ForewordSummary of fi ndings

The Power of Social MediaThoughts from Alastair BanksMarket growth and trendsHow Social Media is being usedaround the WorldWhy we created this surveyThe ResultsInvestment in Social MediaUse of Social Media

Who fi lled out this survey

Investment in Social Media

Social Media Policy & StrategyConclusionsA quick guide to getting started with Social MediaTop tips from Like Minds

Legal considerationsA look to the futureLets keep the conversation goingAbout Optix Solutions

Contents

Foreword

Chris BroganPresident of New Marketing Labs

We've gone from thinking of Social Media as "gee whiz" and we're into the "okay, now what?" phase. Whether you're ready or not, your buyers and customers are using Social Media tools and networks to talk about you and your products. It's time to get a bit more understanding on what this means for you.

The Internet of 10 years ago or even 5 years ago isn't what you're facing today. Now, it's a matter of real-timeinformation streaming rapid fire through loose social ties. More sectors of society than ever before are embracing these tools to build relationships, to express interests, and to pursue information. For the first time inthe web's history, search is losing ground to social search: asking friends.

This is the new radio. This is the new phone. Learn how to engage, and seek your own success today.

Chris Brogan is President of New Marketing Labs, a new media marketing agency. He works with large and mid-sized companies to improve online business communications like marketing and PR through the use of social software, community platforms, and other emerging web and mobile technologies.

http://chrisbrogan.com http://twitter.com/chrisbrogan http://facebook.com/dotchrisbrogan

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Summary of findingsTop 3 reasons respondents useSocial Media. (multiple choice question)

60%

45%

73%

To find newcustomers

To retain ourexisting customerbase

To monitor whatis being said aboutour brand

57%

45%

73%

Facebook

LinkedIn

YouTube Twitter

Blog

57%37%

Top 5 Social Media platforms respondents spent up to anhour a day on. (multiple choice question)

Was Social Media originally part of your current Online Marketing budget?

30%

No

Yes

70%

Do you have a formal SocialMedia Strategy?

32%

Yes

No

68%

4

Summary of findings

Top 3 barriers for implementation of Social Media strategies. (multiple choice question)

50% 43%71%

Lack of resource time

Unsure of ROIor valueLack of knowledge

Other Online Marketing channelsused. (multiple choice question)

60%52%

70%

Direct MailMarketing

Blog

78%

58%

On average 47% of those surveyed do not measure their Social Media ROI

47%

Online PR

Search EngineOptimisation

Email Marketing

While the great majority of respondents see Social Media as a means to retain and grow a customer base, almost half have no measure of return on investment (ROI) against the social platforms they use.

Almost 70% have no formal Social Media strategy in place, despite significant concerns over the lack of time, resources and knowledge required to use Social Media effectively.

It is clear that Social Media is being used as part of a multi-touch marketing strategy for businesses. However, with the majority of respondents not measuring ROI or having astrategy in place - we have concerns that they are not capable of harnessing the best of these tools and ensuring success.

5

The Power of Social Media

Until very recently Google was the biggest referrer of traffic to websites but the increasing use ofSocial Media is beginning to take it over. In May of 2010 social networks accounted for 11.9% of all UK internet visits, while search engines accounted for 11.3%. (Source: Hitwise June 2010)

Before falling foul of privacy concerns, Burger King’s “Sacrifice ten friends” Facebook campaignwent viral and resulted in the loss of over 230,000 friends.

Social Media sites enable users to participate in and build communities and networks of peoplewho share similar interests and activities. This is possible through a plethora of tools and features, including discussion forums, blogs, videos, photos, instant messaging, etc. These sites quickly become part of the day-to-day life of their users, who develop a rapport with fellow members.

IBM’s network of blogs allow staff with different expertise to give insights into the latestdevelopments and products across this multinational and multilayered organisation.

You can encourage interaction with Social Media networks and applications on your website viasocial bookmarks, allowing your customers to share information from your site with theircommunities and networks. In order to reap the rewards of this opportunity, you need to regularyengage with and contribute to these platforms.

