7 Myths of Social Media

Marketing 2010

Roy Young, President

MarketingProfs

7 Myths of Social Media Marketing Practice:1. Marketing departments are hiring social media specialists

2. Social Media communications is free

3. Social Media is just for the kids

4. The bigger the Twitter network the better

5. B2B is totally different from B2C

6. Corporate culture constrains usage and effectiveness

7. Free analytics software is all you need for measurement

State of Social Media Marketing

• 5,168 marketing and business

professionals responded to a general

survey on marketing practices – 64% (3,285) indicated that social media is one of their

job responsibilities

Myth #1:

Marketing

departments

are actually

NOT hiring

social media

specialists• 61% are folks

doing this work in

addition to their

defined role

• And 32% have

social media

responsibilities as

just part of their

job.

Myth #2: Social media

marketing is NOT

free. Budget for

social media in terms

of staff time, not

media spend and

Myth #3: Social Media

is NOT just for the

kids.

• High-level executives are

more likely to be active in

social media than not

active, making that time

more costly.

• Young staff may not have

the experience to be

leaders in social spaces.

1.1

Myth #4: Large

Twitter

networks are

NOT

necessarily

more valuable

than smaller

networks

• Majority of Twitter

users have far

fewer than 1,000

followers

• Raising the

question “is quality

or quantity more

important when it

comes to Twitter

followers?”

14.6

Myth #5: B2B is NOT

significantly

different from B2C

social media

marketing.

• Surprisingly similar

usage rates of “earned

media” among B2B and

B2C organizations.

• Email to house list is the

most commonly used

form of earned media.

• As for social media,

public online

communities are used by

over a third of

companies; blogs by

about a third; and videos

for viral use by about a

fourth of all companies

12.1

THANK YOU!

Myth #6:

Success Requires a Company Culture of Openness

34%45%Uses consumer feedback productively to

improve the offering

28%48%Encourages collaboration between marketing

and others

27%47%Value open, honest dialogue about marketing

28%55%Quick to adopt new media technology

DisagreeAgreeCompany Cultural Attribute

Have Had Success Creating an Online Community Around a Brand

Myth #7: free

analytics software is NOT alone enough.

• Nearly every measurement option is mostly “helpful” (blue and orange sections of bar)

• Traditional web analytics tools score higher than new social media monitoring tools for robust measurement

39

For information about the research,

go to:

http://bit.ly/8kjHHx

THANK YOU!