Media Use in Large Enterprises

Social Media Trends at Fortune 100 Companies [STATS] by Mashable

Among the world’s 100 largest companies, two-thirds are using Twitter, 54% have a Facebook page, 50% manage at least one corporate YouTube channel and 33% have created company blogs. Overall, 79% of Fortune 100 companies are using at least one social media channel, with the highest use in European (88%) and U.S-based (86%) companies. However, only 20% of these companies (28% in the U.S.) are using all four major social media platforms. 69% of U.S.-based firms in the study have a Facebook page, but just 32% have posts with comments from fans.

Fortune 500 favors Twitter over blogging by iMedia Connection

Among the world’s largest 500 companies, 35% had Twitter accounts in 2009, but only 22% maintained company blogs. Less than half effectively used SEO.

Twitter Moves Ahead of Blogs in Fortune 500 by Social Media Today

Among Fortune 500 companies, 108 (22%) have an active, public-facing corporate blog. 93 (86%) of those blogs are linked directly to a corporate Twitter account. 173 (35%) of the Fortune 500 firms maintain an active Twitter account, including 47 of the top 100 companies on the list.

How Fortune 100 Companies Leverage Social Media [INFOGRAPHIC] by Penn Olson

Social media use by the Fortune 100 in visual Infographic form: the average Fortune 100 company follows 731 people on Twitter and is followed by about 1,500 (seems like small numbers for big companies). However, the average socially active Fortune 100 company has almost 41,000 Facebook fans and 39,000 YouTube channel subscribers.

Social Media in Business: Fortune 100 Statistics by iStrategy

According to a Burson-Marsteller study, 79% of the Fortune 100 are “present and listening” on at least one social networking platform. 20% of these corporate giants are using all four of the main social technologies (Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Blogs), and 82% of the Fortune 100 companies on Twitter actively engage with customers there at least once per week.

The State of Social Media Jobs 2010 – A Special Report by Social Media Influence

Although “the importance of social media certainly is resonating through many big companies,” just 59 of the Fortune Global 100 firms have hired staff specifically to perform core social media tasks such as customer outreach, PR, marketing and internal communications. The most social media “active” industry sectors include healthcare, telecom, retail and automotive, while companies in heavily regulated industries such as financial services, insurance, energy and utilities are among the social media laggards.

Social Media Use in Small to Midsized Businesses (SMBs)

Small Businesses That Blog Have 102% More Twitter Followers by HubSpot Blog

Still wondering if your business should have a blog? A HubSpot study of more than 2,000 companies showed that, for businesses of all sizes, companies that have blogs have 79% more Twitter followers than those that don’t. Blogging “increases Twitter reach by 113% for B2B companies and 30% for B2C companies.”

Where SMB Spend their Marketing and Advert Money? [Infograph] by Thoughtpick

At the other end of the scale, for small to midsized businesses, marketing budget allocations are changing. Traditionally, small business marketers have favored email and search, and spent the majority of their marketing dollars offline. In 2009, only one-third of SMB marketers viewed Faebook as “very” or “somewhat” beneficial. But for 2010, 74% planned to increase their use of email marketing and 68% planned larger expenditures for social media. Over the next five years, social media budgets are expected to grow at a 34% annual rate — twice as fast as all other forms of online marketing. By 2014, Forrester predicts that social media spending will be higher than that for both email and mobile, though still much smaller than search and online display advertising.

Small Biz Lead Gen Surges with Social by eMarketer

According to a HubSpot study, “not only can inbound marketing bring leads for less money but it can also double average monthly leads for small and medium-sized businesses.” Twitter reach is critical for increased lead generation: “Companies with 100 to 500 followers generated 146% more median monthly leads than those with 21 to 100 followers. Beyond the 500-follower mark, though, there was no further gain,” as is blogging — but the study noted that “Businesses must produce enough content for their blog to kick off growth in leads, which starts with about 24 to 51 posts…more indexed pages on Google also translates to more leads. Every 50 to 100 incremental indexed pages can mean double-digit lead growth.”

Social Media in Small Business is Anything But Small by Social Media Today

The prolific Brian Solis reports on recent research showing that social media adoption by small business doubled from 2009 to 2010. 61% of small business owners now use social media to help identify and attract new customers, 75% have a company page on a social networking site, and 45% expect their social media activities to be profitable within the next 12 months. 58% say that social media has met their expectations to date, and only 9% expect to lose money on social media efforts for the next year.

