Today I heard about a couple of very interesting posts, relevant to a topic I seem to be discussing frequently in the last few weeks: the importance to drive a better understanding, particularly among high level marketing executives, of Social Media: what is it? what are the potential applications? what is the impact it can have on business objectives?
- 77% of the respondents indicated they understand social Media very well or well enough to get by; but 81.9% would be willing to attend training.
- 97.4% indicated that it is extremely or somewhat important for an agency to show proven understanding of how social media strategies apply to business; however 80% of agency recommendations seem to be centered in tools versus strategies. (which in my humble opinion shows those agencies don't quite get it)
- "The most significant barrier to social media adoption named by 46% of respondents to a MarketingSherpa survey is 'lack of knowledgeable staff' " while 43% indicate the "inability to measure ROI" as the second one.
Pointing out three key points out of the above:
- We (Social Media Professionals) have a lot to gain by focusing efforts on the education of our potential clients (particularly executives, but also staff). We would effectively open the flood gates for business opportunities.
- We have a lot to gain by standardizing our language and metrics; which will render as one of its results the creation of benchmarks that in turn can be used to demonstrate effectiveness and compare results of one social media effort versus another. (thus advancing in tackling the ROI point)
- We need to demand deeper instrumentation and better reporting tools from the major social networks we normally use to execute our efforts; thiswill equip us to better execute in our social media efforts and measure more effectively their ROI impact.
What do you think?
Filiberto Selvas