As you are dealing with an essentially social process, it is important that you get the rightbalance between promoting a product and engaging.

6

Thoughts from Alastair Banks

Alastair BanksDirector of Optix Solutions

Harnessing the enormous potential of Social Media is both the biggest online opportunity and challenge for businesses across all sectors.

As a co-director of one of the South West’s leading WebDesign and Online Marketing agencies, I’ve seen firsthand how rapidly the internet has changed.

Social Media is the latest technological advance thatorganisations are striving to get to grips with, but it isvery different from traditional and online marketing tools. This process requires developing skills aroundengaging with existing and potential customers,establishing relationships with them and creating opportunity by listening and understanding what it isthat they look for from your company or brand.

Alastair grew up in Essex before moving to study in Exeter, where he helped found Optix Solutions with James Dawkins while still at University. He now runs three successful businesses.

Alastair believes in practicing what he preaches. His own blog http://iambanksy.co.uk is made up of articles and advice based on personal experience covering all aspects of starting and growing a business. He has recently gone back to his roots, starting a mentoring scheme for promising undergraduate students from Exeter University.

http://twitter.com/banksy6 http://iambanksy.co.uk http://optixsolutions.co.uk

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Market growth and trends

About 2 million UK workers are spending at least 1 hour each day on social networkswhile at work. (Source: Bizreport, Aug 2010)

Facebook accounts for 1 in 6 UK page views and is the second most visited website in the UK. InJuly 2010 it accounted for 7.14% of all UK Internet visits and over half (54%) of all visits to social networking websites. (Source: Hitwise, Aug 2010)

55% of the UK’s workforce access Social Mediaat work.

33% of workers spendat least 30 minutes on social networks.

6% spend at least an hour on social networks.

10% of workers claim social networkingwhile at work makes them more productive.

2 Million 55% 33%1 in 66%10%

More than 700,000 local businesses haveactive pages on Facebook. (Source: Facebook,Jan 2010)

700k

1 billion

YouTube now serves more than1 billion videos per day. (Source: YouTube Blog Oct 2009)

There are now 15 million LinkedIn users on theEuropean continent. This site has grown by around 40%, now with over 70 million usersglobally. (Source: Econsultancy blog Jul 2010)

15 million

67%

Businesses with blogsgenerate 67% more online leads than businesses without blogs.(Source: Hubspot Apr 2010)

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How Social Media is being used around the World

USA

United Kingdom

Brazil

Spain

Italy

Australia

46.5 Million

19.7 Million

127 Million

13.4 Million 11.3 Million

28.7 Million

11.4 Million11.6 Million

5 Million 5.9 Million

24.2 Million 3.7 Million

2.9 Million 2.7 Million

2.1 Million

8.7 Million

1.3 Million 1.1 Million

1.4 Million

0.8 Million

16.4 Million

0.9 Million

1.4 Million

1.9 Million

1 Million15.2 Million

; 6.6 Million

2 Million

1.8 Million

1.7 Million

Facebook

MySpace

Twitter

Flickr

LinkedIn

Badoo

UOL Comunidades

Orkut

iG Comunidades

Data taken from Econsultancy: Social Media Statistics Compendium

Unique Audience

; Tuenti 9

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Why we created this survey

We aren’t short of Social Media success stories. Who hasn’t heard of the millions Dell has made through Twitter?

Businesses throughout the UK are keen toharness Social Media for their own similarsuccess stories.

This Survey was created to help form an understanding of how organisations throughout the UK are using the various platforms, what return they are yielding and gain an insight into their future plans for Social Media.

A foundation, we hope, for your own Social Media success.

TheResults

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Investment in Social MediaHow much has your Social Media training cost to date?

£0-99

I am selftaught

£100-500

We are not using Social media

There is no denying how cost effective Social Media has been for respondents, with the majority professing to be self taught and investing less than £500 a month.