B2B Social Media Marketing Statistics

B2B Marketers Severely Lag B2C Players in Social Media by My Venture Pad

Andy Beal reminds us that “It’s a pretty well known fact that B2B marketers have been slower on the adoption curve of social media (than B2C marketers.” But why? One reason is executive buy-in (or lack thereof); in a recent study, one-third of claimed low executive level acceptance of social media was holding back efforts, while only 9% of B2C marketers said the same thing. Another is that 45% of B2B marketers said their company had a basic social media presence but didn’t use it as an active marketing tool; only 26% of B2B marketers concurred. Finally, “46% of B2B respondents said social media was perceived as irrelevant to their company, while only 12% of consumer-oriented marketers had the same problem.” If you’re one of those 46%, hopefully you’ll find facts and statistics in the following posts to help build a business case for social media in your company.

The Business of Social Media: B2B and B2C Engagement by the Numbers by Social Media Today

***** 5 stars
Brian Solis breaks down B2B vs. B2C use of social media marketing. B2B companies are more likely to maintain a company blog (74% to 55%), participate on Twitter (75% to 49%) and monitor brand mentions (73% to 55%) while B2C firms more often advertise on social networks (54% to 42%) and use Facebook (83% to 77%) and MySpace (23% to 14%) as part of their social media strategy than their B2B counterparts.

Will B2B Companies Embrace Social Media in 2010? by MediaPost Online Media Daily

B2C companies led their B2B counterparts in adoption of social media marketing because more people are active in social networks for personal use than business, making it easier to target someone who is interested in golf than, say, machine tools. However, B2B use of social media is on the rise, with 6 of 10 companies planning to increase their spending on social media initiatives in 2010.

Creating Engagement in B2B Marketing by Buzz Marketing for Technology

93 percent of participants in a social media in business study believe that all companies should have a presence in social media. And 85 percent believe “companies should not just present information via social media, but use it to interact and become more engaged with them,” according to Paul Dunay.

Vital statistics for every B2B marketer by Earnest about B2B

75% of B2B marketers use microblogging tools such as Twitter vs. 49% of B2C marketers. The biggest barrier to adoption may be CIOs; 54% of CIOs block social networking sites, such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, in the work environment. 93% of B2B buyers “use search to begin the buying process,” and 9 out of 10 say that when they are ready to buy, they will find vendors. Plus much more.

B2B Spending on Social Media to Explode by eMarketer

B2B marketing on social networks is expected to grow 43.3% this year, and Forrester Research B2B spending on social media marketing to reach $54 million in 2014, up from only $11 million in 2009. Paid advertising is expected to account for only a small portion of spending, but “when companies budget for social media marketing in 2010 and beyond, a substantial portion of their expenses will go toward other initiatives, such as creating and maintaining a branded profile page, managing promotions or public relations outreach within a social network, and measuring the effect of a social network presence on brand health and sales.”

Vital statistics for B2B Marketers by EarnestAgency’s Channel (YouTube)

An entertaining and creative presentation which makes the case that B2B actually leads B2C in social media marketing — because that’s where their buyers are. 37% of b2b buyers have posted questions on social networking sites, 48% follow industry conversations on key topics of interest, and 59% “engage with buyers who have done it before.” 53% of C-level executives prefer to find information themselves rather than tasking subordinates with this, and 63% turn to search engines for their research. Many of the statistics used in this video can be found elsewhere, but not in such an engaging fashion.

What B2B Marketing Tactics Are Up, Down, Flat? (Survey Sneak Peek) by Everything Technology Marketing

Holger Schulze shares results from a study showing how b2b use of various marketing tactics have changed over the past three years. Social media saw the biggest jump in activity, with 81% of respondents doing more of it (as Holger points out, “not surprising considering social media use in B2B was still nascent 3 years ago”). Content creation (68%) and website marketing (56%) are also increasing, while direct mail and print advertising saw the biggest drops.

SEO Statistics

First Page Or Bust: 95% of Non-Branded Natural Clicks Come From Page One by MediaPost Search Insider

***** 5 stars
In SEO, how important is a page one ranking? This post tells you: according to a recent study from iCrossing, across the three major search engines, 95% of the clicks came from page one. While Rob Garner notes that this figure is higher than in other studies, the clear implication is that doing some extra optimization to move your site to page one from page two or three can pay off in dramatic traffic gains.

