More than a third of business now subscribe to a paid social media monitoring service, according to new research.
A report by Circle Research, self described B2B experts, puts the increase down to an increase in the value of social media to businesses. The research found that 83% of marketing teams are now on social media, they spend 20% of their time posting on social media, and 35% of business now pay for a social media monitoring service.
Interestingly, the report also found that the most important networks for B2B publishing are Twitter and LinkedIn, not Facebook, which is typically viewed as the medium which drives the most traffic. In fact, Facebook recently overtook Google as the main referrer even for breaking news.
Google+ is still struggling according to the research as it is only thought of as the most effective platform by 1% of businesses, muscled out by the more professionally focussed LinkedIn.
The report also highlights the growth of YouTube, with a 76% growth expected over the coming year, despite having a lower usage currently than LinkedIn or Twitter. This is linked to the final point of the report, that linking from social media to your own site won’t cut it any more, social media has to become a medium in its own right, something YouTube is well designed to do. Video is believed by 66% of businesses to be “very effective”, second only to infographics on 66%.
Their report is further broken down in this handy infographic, created by Circle Research, or in their full report, which is available on their site.
