Saw an interesting article from eMarketer today on Executives and Social Media. This led me to some interesting thoughts. Now I am by no means a social media czar as you can tell by the fact that I only have 250 Twitter followers as of today (if you want a couple of social-gurus, check out Nate Riggs or Cheryl Harrison).
The True Value?
However, contrary to some of the statistics below, I don’t feel that Execs and Biz owners in general really fully understand the true value of social media. Here are some stats & quotes from the article:
“More than eight in 10 management, marketing and HR executives responding to the July 2009 survey cited relationship- and brand-building as benefits of social media. Execs also considered social media a good tool for recruitment (69%) and customer service (64%), and 46% thought it enhanced employee morale.”
Well, the stats don’t lie, social media IS valuable. But do they tell the whole story. While many execs and biz owners know Twitter, Facebook, and the like is important, they still don’t have the slightest clue how to utilize it. I’ve had so many conversations over the past 6 months were something like this:
Me: “Are you using social media to market your business?”
Them: Avg Responses from Biz Owners or Execs:
“I’m on Twitter, but I don’t use it much…”
“I’ve got a guy who does that for me…”
“I’ve been thinking about it, but I don’t know what kind of ROI I’ll get…”
“I have a Facebook page, but it hasn’t driven me any additional business…”
In fact, I just had a conversation yesterday trying to pitch the importance of social media where the person more or less said it wasn’t for them and that it was too hard.
Reasons To Go Social
The problem IMO is that they’re mostly missing the point. I thought eMarketer’s article WAS dead on with what social media can and should be used for:
The Skepticism Remains
Speaking from personal experience, I still think that the execs who DO get it are more the exception than the rule. In fact, I think eMarketer’s final graph is more representative of the general skepticism I’ve found regarding social media as a business tool.
“Despite high levels of usage and awareness of benefits, executives still have fears about the issues raised by social media. More than one-half of those who did not use social media said they did not know enough about it, and four in 10 worried about confidentiality and security problems. Another 37% had concerns about employee productivity.”
I’ve seen first-hand how these types of fears completely stifle innovative thinking, causing those innovative minds to seek refuge elsewhere. Personally, I am totally on-board and committed to social media and all that it is (and can be), but I just wonder if these stats are totally representative of all execs and biz owners?
Don’t get me wrong, I know that there are some higher ups out there that truly get it, but I just don’t think as a whole the majority really do “get it”.
What do you think?
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