Organic Search Still Reigns by eMarketer

Diving deeper into the iCrossing study referenced above, Google accounts for 74% of non-branded search traffic, with Bing and Yahoo tied at 13%.

Small businesses spending more on search by iMedia Connection

The average small business spent $2,149 on search engine advertising in the fourth quarter of 2009, up 30% from 3Q09 and 111% from the final quarter of 2008. Also, video is taking off in this segment: at the end of last year, 19% of small businesses were using video on their websites, up from just 5% the previous quarter.

Content Marketing

Most Valuable Content and Offers for IT Buyers by High-Tech Communicator

***** 5 stars
If you’re trying to sell to technology buyers, note that a recent study shows the types of content they are most likely to click on are “news and articles (84%), competitive comparisons and buying guides (73%), and promotional content (70%).” These decision makers are about equally to click on offers for promotional content, online tutorials and demonstrations, competitive comparisons and buying guides, free research, and educational content.

Search Engine Marketing

SEMPO Report Suggests Measuring ROI Still Challenging by MediaPost Online Media Daily

The share of North American companies using paid-search marketing increased from 70% in 2008 to 78% in 2009 and 81% in 2010. 97% of these companies use Google AdWords; 56% advertise on Google’s content network. 59% of firms anticipate spending more on search marketing in 2010; 37% say budget3 will remain the same, while just 4% planned to cut spending in this area.

Study: Three-Word Queries Drive Most SEO Traffic by Search Engine Land

Three-word search queries are the most common, at 26% of all searches; 19% are two-word queries, and 17% use four words. Yet for paid clicks, keywords of 4-6 words in length drive the highest average CTR at 1.1-1.2%. The overall average CTR for paid search ads was 0.91%.

Other Online Marketing Statistics

What’s Changed This Decade (1999-2009) by Virtual Video Map

An enlightening, graphic guide to many of the changes seen over the past 10 years, from the growth of the U.S. economy and national debt to the incredible expansion of Internet use. Examples: The number of Internet users worldwide grew from 350 million a decade ago to 1.7 million today. One out of five (actually now almost one of three) of those users has a Facebook account. Cell phone use increased from one of out of 10 people in 1999 to two out of three in 2009.

Did You Know? (video) by EducoPark

The top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 didn’t exist in 2004. Half of all workers have been with their current employer for less than five years. There are roughly one billion searches performed on Google every day — more than ten times the number just four years ago. It took radio 38 years to reach a total audience of 50 million people; it took the Internet just four years to reach that number, the iPod three years, and Facebook only two years. There will be more pages of unique information published this year than in the last 5,000 years combined.

SuperPower: Visualising the internet by BBC News

This slick tool visually illustrates the growth of Internet penetration, by country, from 1998 through 2008.

Small-Biz Success from Deeper Online Interaction by eMarketer

Ye shall reap what ye sow online, apparently: a study by American City Business Journals concluded that small businesses who were most active online achieved higher sales than those who made less use of the Internet. The study concluded that “‘Interactors,’ the most active participants online in almost all respects, accounted for only 15% of businesses but 24% of sales. ‘Transactors,’ somewhat less active online but the group most involved in online selling, also overindexed in sales. The least involved groups, ‘viewers’ and ‘commentators,’ also exhibited the worst business performance.”

Here’s What’s Really Going On In Online Media Consumption by Business Insider

Of the four largest daily print newspaper websites (the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal and USA Today), only the New York Times has gained visitors in the past 12 months — and that growth has been modest. Among weekly news magazine websites, The Week (focused on multi-source aggregation) has shown dramatic 170% growth in the last 12 months as Newsweek.com, once the leader in this segment, has seen a 17.5% decrease in traffic. Visits to the Huffington Compost are up 86% in the past year.

And Finally…

The Ultimate List: 300+ Social Media Statistics by HubSpot Blog

If this post hasn’t satisfied your data fix, knock yourself out with this extensive collection of videos, infographics and presentations compiled by HubSpot with still more social media stats and figures like: Twitter has 50% more activity on weekdays than on weekend days. Facebook is the most popular way to share information, followed by email, then Twitter. More than twice the amount of information is shared on Twitter as on Digg. 48% of bloggers are US-based, 2/3 are male, and 75% are college graduates. 35% of traditional journalists also blog. Social networks Bebo, MySpace and Xanga attract the youngest audience; Delicious, LinkedIn and Classmates.com have, on average, the oldest demographics. More than 210 billion emails are sent daily, which exceeds the number of “snail mail” letters sent each year. Etc.

