Social Media Marketing & Research Reports for SMBs

From: http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/article.php/3939701

Social Media Marketing & Research Reports for SMBs
By Vangie Beal

November 17, 2011

Social commerce (or social shopping) refers to the growing number of today's consumers who use social networking services and sites to share their latest purchases, deals, product reviews, want lists, and other shopping finds.  Keeping track of social media trends, research and statistics gives small business ecommerce site owners a solid foundation to plan and then to create a retail or Internet marketing strategy that is optimized for social media.
The following social media-related research and statistics are free reports or research highlights from trusted industry sources and experts.

11 Social Media Growth and User Statistics for 2011

Here are the top industry research reports to help you understand how many people use social media and social networking sites, the growth of social media in general, and which of the services are the most popular among consumers.

• Twenty-eight percent of all American adults use mobile or social location-based services of some kind. This includes 9 percent of Internet users who set up social media services such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn to automatically include their location in their posts on those services. (Source: Pew Research Center; Internet & American Life Project)
• Social media has grown rapidly. Today nearly four out of five active Internet users visit social networks and blogs. Americans spend more time on Facebook than they do on any other U.S. website. (Source: Nielsen; Social Media Report Q32011)
• Forty-two percent of online consumers have "followed" a retailer proactively through Facebook, Twitter or a retailer's blog, and the average person follows about six retailers. While shoppers' reasoning for following a retailer varies, the majority of respondents (58 percent) said they follow companies to find deals, while nearly half (49 percent) say they want to keep up to date on products. (Source: Shop.org/comScore/Social Shopping Labs; 2011 Social Commerce Study)
• ComScore ranks Facebook.com as #4 in the list of its Top 50 U.S Properties in September 2011 (source; comScore Media Metrix; Top 50 U.S. Web Properties for September 2011)
• Sixty-five percent of adult Internet users now say they use a social networking site like MySpace, Facebook or LinkedIn.  Among Internet users, social networking sites are most popular with women and young adults, but most of the growth over the past year came from adults over age 30. Looking at overall usage, wired seniors grew their ranks the most over the past year; 33 percent of people aged 65 and older now use the sites. (Source: Pew Research Center; Internet & American Life Project)
• How many Facebook users are there?  The Facebook User Growth Chart shows the number of Facebook users from 2004 to 2011 based on a variety of data including Facebook. (Source: Ben Foster; Facebook User Growth Chart)
• Ninety-one percent of online adults today (or 129 million individuals) access social media in a typical month. The greatest growth sector is among older Americans. Today 82 percent of people ages 55 to 64 use social media in a typical month. (Source: Experian; The 2011 Social Media Consumer Trend and Benchmark Report)
• Contradicting commonly held beliefs about gender and social behaviors, the 2011 Social Shopping Study showed men more frequently research product information, read reviews, compare products, find product availability and get store information via social networks, shopping and deal sites; women reign supreme when searching for deals, coupons and specials on similar sites. (Source; Performics; The 2011 Social Shopping Study)
• Facebook users are more trusting, have more close friends, are more politically engaged, and get more support from their friends. A Facebook user who uses the site multiple times per day is 43 percent more likely than other Internet users and more than three times as likely as non-Internet users to feel that most people can be trusted. (Source: Pew Research Center; Internet & American Life Project)
• In previous Future of the Internet surveys, email has most often been mentioned as a key social tool online. In this survey, social networks were mentioned far more often than email. Other social applications noted by respondents included instant messaging, blogging, text messages and voice over IP. (Source; Pew Research Center; Future of the Internet Survey)
• Experian Hitwise reports that during the month of August 2011, Facebook users spent 20 minutes and 46 seconds each time they visited Facebook.com, compared with Twitter users who spent 12 minutes and 41 seconds during a typical visit to Twitter.com. Google+ users spend considerably less time on that site with the average visit to plus.google.com clocking in at 5 minutes and 45 seconds. (Source: Experian; The 2011 Social Media Consumer Trend and Benchmark Report)

5 Social Commerce and Social Shopping Trends for 2011

From sharing a product review on Twitter to checking out with a Facebook login, the following social commerce and social shopping reports can help you prepare for selling in this new channel.

• The appetite for buying directly through social networks appears strong: one-third of shoppers say they would be likely to make a purchase directly from Facebook (35 percent) or Twitter (32 percent).  (Source: Shop.org/comScore/Social Shopping Labs; 2011 Social Commerce Study)
• According to October 2011 conversion rates, 9.2 percent of consumers that visited a retail site from a social media site made a purchase. This compares to 5.5 percent of all direct online shopping last year. Also in 2010, the vast majority of social shopping will continue to come from Facebook, which in October accounted for 77 percent of all traffic from social networks. (Source: IBM Coremetrics; IBM's fourth-annual Benchmark Campaign)
• Active social networkers most often turn to shopping sites like Amazon, eBay or brand websites to begin the purchase process when searching for a product (87 percent) and right before they commit to a purchase (83 percent). They are more likely to turn to social networks such as Facebook immediately after the purchase to share their experience (59 percent). (Source; Performics; The 2011 Social Shopping Study)
• More than 80 percent of the affluent are social media users. The average age of respondents was 43.9 years and average household income was $308,700, net wealth $9.2 million. Virtually all respondents use the Internet for personal uses, including shopping. A segment called 'heavy-users' was identified as important for luxury marketers when planning Internet and social media strategy. (Source: Unity Marketing; Affluent Consumers and How They Use the Internet, Social Media, and Mobile Devices)
• Parents are spending, on average, 14 hours a week of their personal time on the Internet, six of these on social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter. Despite the enormous presence of parents on social networking sites it was revealed that this activity failed to have a significant impact on purchasing decisions when compared to offline conversation with friends and family. (Source: Different Size Feet via BizCommunity; Meet the Family:  A new model for social influence)

 How Businesses Use Social Media: 5 Marketing and Research Reports

Most marketers understand that Internet marketing has to span all the communication channels their customers use. The following research report looks at some of the facts, figures and issues surrounding social media communications for businesses, and it also provides a look at how businesses use social media for marketing and sales.

• Ninety percent of marketers indicate that social media is important for their business. The majority of marketers (58 percent) are using social media for 6 hours or more each week, and more than a third (34 percent) invest  11 or more hours weekly. (Source: Social Media Examiner; 2011 Social media Marketing Industry report)
• Thirty-four percent invest 11 or more hours weekly. (Source: Social Media Examiner; 2011 Social media Marketing Industry report)
• Companies have moved from experimentation with social media marketing to a range of activities that are more likely to be integrated with other marketing channels and across business functions. More than half of company respondents (52 percent) say their organizations use Facebook for reacting to customer issues and inquiries compared to only 29 percent last year. (Source: Econsultancy/LBi/bigmouthmedia; The State of Social Report 2011)
• Companies looking to drive traffic to their core brand sites should strongly consider a social media campaign promoted by email. According to Experian CheetahMail, making email the foundation of a social campaign is key, given that the typical company's email list is 32 times larger than the number of fans they have on Facebook. An analysis conducted by Experian Hitwise also reveals that 60 percent of brands that sent out an email with the word 'Facebook' in the subject line averaged a 27 percent increase in traffic to their website the week following the email deployment. (Source: Experian; The 2011 Social Media Consumer Trend and Benchmark Report)
• Twenty-seven percent of small businesses use Facebook, eighteen percent use LinkedIn and seven percent use Twitter. Overall, nine percent of small businesses said a social media expert would be their most helpful new hire -- the second most popular choice behind a book keeper. (Source: Crowdspring; Small Businesses and Social Media Infographic)