Clearing the Social Media hurdles

Has social media become mainstream? Figures from Econsultancy’s “The State of Social Media Report 2011” published this month, suggest it’s clearly heading that way. From a survey of more than 1,000 respondents only 5% said they did nothing at all, 31% had experimented with social media, while 43% did an average amount (up from 37% in 2010) and 21% were heavily involved (up from 18% in 2010).

But how well are they using social media? In 9 out of the 10 aspects of social media usage surveyed only a small percentage felt they were doing it well. This included listening and monitoring, using Facebook, engaging customers in dialogue and having a content strategy. Only when it comes to using Twitter do more than a third feel they are using it well (37%).

So more and more organisations are getting involved, but by and large they haven’t got it right yet, although they are steadily improving. Those stats are hardly surprising given the recency of social media marketing and the unique qualities which distinguish it from other forms of marketing.

So what are the most important barriers to adoption and effective use? As the chart below shows, lack of budget and resources are the main ones with measurement, lack of understanding and company culture following close behind. Access this Econsultancy report.

Lack of budget and resources is closely linked to the ability to measure ROI. 41% of respondents said they could not attribute an ROI figure to any of the money they spent on social media. This in turn is linked to the ability to measure. Lack of understanding may be on the way down in the view of most organisations but interestingly, when respondents from agencies were asked what prevented their clients from being more effective with social media 47% of them cited lack of understanding.

This comment is echoed by many digital agencies who, being the experts in all things digital, feel they have to constantly educate clients to adapt and adopt. "A recurring theme" says one ADMA tutor "is the misconception that social media is just another channel. It’s not! It’s fundamentally different in many ways, not least of which is the fact that we, the advertisers, don’t control the content or 99% of the interactions that take place on any given platform. Once they (clients) start to treat it differently, they start to look for different and unique outcomes and then we get to progress".

ADMA's own Social Media short courses are designed to help organisations tackle these barriers. Social Media Marketing Strategy helps organisations to think about what they want to do with social media and how to do it with available tools. It also specifically deals with the question of what to measure and how to use this to determine how much in terms of money and manpower to allocate. Social Media Consumer Marketing helps organisations who have already dipped their toes into the water get a hands-on practical tutorial in the most popular tools – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and others.

Both courses are still available before the end of the year in Melbourne, Sydney and Perth. More information on these courses can be found here.