Tags: Andy Beal, b2b social media, Brian Solis, Chitika, Cision, Danny Brown, Earnest Agency, Erik Qualman, Facebook statistics, Fortune 100 social media, Holger Schulze, HubSpot, Jennifer Mattern, Lady Gaga, Pam Dyer, Pamorama, Rob Garner, SEO statistics, social media research, social media statisitics, social media studies, social networking, Xanga
Posted in Marketing Research, Social Media Marketing | 5 Comments »

Best Marketing Strategy Insights of 2009

Monday, April 26th, 2010

What strategies and tactics should you employ to maximize business results online? What are the leading marketing thought leaders saying about marketing strategies in 2010? How effective is demand generation software? How do you select the right market research to support your goals? Why is content marketing becoming critical? What key trends on the horizon do you need to be aware of? Can you fire your sales force?

Get the answers to these questions and more here in the best blog posts and articles of the past year on marketing strategy.

12 Marketing Minds, One Free eBook by Search Engine Guide

Jennifer Laycock previews a free eBook from Valeria Maltoni featuring thoughts on marketing strategy and tactics from 12 online pros including Beth Harte, Christina Kerley and Matt Dickman.

Don’t Forget the Brand in SEO, PPC and Social Media by Search Engine Journal

Garrett Pierson advises marketers to capitalize on their brands in all areas of online marketing, such as by search-optimizing for all common variants of company and product names, and presenting consistent brand images and messages across all areas of the firm’s social media presence.

Peter Guber’s magic formula for marketing success by iMedia Connection

Jodi Harris summarizes highlights from Mandalay Entertainment Founder and CEO Peter Guber’s keynote speech at the 2009 Entertainment Marketing Summit advising marketers to overcome resistance to change, create memorable stories and great content in order to motivate prospects.

101 Tips from 50 Small Business Bloggers by Open Forum

Glen Stansberry supplies a wealth of strategic guidance packed into short nuggets from a wide range of business thought leaders like Seth Godin, Anita Campbell, Mark Cuban, Jared Reitzin and Matt McGee.

The Marketing Automation & Lead Nurturing Myth by Nurture

A brief but insightful post contending that there is no such thing as “demand creation,” only demand identification and lead nurturing–and counseling marketers to undertake the right kinds of programs, then have patience.

Web Strategy in 2010 by baekdal.com

Thomas Baekdal offers a 22-point checklist for maximizing the way the web works today, from content generation and social media to calls to action.

A CMO’s guide to picking the right market research by iMedia Connection

Michael Estrin advises companies on how to find the most meaningful data for their tactics and brand, including using aggregators help you figure out which data are best for your needs.

What made the Digital Marketing World-Go-Round? 10 Takeaways from the MarketingProfs Digital Marketing World Virtual Conference by Modern B2B Marketing

Maria Pergolino wraps up the key takeaways from this virtual conference, covering areas from social media integration and landing page optimization to relationship-building and sales-marketing alignment.

Content Marketing / Custom Publishing Research – Marketers Telling the Story by Junta42

Joe Pulizzi reviews research from King Fish Media on the state of content marketing and provides some interesting statistics on the scope and ROI of custom content creation. His conclusion: “We are all publishers now.”

7 Free or Cheap Ways to Effectively Promote Your Business Online by Dumb Little Man

Actually, this post presents eight strategies for online promotion ranging from social networking and video to PR and local portal sites. It also includes links to additional resources to dig deeper into each area.

5 marketing megatrends you can’t ignore by iMedia Connection

The brilliant Adam Kleinberg expounds on five megatrends–including mass collaboration, constant connectivity and globalization–and details their impacts on marketing strategies.

Why Content Strategy is So Important by Acsellerant

Bob Leonard argues that marketers must become publishers, then details the seven components of a successful content strategy.

In Social Media, It’s Not Just Business, It’s Business-To-Business by Brian Solis

***** 5 Stars
Social media thought leader Brian Solis disects shifts in b2b marketing spending, making extensive use of data from eMarketer on metrics such as changing budget allocations, objectives of using social networks and other social media sites, ROI measurements and more.

Preparing for a world without salespeople by iMedia Connection

Reid Carr muses about how the rapid increase of online information and spread of social media are changing the sales process, particularly for younger consumers. Making the case that “companies need to adapt to the changing environment, in which the next generation of consumers doesn’t want to talk to your salespeople,” Reid provides guidance on how different types of firms can adapt to this shift.