More than £500

7%

Top 5 Social Media sites respondents spent up to an hour a day on. (multiple choice question)

57% 57%73%

Facebook, up toan hour a day

LinkedIn, up to an hour a day

45% 36%

Blog, up to anhour a day

56%

15%

10%

12%

How much of your monthly budget doyou allocate to Social Media?

More than £500

Under£500

We are not using Social media

75%

7% 18%

Twitter, up toan hour a day

YouTube, up toan hour a day

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Use of Social Media

More than 2 years

10%

How long have you been using Social Media aspart of your marketing strategy?

6 Months to 1 year

31%

Less than 6 months

26% We are not usingSocial media

15%

67%

47% 73%

Facebook

LinkedIn

YouTube

Twitter

Blog

90%64%

Top 5 Social Media sites respondents plan to useover the next 12 months. (multiple choice question)

1 year to 1 year6 months

13%

1 year and 6months to 2 years

5%

Over 50% of respondents had started using Social Media within the past 12 months of partaking in the Survey.

Only 10% of respondents had been using Social Media for more than 2 years.

More than half of respondents engage with and/or use Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Blogs as part of their Social Media strategy.

Despite being the second largest search engine in the world, less than 50% of respondents used YouTube.

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Use of Social Media

Whilst the majority of respondents saw Social Media’s positive potential in finding new customers and retaining existing ones, it was also seen as a monitoring tool, both of feedback on own brand and to keep informed of competitors.

Almost 10% of respondents admitted to introducing Social Media because their competitors had done so.

Top 5 reasons respondents were using Social Media. (multiple choice question)

60% 45%73%

To find newcustomers

To retain ourexisting customerbase

To monitor whatis being said aboutour brand

42% 36%

To keep ahead of ourcompetitors

To monitor ourcompetitors

What type of business are you?

B2B & B2C

47%

B2C

10%

B2B

30%

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Who filled out this survey?

How many customers do you have?

0-10

19%

11-100

32%

101-500

17% 500+32%

3%

7%

4%

13%

22%

6%

3%

4%

8%

8%

5%

6%

11%

IT

Marketing, PRAdvertising

Media, Creative

Legal

Accountancy

Sports & Leisure

Other

Public sectors& services

Management

Recruitment

Engineering &Manufacturing

Non Profit, Charities

Retail

What sector do you work within?

The most popular sectors for respondents were Media, Creative, Marketing, PR and Advertising, followed closely by Management, Non Profit, IT, Recruitment and Retail.

51% of respondents reported having less than 100 customers, while 49% reported having over 100 customers, reflective of the power Social Media has to engage with audiences of all sizes.

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Investment in Social MediaHas a portion of your existing marketing budget been allocated to Social Media?

30%

Yes

No

70%

Was Social Media originally part ofyour current Online Marketing budget?

36%

Yes

No

64%

Will Social Media be a part of yournext budget?

Where did the funding for yourSocial Media budget come from?

YesNo

It’s already a partof our budget

38%27%

35%Moving funds fromone budget to another

59%

External grant 1%

Creation of new budgets

40%

16

Investment in Social Media

More than £500

7%We do not use Social Media

18%

Under £500

75%

2%

5%

11%

Facebook, £1-500 LinkedIn, £25-30k

Twitter, £5-10k

I don’t measure ROI

Blog, £50k+

45%

3%

How much do you invest in Social Mediaeach month?

How much ROI can you attribute to the followingSocial Media sites?(multiple choice question)

The most profound finding was that 45% of respondents had no measure in place for return on investment (ROI).

3% of respondents reported returns in excess of £50k through their blog, followed by 2% attributing similar success trhough Twitter and 1% through LinkedIn.

4%

5%Twitter, £1k-5k

LinkedIn, £1-5k

3%

Facebook, £500-1k

2%

Flickr, £25-50k

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Social Media Policy & Strategy

Does your company have a Social Media Policy for staff?

32%

Yes

No

68%

Do you have a formal Social Media Strategy?

26%

Yes

No

74%

Data Collection

The results of this survey were collected online.

