Recent news coverage suggests that a growing number of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are flocking to sites such as Facebook and MySpace to market their products and services. But how profitable they find these networks - and the actual number of firms actually embracing social media - is still up for discussion.
Unfortunately, two recent studies on SMB adoption of social media marketing do little to clear up this confusion.
A recent online survey by Internet2Go and MerchantCircle assessed small business marketing practices among members of the MerchantCircle member base. It found that out of 2,500 responses, 45.2% say they have a Facebook page for their business and 46% have a presence on Twitter - in the form of either a business or personal account or both.
Such numbers suggest that a highly engaged SMBs class has emerged that is embracing social media platforms. According to Greg Sterling, an analyst with Internet2Go, out of a large group of responses - a typical survey gets about 300 responses - these are very high numbers. It's easy to see why SMBs are using these platforms: "they’re cheap and easy to use, perfect tools for the SMB," he said.
However, a separate study by Citibank/GfK Roper suggested just the opposite, pointing to significantly less enthusiasm among SMBs for social media tools, and a preference for search for finding information about marketing and promoting their business.
Citibank found that of the 500 US small-business executives queried, 76% have not found social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to be helpful in generating business leads or for expanding their business during the last year. Moreover, 86% have not used social networking sites to get business advice or information, and 28% use email marketing and 25% use online advertising to generate business leads and sales.
Despite the dramatically different methodologies and respondent pools, Sterling said that the two separate findings illustrate why it remains difficult to quantify how and what SMBs do online. However, he added that there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that SMBs are indeed leveraging online marketing.
According to The Kelsey Group, this year was the first time SMBs use of online media for advertising and promotion eclipsed traditional media. Also this year: the number of Facebook clients using its automated ad system more than tripled, in large part because of SMBs.
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