5 Social Media Myths by Digital Tonto

A thought-provoking post on the true impact (smaller than you may think?) social media will have on other, more traditional form of media and information distribution. Well worth a read.

Tags: Adam Kleinberg, Anita Campbell, Brian Solis, Content Marketing, demand generation software, Digital Tonto, Jared Reitzin, Jennifer Laycock, Joe Pulizzi, Junta42, Maria Pergolino, Marketing Strategy, marketing thought leaders, marketing trends, Matt McGee, Peter Guber, Reid Carr, Seth Godin, social networking, Valeria Maltoni
Posted in Marketing Strategy | No Comments »

Social Media is Simpler Than You Think

Monday, March 29th, 2010

With the tidal wave of how-to articles, jargon and self-proclaimed “social media experts” hitting the online world, it’s easy for marketers and business executives to view social media as something akin to the unexplored regions of the earth as presented on medieval maps—”here be dragons.” Potentially fascinating, but dangerous, mysterious and scary.

Social Media Demystified

In reality, social media marketing is simpler than you’ve probably been led to believe. At its core, social media is not about doing new things, but about doing things you’ve always done as a business person differently. Specifically, social media marketing involves five common, very traditional business activities. It provides a rich new toolset and set of techniques for carrying out these processes, but the processes themselves are familiar: listening, networking, interacting, information sharing, and promoting.

Social Media Listening

Think about “listening” in the broadest sense of the term, encompassing all of the things you do to keep abreast of what’s happening in your industry and your market. What are your competitors up to? What are the trends? What new products and services might help you operate your business more effectively and efficiently? What’s happening with prices? And most importantly: are your customers talking about you? And if so, what are they saying?

Business people have always had to do this, and have used a variety of tools: trade publications, direct conversations with vendors and customers, analyst reports, seminars and other events, trade associations newsletters and other sources. Social media doesn’t change the fact that you do this, but it does do two key things: it makes it easier for people to talk about your business, and it gives you new tools for listening to your market.

Social media reduces the friction of customer communications. Writing and mailing a letter to a company to complain about or praise their products or services is a lot of work. But expressing your opinion on Yelp, epinions, Twitter, Facebook or any social site is easy and takes only a few minutes—and your words reach a far larger audience.

Tools for social media monitoring (listening) range from free (Google Alerts, SM2 Freemium) to low-cost (uberVU) to sophisticated (Vocus, Cision). The brilliant Dan Schawbel of Mashable has written more about free social media monitoring tools and tools worth paying for.

Networking

From the dawn of commerce, business people have always used networking to meet new people and establish new relationships with suppliers, potential partners, industry experts, and most importantly sales prospects. Historically, most of this activity was done face-to-face, at trade shows, conferences, seminars and other industry events.

Physical networking at such events is still important. But social networking sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, Plaxo and tools like Twitter enable you to put this activity on steroids, building online relationships not only with people you’ve physically met but also with smart, interesting people literally across the globe who you’d unlikely ever meet in other contexts. The etiquette is similar (introduce yourself, ask questions, have something interesting to say, don’t immediately go into “hard sell” mode) but the tools are far more powerful and far-reaching than traditional networking.

Interacting

Interacting is simply the conversations that typically follow networking—following up, gathering more information, and asking and answering questions. Again, this is a traditional business activity that’s commonly been done by phone and for most of the last 20 years also via email. For confidential or highly specific communications, these mediums are still ideal.

But again, social media enables you to take interactions to an entirely new level. What about answering common customer or prospect questions? Social media makes it easy to answer such questions online not only for a specific prospect, or even all the prospects you’re aware of, but also for potential prospects not even yet on your radar. Your answer is not only available immediately to a larger group of people, but indexed and globally searchable (so you better have good answers!).

Social networking sites are among the key tools for social interaction, but such conversations can happen almost anywhere on the social web where people are talking about your brand, asking questions about products or services, or simply discussing what’s happening in your industry, including review sites, blogs, wikis and forums.

Information Sharing

Before the internet, sharing an interesting industry news article, how-to guide, coverage of a company or your own thought-leadership content was a tedious task involving copying and then physically mailing or faxing a document to selected recipients. Email made the process much easier, but distribution was still limited to known contacts.

