For all of the positive points that have been made about social media marketing (we've even discussed it a lot here), many businesses are still resisting the urge to jump on the bandwagon.
Avanade, a global IT consultancy company recently conducted a survey, which revealed that fear and apathy act as key barriers to companies using social media. Over half of the respondents say their IT staff is concerned about it afffecting productivity, and sixty percent say their managers don't understand the potential of what social media can offer a business.
"Social media technologies are reaching a turning point -- they are no longer lingering outside the domain of IT departments. Companies that do not adapt to these changes or move fast enough will lose customers," said Mike Pazak, Vice President of Enterprise Business Solutions at Avanade. "We are working with organizations to deliver solutions that take advantage of the ways social media can impact customer relationships, opening up a new level of internal and external collaboration, trust and loyalty."
Some other interesting statistics to emerge from this survey include:
- More than 75 percent of companies worldwide admit that social networking will come into the business by stealth if not proactively managed.
- 9 out of 10 companies understand that the next crop of employees will usher social networking into the workplace.
- Approximately 60 percent of respondents say integrating social media technologies is not on the agenda.
- Only 18 percent of respondents have any kind of strategy in place to integrate these technologies within the company for employees.
- More than 60 percent agree that social networking is the next major step in collaborative activities and technology for a business.
- The key barriers to adoption of social media technologies are concerns about security (76 percent); senior management apathy (57 percent); and, fear of using unproven technologies (58 percent).
I can understand security being a concern (especially after the recent "facebot" stories), but productivity can actually be boosted by social media. Sure, it can be wasted too, but it all depends on how the employees are using it, and that can likely be said with just about other factors of their job description.
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That's OK with me!
If other businesses aren't quick to jump in to social media marketing, that's fine with me.
I've been socially marketing my safety and security products and website for several months now. I've made some valuable friends and contacts, increased my traffic and raised awareness for the need to stay safe. It's all good there.
There is little or no cost for this type of marketing, but it can be time consuming as you keep up with conversations from many friends on various social networks.
If the other businesses aren't interested, that's OK by me.
Way too powerful.
I agree with Debbie and I am confident that their fears will someday subside. When it does, those of us who have taken the time and attention to put things together and build our networks will be a step ahead of the game. The internet is way too powerful as a tool for many people to grasp, but the numbers show it has reached the same amount of audience within years, that took tv and radio decades to reach.
But, hey, as I said in agreement with Debbie- it's fine by me if other businesses don't want to try it out! Yuwie Me | FaceBook Friends | Qassia
Let us also be wary of
Let us also be wary of "jumping on the social networking bandwagon" simply because it's trendy, but without any real ideas on how it can help our customers (which helps our businesses).
I've heard "lets put up a blog!" more than once lately, and yes, it can be a great tool, but when it's a tool that only Marketing cares about, all you're going to get is a couple moldy posts about Marketing stuff. There won't be instant celebrity or a huge spike in sales as they've read about in all their "reliable sources", and they'll get discouraged.
It's a matter of finding something USEFUL FOR YOUR CUSTOMERS. If you aren't helping them, they won't care that you have a blog, or a myspace page, or a twitter or facebook or any of that stuff. Is it useful to a customer? Great, go for it. If not? Look elsewhere - they're smart enough to know a hollow attempt at trendiness when they see it.
RE: Let us also be wary of
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