Promoted via:LikeMinds ConferenceSocial Media channelsEmail marketingTraditional media

The survey ran for a period of 10 months in total.

Acknowledgements

We would like to take this opportunity tothank all that took the time to contributeto this publication.

For a full list of our acknowledgments,please visit:

http://optixsolutions.co.uk/smsurvey2010

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Conclusions

For true success in employing Social Media you should ensure you have provided all the tools to empower your internal team and make using it part of their daily working routine. It is important to back this up with a proper strategy – one that fits with and into an overall online marketing strategy.

Although many respondents did claim to have a Social Media strategy in place, the majority didn’t have a Social Media policy or measure ROI. To ensure a consistent, informed and coherent approach to Social Media, all three elements need to be brought together.

The huge growth in the amount of time spent on Social Media sites, and the ever-increasing number of businesses establishing a presence on them, make it vital to develop a structured and coherent approach to Social Media; differentiating your business and brand, while delivering consistent messages.

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A quick guide to getting started with Social Media

1 Develop a Social Media Strategy. Spend time defining who you are targeting, what you are hoping to achieve and how you are going to go about achieving it by identifying which of the Social Media networks are most suitable. This should include identifying key words and phrases relating to your business, i.e. ‘web design, Exeter’, that you want to monitor. These are useful catalysts for beginning to establish engagement.

2

3

4

5

Identify who in your business can be your Social Media ‘champions’.

Invest in training to ensure that staff know how to use the platforms they will be expected to engage in properly – and ensure they have spent some time learning how others are using each channel before allowing them to throw themselves into it.

Allow all staff, especially sceptics, to buy into the process by ensuring theyunderstand what you are trying to achieve and why.

Develop a Social Media policy and ensure it is signed by all staff. Incorporate it into your HR processes.

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A quick guide to getting started with Social Media

Invest in equipment. You may need to equip your Social Media ‘champions’ with a video camera, laptop, mobile phone, etc… to enable and support their engagement.

Make the leap and start engaging via the channels you have identified in your Social Media strategy.

Ensure customers are made aware of your presence on Social Media sites and encourage them to engage with you.

Ensure that you are regularly measuring and optimising what you are doing so you can increase success by identifying your achievements and new opportunities.

Don’t neglect other forms of advertising and promotion – Social Media is a key part of a marketing mix, not the whole package.

6

7

8

9

10

: )Enjoy it! Socialising should be fun.

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Top Tips from Like Minds

Ask not what the internet can do for you, ask what you can do for the Internet. There is no secret to Social Media. You could rename it participation media or relationship media - it would all echo the same sentiment of enabling people to get involved. Some want to get involved a little, and some a lot, as is bourne out in this report. But the beginning and the end of it is around providing a platform that matters to people.

Like Minds was founded in August 2009 amidst the boom of Social Media. Their mission is to create a platform through conferences held around the world, where participants can join fellow “like minds” in order to inspire one another and make those ideas happen, all on a level that is accessible both financially and structurally.

Scott Gould is co-founder of Like Minds, where he is connecting people across the world through talking and then doing. He is internationally recognised as a leader in Social Media and community, working with Fortune 500 companies and speaking at events across the world.

http://twitter.com/scottgould http://scottgould.me http://wearelikeminds.com

Social Media takes me around the world, in person, and gives me a chance to talk with people face-to-face. Those face-to-face conversations reveal what I believe are the fundamental drivers of Social Media: 1) everyone wants to be heard, 2) everyone wants to be understood, and 3) everyone wants to know his or her life matters.

Trey is leveraging Social Media to connect with audiences around the world. HubSpot ranks his Facebook profile as the #4 most influential in the world. They also routinely rank his Twitter profile in the top 0.1% of all profiles ranked.

http://twitter.com/treypennington http://treypennington.com

Scott Gould

Trey Pennington

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Top Tips from Like Minds

The socialisation of Media marks the end of corporate communications asa top down, command-and-control channel. It is an evolutionary leap inthe way humans interact.