As with listening and responding, social media has dramatically reduced the friction of such information sharing and dramatically expanded the audience. One can now post a link to and short description of interesting information to a LinkedIn group, Facebook page or Twitter stream in seconds and reach an audience of hundreds or thousands of interested individuals. Blog posts, news articles, product reviews, reports, images, videos, customer interviews, presentations and other information can be distributed to large groups with a few mouse clicks. And again, distribution isn’t limited to those you know, but also includes interested parties you’re not yet aware of—this enables prospective buyers to find you, exactly when they are looking for what you have to offer, instead of you having to use expensive, interruptive marketing techniques in the hope of hitting the right buyer at the right time.

Promoting

In terms of advertising, social media is much like other, more traditional online mediums. It’s as easy to place an ad on Facebook as on an industry publication website.

But the power of social media lies in its interactivity, in participation. In this respect, companies need to handle direct promotion carefully. While direct promotion through social media can work well for certain types of businesses (e.g. a restaurant owner tweeting about today’s lunch specials, or a retailer offering special discounts available only to fans on Facebook), it’s a delicate balance for most companies. Particularly in the b2b world, indirect promotion works best. That is, rather than trying use social media to tell people how wonderful your products and services are, it’s much more effective to demonstrate your knowledge by answering questions, sharing interesting and pertinent information, and highlighting third-party endorsements in the form of favorable reviews, blog coverage or customer comments.

Participation in social media is no longer optional for most companies. Customers, pundits and others are already talking about your industry and quite likely your company on these sites. Ignoring such conversations amounts to tacitly endorsing whatever is being said about your firm, your people, and your products or services. Understanding that social media doesn’t involve doing entirely new things as much as doing things you’ve always done, but in new and more powerful ways, should take some of the mystery and fear out of social media engagement.

Tags: b2b social media, Dan Schawbel, epinions, Facebook, indirect promotion, interruptive marketing, LinkedIn, Mashable, Plaxo, social media, social media demystified, Social Media Marketing, social media monitoring, social networking, Twitter, Yelp
Posted in Social Media Marketing | 8 Comments »

How to Avoid Social Media Mistakes

Monday, March 15th, 2010

Despite the widespread adoption of social media in the marketing mix, many companies still use this medium less than effectively. This is perhaps not surprising given that, according to recent research by Business.com, 40% of b2b marketers have been using social media as a marketing tool for less than a year, and 60% spend less than 20% of their time on it. This lack of experience can lead to several common, but avoidable mistakes.

One of the most common mistakes is expecting instant results. While the current tough economy is forcing marketers to do more with less and focus on productivity, social media isn’t like advertising: it requires a sustained commitment over time to build an online reputation as a helpful, knowledgeable resource, the kind of company your prospective customers will want to do business with. Giving short shrift to social media activities now, because it may not have an immediate impact on the bottom line, is short sighted. B2b companies that build a social media presence now will be best positioned for growth once the economy rebounds.

An even bigger mistake is ignoring the synergies between different forms and types of social media. Media sharing sites, social networking profiles, blogs and online reputation management tools are all part of a larger strategy of web presence optimization, maximizing your online presence through various forms of media and most importantly, interlinking these points of presence to maximize your company’s visibility in search.

For more guidance on maximizing the impact social media marketing can have for your organization, see 8 Common Mistakes in Social Media Marketing on the HubSpot blog. Avoiding these mistakes will help improve your organization’s online presence and website traffic now, and position it well to thrive once the economy turns around.

Tags: b2b social media, HubSpot, Social Media Marketing, social media mistakes, social networking
Posted in Social Media Marketing | 3 Comments »

(Almost) 100 (of the) Best Social Media Marketing Blog Posts and Articles of 2009

Monday, February 1st, 2010

Social media marketing activity exploded in 2009, and so did coverage of these practices. Every social media consultant, corporate marketer and PR professional was challenged to keep up with the latest writing on the topic.

So in case you missed any of these, here are almost 100 of the best blog posts and articles covering social media strategy and tactics, measurement, monitoring, research, pitfalls to avoid, policies, tools and more from 2009. Whether you’re looking for guidance on measuring social media results, justifying investments, utilizing best practices, finding the best tools, or just want to broaden your social media knowledge, you’ll find it here.

