While many marketers struggle with how to measure social media marketing return on investment, some businesses are finding at least one hard metric where their efforts have paid off—customer acquisition.
According to a February–March 2010 survey from office services firm Regus, smaller companies see the most success, with nearly half of small businesses around the world having acquired a customer through social networks.
“Organizations who have not yet ventured into the world of social networking may be missing out on sizeable business opportunities.” said Sande Golgart, vice president at Regus.
In January 2010, Hubspot found that more than 40% of companies using social media marketing had acquired a customer through the channel. The Regus survey, which was not limited to businesses using social marketing, suggests that number may be slowly climbing.
Three-quarters of small businesses will increase their spending on e-mail marketing in 2010, while nearly seven in 10 will put more dollars toward social media, according to VerticalResponse data.
Almost all businesses with 500 or fewer employees will use e-mail marketing next year—just 3.8% said they would not. On the opposite side of the spectrum, more than 70% would not use TV or radio advertising.
Amid the popularity of e-mail and social media marketing, fewer small businesses told VerticalResponse they were dialing up their search efforts, and more than one-half would do no banner advertising in 2010.
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Company: Janus Development Group
Tagline: We guide people, organizations, and communities to develop their leadership potential for maximum results
Contact: Jan Day Gravel, Chief Learning Officer
Phone: (703) 827-8727
Email: info@janusdevelopmentgroup.com
Location: Washington, DC
Web Site: http://janusdevelopmentgroup.com
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Data from ComScore, for March 2009, has Google at 63.7 percent of all Internet searches conducted in the United States. Yahoo is a distant second at 20.5 percent, with Microsoft at 8.3 percent, the Ask Network at 3.8 percent and AOL at 3.7 percent.
Google is in no danger. The research firm Hitwise submitted search engine traffic data for April that suggests Google’s lead in the market continues to widen. According to Hitwise, nearly 73 percent of all online searches in the U.S. in April were through Google. Yahoo clocked in for April at 16.27 percent, Microsoft’s MSN Search claimed 5.68 percent and Ask.com claimed 3.95 percent.