Olivier is a Brand Strategist with 15 years of marketing management experience across a variety of B2B and B2C industries, from manufacturing and distribution to new media and consumer goods. He currently manages BrandBuilder Marketing, a brand consulting and marketing management firm.

http://twitter.com/thebrandbuilder http://thebrandbuilder.wordpress.com

Make sure you join LinkedIn NOW! Create a WOW (buyer friendly) profile and add all your “Raving Fans” and contacts. But, MOST IMPORTANTLY, don't forget to reach out and ask for the... appointment, project or job. “Navel gazing” is just not an option.

Julian Summerhayes is a Social Media consultant to the professional services sector, and, having worked as a lawyer for 14 years, he is able to offer key strategic advice to leverage a firm's creative intellectual capital. In short, he walks the talk.

http://twitter.com/0neLife http://juliansummerhayes.com

Olivier Blanchard

Julian Summerhayes

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Legal considerations

As Social Media continues to grow and develop so do the legal considerations. On one hand businesses have looked to restrict or even prohibit staff using Social Media in the workplace, whilst at the same time they are looking to embrace the opportunities that it brings. Social Media is here to stay and its use both in the private and business environment will increase. The opportunity for businesses to capitalise on Social Media and increase its market knowledge and reach are massive, but it is imperative that this is done in a manner which does not expose a business to unnecessary and costly legal disputes. Anyone embarking on a Social Media campaign needs to consider a number of legal areas including data protection, employee rights, potential defamation/libel, breach of confidentiality and protection or infringement of intellectual property.

Whether you are using Social Media for business or personal reasons, it is important that you understand the legal issues which could cause problems for you and your organisation.

Garry MackayPartner, Ashfords LLP

Garry is a Partner in Ashfords’ Intellectual Property and Information Technology Team. He advises clients on their commercial agreements and in particular IT contracts. His work includes outsourcing agreements, software licensing, development agreements, maintenance contracts and major commercial project agreements.

Ashfords LLP is a full service law firm providing a broad range of legal services to both commercial and private clients. As a major law firm, Ashfords serves regional, national and international clients.Ashfords size and experience means that they are able to provide a wide range of expertise to meet their clients needs.

http://ashfords.co.uk

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A look to the future

When we created the survey back at the beginning of 2010, the social landscape had a very different form to that you’ll find now. Geo-location services were in their infancy in the UK, so we didn't include questions on them. Platforms like Foursquare, Gowalla and now Facebook Places were relatively unused or non-existent. Now they are coming into their own, look out for more retail and B2C businesses using these ‘check-in’ services to reward regular customers going into 2011.

Mobile Apps, such as Qype and Voucher Cloud, are getting more traction and offer end users and businesses excellent ways of finding each other.

The landscape is evolving and it’s exciting; who knows what we'll be writing about next year...

Alastair Banks

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Lets keep the conversation going

This survey is not the end. Social Media platforms continue to evolve and there is always something to say, so why not join us and share your comments?

LinkedIn Group: http://linkd.in/aB6DZ1

Twitter: #smsurvey

Blog: http://optixsolutions.co.uk/blog/

Whether you have a comment or question on the results of this survey or want to share your own experiences with Social Media, we want to hear all about it.

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Optix Solutions Ltd is among the UK’s leading and most innovative web design & online marketing agencies. Based in Devon, our client base includes some of the country’s leading companies and organisations.

We specialise in providing bespoke online solutions, including all aspects of website design, development and online marketing. We work in partnership with our clients, building a thorough and ongoing understanding of an individual business, the market it operates in and its future development.

We have been working with Social Media, both internally and with businesses looking to employ it effectively, for the past few years. Part of our reason for conducting this survey was to measure our experience of Social Media usage against that of other businesses, and identify the principal challenges they face in employing Social Media to optimum benefi t.

For more information on us, please visit:

http://optixsolutions.co.ukhttp://facebook.com/optixsolutionshttp://youtube.com/optixsolutionshttp://twitter.com/optixsolutions

About Optix Solutions