Social Media Measurement
and ROI

ROI Is Dead by StraightUpSearch Blog

Social Media Ad Metrics Definitions (PDF) by The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB)
Ryan Walker

Understand the Impact of Social Media by ClickZ
Jason Burby

Study: Social Media Pays by MediaPost Online Media Daily
Mark Walsh

6 ways to dispel fear and loathing of social media by iMedia Connection
Kevin Nalty

A Case in Proof: Selling Innovative Marketing to the Top Brass by My Venture Pad
Margot Heiligman

Social Media Measurement: It’s Not Impossible by Journal of Interactive Advertising
Chris Murdough

Top Ten blogs: Social Media Measurement by Seldom Seen Kid
Matt Churchill

How To Measure The Value Of A Fan Or Follower In Social Media by Search Engine Land
Kelsey Childress

Social Media Has Direct Influence on Brand Search by Marketing Charts

Social Media: The Need For Measurement by SEO Book
Peter Da Vanzo

6 Must Read Posts about the ROI of Social Media by Social Media Today
Maddie Grant

This Guy Gets the Basics of Social Media ROI by My Venture Pad
Zane Safrit

Measuring Results in Social Media Marketing by Optimize This

17 areas to benchmark for social media optimization by John Haydon
John Haydon

Measuring Social Media ROI: Why it fails by Social Media Today
Urs E. Gattiker

Socialnomics – Social Media ROI or Social Media Measurement? by SocialSteve’s Blog
Steve Goldner

Social media measurement: a 10-step guide by Econsultancy
Chris Lake

Social Media’s Elusive ROI by CIOZone
Michael Neubarth

8 Steps To Demonstrate Positive Return On Investment For Social Media Marketing by Jeffbullas’s Blog
Jeff Bullas

Social Media ROI: Does It Matter? by CIOZone
Michael Neubarth

Common Social Media Mistakes to Avoid

The Seven Deadly Sins of Social Media by Search Engine Journal
Jennifer Horowitz

B2B’s biggest social media screw-ups by {grow}
Mark W. Schaefer

8 social media sins to avoid by iMedia Connection
Chris Aarons

We Have Sinned by MediaPost Social Media Insider
David Berkowitz

5 Reasons Why 90% Of Social Media Efforts Fail by Community Marketing Blog
Andrew Ballenthin

Five reasons corporations are failing at social media by Social Media Today
Amy Mengel

Hiring for Social Media: The Ugly Side by Altitude
Amber Naslund

7 steps to avoid social media pitfalls by iMedia Connection
Taddy Hall

Social Media Statistics and Research

Did You Know 4.0 by YouTube

What Neuromarketing Can Teach Social Media by Social Media Today

Why Many Businesses Still Fear Social Media by The Marketing Mélange
Mike Frichol

Wow! Top execs say they are influenced by social networks by ZDNet Blogs
Tom Foremski

Winning with Social Media at Your Company: A Letter to the CEO by SocialSteve’s Blog
Steve Goldner

Survey: Most CMOs To Boost Social Media Budgets In 2010 (And It Had Better Pay Off) by MediaPost Online Media Daily
Mark Walsh

New Harvard Study: 30 Key Findings on How The CEO Engages With Social Media by Jeffbullas’s Blog
Jeff Bullas

Experts Predict 2010 the Year for Social Media ROI by ReadWriteStart
Dana Oshiro

Data: What are the Benefits of Social Media Marketing? by Mashable
Adam Ostrow

2009 in Review: The Rise of Social Media by The Milwaukee SEO
Tony Verre

Facebook Marketing

Facebook Lets Users Open Up Profiles by MediaPost Online Media Daily
Mark Walsh

Facebook is a Personal CRM for Baby Boomers by iMediaConnection
Daniel Flamberg

Facebook for Business SuperGuide by Interactive Insights Group
Robin Broitman

Facebook: Who you know; Twitter: What you know by Social Media Today
Thomas Crampton

SEO tips for Facebook and Twitter by iMedia Connection
Drew Hubbard

Social Media Monitoring

How to Build a Reputation Monitoring Dashboard by aimClear
Marty Weintraub

How to listen in a bad economy- 67 social media/web/reputation management tools and sites by Social Media Today
Marc Meyer

Online brand reputation or social media listening software – a review of 26 tools by SMART Insights Digital Marketing Blog
Dave Chaffey

Eight reasons to monitor social media and a list of tools for doing it by Chris Koch’s B2B Blog
Chris Koch

We Care: 5 Easy Steps to Make Listening a Form of Activity by SocialNetDaily
Anne Deeter Gallaher

Social Media Marketing Strategy, Tactics and Best Practices

5 Steps to build Social Media team by Social Media Today
Michael Brito

Are You Blogging or Doing Social Media for SERPs & Links? by SEM ClubHouse
Liana “Li” Evans

