By Chris Lee

Hardly a week goes by without a new survey highlighting the growing role of social media and its importance to modern business. Often, the angle is that “businesses aren’t taking social media seriously” or “organisations aren’t using social media correctly”, but a more upbeat report out from social enterprise software maker Buddy Media and consultants Booz & Company has highlighted growing budget allocation for social.

According to the report, 95 per cent of global companies are increasing their investment in social media, with almost a third (28 per cent) believing that social will grow to exceed 20 per cent of their total digital marketing budgets.

A third of companies now have a senior executive – often in marketing – heading up social media and more than half (57 per cent) say they are employing full-time social media staff.

Deriving value from social media

According to Luca Benini, managing director for Buddy Media in Europe, for brand marketers, choosing not to connect to consumers via social media is simply no longer an option.

“The industry is at an inflection point where marketers will invest more in social as their marketing capabilities become stronger, pervasive and more tailored to the needs of social,” he said. “However, it’s vital they have the right capabilities internally in order to expand their social media and digital marketing activities.”

Ultimately, unique and interesting content is the main fuel of any social media campaign, Benini argued. This is the reason companies care so much about metrics for engagement and participation, and why tangible results such as Likes and re-tweets are so valuable to social media community managers.

“Software and products can provide a good-looking vehicle to deliver the content, but ultimately, community managers and creative talent create the content. Companies see the logic behind this and are hiring accordingly,” he added.

Emerging trends

The report from Buddy Media and Booz & Company showed that the primary uses of social media platforms are advertising and promotions, PR and customer service. And it’s no surprise that Facebook (94 per cent) and Twitter (77 per cent) came out on top as the priority platforms for most companies, with video channel YouTube (42 per cent) in third place.

Interestingly, the survey found that companies are not tapping into social for research and product development as much as might be expected. Using social media for research (16 per cent) and product development (eight per cent) are clearly still emerging practices for global businesses.

“There is no formula for brands to utilise social media,” Benini concluded. “Each company has its own objectives and goals, and social media’s flexibility allows companies to utilise these platforms in a way that best suits the individual brand.”