STUDY: 75% of Small Businesses Are Not Engaging In Social Media

October 10, 2009 | Sarah Chong

  Comments

• jclarey
  Sarah, I think you said it all with this statement: "Building relationships takes time and a lot of sincerity, but the result is increased customer retention and brand presence." I work in the learning technology field and the same thing applies there. I think some companies think they can just add an icon for a Facebook group and do the same old marketing push through it or, expect people to just "go there" and talk with them. The companies that understand what social media is about - interaction, community, networks, reciprocity, authenticity, etc. will be the one that prosper. Of course, social media has to be the proper channel and that means knowing where your customers are.
• sarah_chong
  Hi Jclarey!
  
  Thanks for sharing your own experience and confirming what I said. It really frustrates me when companies simply sign up for an account and end right there. I guess it is also important to hire someone who truly loves social media to handle the company's profiles. We can tell!
• Steve Law
  I agree, I'm working my last month as an intern for a social media marketing agency...because I'm an intern I need to stick to what I'm told to do, but I can clearly see that social media isn't working for some of the clients. Social Media needs to work in synergy with a business model, it can't simply be tacked on as an afterthought.
  
  I read that smaller companies have more to gain from social media because they can mold their business model to fit the needs of social media far easier than global companies. It will be interesting to see how these results have changed a year from now, I bet it will look very different; 2010 is the year of social media! :)
• Brian Arfi
  Well, online stores can ONLY benefit from repeat order/past customer. so looking into social media and using it to generate ideas and input is great.
  
  But what IF our customers do NOT use social media?
• sarah_chong
  While not all social media sites are appropriate for specific target groups and markets, there will be at least one that works for companies.
  
  For one, Facebook has 300 millions active users and is one of the most popular sites in most countries. I am pretty sure Facebook would work great for most companies. Especially so if you are talking about online stores. If your customers are buying online, they should be savvy enough to use social media.
• Priit Kallas
  Stumbled here to read about the study but was most impressed by the great design and layout. Really cool.
• sarah_chong
  Hey there!
  
  Thanks and I hope the content helped too (:
  
  Keep reading!
• <ss
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