Social Media and SEO: 5 Essential Steps to Success by Mashable
Lee Odden

6 ways to simplify social media updates by iMedia Connection
Todd Tweedy

Managing Twitter Accounts for Companies by Ignite Social Media
Olivia Hayes

4 signs you’re a social media failure by iMedia Connection
Denise Zimmerman

100 Tips and Tools to Research the Social Web by Sociable Blog

10 Golden Rules of Social Media by WebWorkerDaily
Aliza Sherman

How to market your social media presence by iMedia Connection
Steve Glauberman

New e-Book: “GOING SOCIAL…” Developing a Social Media Program for Your Business, Your brand or Your Clients by CVMonologues
Gretel Going

When Social Media & PR Matters More Than SEO by Small Business Search Marketing
Matt McGee

Free Social Media Marketing Checklist by NikkiPilkington.com
Nikki Pilkington

16 Rules For Social Media Optimization Revisited by TopRank Online Marketing Blog
Adam Singer

Answers to Social Media Questions You Should Know by Xigaware

How to Extend Your Customer Experience Through Social Media by Harvard Business Review
Peter Merholz

10 social media strategies from top brands by iMedia Connection
Lois Kelly

10 Best Social Networking Tips for Business by Simple Thoughts

10 SEO tips for YouTube by iMedia Connection
Drew Hubbard

10 Ways a Start-Up Can Use Social Media to Market Itself by HubSpot’s Inbound Internet Marketing Blog
Edward Boches

6 socially savvy brands by iMedia Connection
Kent Lewis

How to maximize revenue through social media by Social Media Today
Jordan Julien

A scientific method to tame social media madness by iMedia Connection
Tamsen McMahon

The Social Media Marketing List: 45 things you should be doing but probably aren’t by Conversation Marketing
Ian Lurie

Report Reveals:15 Best Practices of Social Media Implemented by the Top 100 Brands by Jeffbullas’s Blog
Jeff Bullas

Social Media Policies

A Corporate Social Media Policy: Do You Really Need One? by Social2B
Kent Huffman

Online Database of Social Media Policies by Social Media Governance

How to create B2B social media policies by Chris Koch’s B2B Blog
Chris Koch

How a 40,000+ Employee Company Trains its Employees on Social Media by Mashable
Adam Ostrow

Social Networking

Why LinkedIn is essential for brand marketers by iMedia Connection
Lori Luechtefeld

Sphinn: SEO/Social Media Niche Site by Search Engine Marketing Group
Alysson Fergison

Social Media Tools

Google Wave: The Next Social Media King? by SEM Nook

6 social media platforms at a glance by iMedia Connection
Kent Lewis

20 Free Buzz Monitoring Tools by Econsultancy
Jake Hird

Social Media Marketing Guide by SEOmoz

Social Media Dashboard Aggregates Data by MediaPost Online Media Daily
Laurie Sullivan

The Big List of Social Aggregators by Search Engine People
Helen Overland

10 Social Media Tools – Best Kept Secrets by Junta42
Joe Pulizzi

Social Media for B2B Marketing

Why B2B companies need social media too by iMedia Connection
Reid Carr

How Social Media Monitoring Can Benefit B2B by Search Engine Land
Shellie Foriska

Seven Reasons B2Bers Ignore Social Media by Bianchi Biz Blog
Jim Bianchi

How To Sell Social Media to B2B Executives by Social Media B2B
Jeffrey L. Cohen

Crushing the Myth of B2B Social Media by Convince & Convert
Jay Baer

9 Ways to Find Your B2B Industry Influencers by Social Media B2B
Jeffrey L. Cohen

Online Reputation Management

SEO Tips For Building Your Personal Brand by Search Engine Land
Kevin Gibbons

Three steps for B2B marketers to build a personal social media presence by Chris Koch’s B2B Blog
Chris Koch

Social Media and Public Relations

The Convergence of Marketing and PR – What It Means for the Communications Professional by The Marketing & Communications Exchange
Stephen Debruyn

Tags: Chris Koch, iMedia Connection, Jeff Bullas, Mark Walsh, marketing on Facebook, Mashable, Michael Neubarth, Mike Frichol, Nikki Pilkington, Social Media Marketing, social media monitoring, social media policies, social media ROI, Social Media Today, social media tools, social networking, Steve Goldner
Posted in Social Media Marketing | 13 Comments »