B2B Web Strategy Blog – eMagine

Business.com’s study of B2Bs’ social media usage – highlights

January 28th, 2010 Posted by: Bill Gadless

Most studies of social media use have focused primarily on the question of adoption, or the rate of conversion of B2B social media skeptics into users.  In contrast, the researchers behind Business.com’s “2009 B2B Social Media Benchmarking Study” take as a given that social media usage has already gone mainstream, and believe that the more interesting questions now relate to patterns and modes of actual usage.  In their words:

“Social media usage is a reality in today’s business environment, and the question of utilization is much more interesting, and important, to company executives and marketers interested in identifying the most effective and efficient opportunities offered by this new medium.”

So the results summarized here are from their study of participants already involved in using social media for business, either using social media as a business information resource, working for a company actively planning or engaged in one or more business social media initiatives, or both.  With 564 respondents, the results are clearly bankable.  We’ve pulled out some findings we thought interesting for inclusion here;  those further interested should download the full study (behind a simple – and free – registration), which includes additional results as well as further breakdowns (by industry, job function, etc.) of those shown here.

Usage.
No surprise that corporate blogging scores with a high percentage of respondents;  but more surprising were…

• Visit company or product profile pages on social media sites – 62%
• Conduct searches for business information on social media sites – 55%
• Participate in online business communities or forums – 51%

Notable for their continued lack of strength (all at 36% or below):  RSS feeds;  using Twitter;  discussion groups on third-party sites;  social bookmarking.

(Counter-intuitively, the usage numbers were even a smidge higher for senior management than the averages shown …especially at firms with more than 100 employees;  both RSS and Twitter use broke the 40% level with top management.)

Modes.
All of the following scored with 50% or more of the responding B2Bs:

• maintaining accounts/profiles on social media sites (the surprising winner at 81%)
• micro-blogging (e.g., Twitter)
• company blog
• monitor company-related or competitor mentions on social media sites
• participate in discussions on third party sites

…and all of these, surprisingly, scored significantly higher with B2Bs than with B2Cs.

Metrics.
Those used by over half of the respondents:  website traffic;  brand awareness;  engagement with prospects;  engagement with customers.

Sites used (i.e., managing one or more profiles on).
Facebook – 77%;  Twitter – 73%;  LinkedIn/Companies – 56%;  LinkedIn/Groups – 53%;  YouTube – 43%.  After that it falls off dramatically;  the next most popular is used by only 14%.

Sites you’d recommend to a professional colleague.
LinkedIn/Companies – 53%;  LinkedIn/Groups – 45%;  Twitter – 43%;  YouTube – 36%;  Facebook – 24%.   (Interesting that while Facebook is the most used, it’s also the least recommended;  but the authors chose not to comment on or further explore this seeming disparity.)

Tools for monitoring online conversations.
Twitter Search, Google Search and Google Alerts are all used by right around 60% of the respondents;  none of the rest break 40%.

If you’re still on the sidelines thinking about whether to use social media.. well, your competitors may already be charging ahead and figuring out what works best for them.  Perhaps this study will provide the guidance needed to help you to get underway.

Entry Filed under: B2B Web Strategy