Thanks to my friend Steve Patti (@polarityinc) who sent this excellent whitepaper from Marketing Profs this morning entitled “The Naked Truth: Insights from the State of Social Media Marketing” dated January 14, 2010, which you can download at the bottom of this post. This is a really interesting read if you are wondering what works and what doesn’t in social media. I know I hear from companies on a daily basis who are scrambling to figure out how to get involved with social media the right way. The authors of this research did a fairly large survey, and included non-social media marketers to get an understanding of who is vs. is NOT using social media.
Here are a couple of excerpts:
1. Facebook is the most popular with 48.2% of companies having a corporate profile
2. Twitter is second most popular with 42.8% of companies maintaining a profile.
3. Ever wonder what industries are participating the most in social media?
4. Check out some of the Twitter tactics that worked vs. did not work as well
Here are some social media myths that the research indicates:
MYTH: Social media is “free”.
While the media may be free, the marketer’s time is not. The average marketer who spends 4-7 hours per day on social media activities is earning over $130,000 per year.
MYTH: Only young people are using social media.
While more young people are consuming social media, but good content is actually produced by older, more experienced social media marketers.
MYTH: It’s a good idea to have your 22-year old intern handle all of your social media activities.
It’s better to spread the work out. Let thought leaders lead thoughts, and customer service serve grumpy customers. (<– love that one!)
You can download the entire paper here. (However, you must visit Steve’s marketing blog since he pays for the Marketing Profs subscription!)
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