SBSI Wave-5
Small businesses also interact frequently with other sites like Twitter. An exception is LinkedIn; almost half (46 percent) update their presence or interact no more often than once a month. The gap in frequency of activity between websites and social media raises the question of whether more could be done to make websites themselves truly interactive through improved functionality – a change in a website should be as easy as updating a status on Facebook.
Many small businesses are finding that social media is not meeting their expectations; 36 percent feel that so far, their use of the medium has fallen short of expectations, while only 9 percent feel it has exceeded expectations (see Figure 16). Disappointment has grown over the past year when only 26 percent felt social media fell short of expectations.
figure 16
*Caution: small sample size
Even if social media use falls short of expectations for some, it does not mean that small businesses are not getting value from the medium. In the past 12 months, they have accomplished many things using social media, including: staying engaged with customers (63 percent), developing a higher awareness of the business in the market (61 percent), and identifying and attracting new customers (59 percent) (see Figure 17).
figure 17
*Caution: small sample size
The role of social media has changed since a year ago. Social media has become more important as a way of engaging existing customers, compared to a year ago when it primarily helped small businesses identify and attract new customers. As society generally moves to social media as a way of communicating and engaging, small businesses may be learning of its value as a way of staying in touch with customers, offering an alternative to email, phone and direct mail.
Small businesses that use social media have a range of positive and negative experiences. On the positive side, 63 percent have found in the past 12 months that social media allowed them to create more loyal customers by talking to them directly (see Figure 18). On the negative, 56 percent have found in the past 12 months that it used up more time than they expected.
Another drawback experienced by 40 percent of small businesses when using social media in the past 12 months is that it has given people a chance to criticize their business on the internet. The silver lining is that social media provides a forum for addressing criticism as well as receiving it; 30 percent of small business owners found they were able to correct problems brought up by customers in social media, and 18 percent were given a chance to defend the business against negative publicity. Looking back over 12 months, only 5 percent of businesses feel that social media has hurt their image more than helped it. On the whole, businesses that learn to master social media and stay engaged can use it to manage their brands and defend against negative word of mouth that might go unnoticed or neglected in a lower tech environment.
figure 18
The final evaluation for social media is the perception of whether it financially pays off. It is hard even for a big business to compute the ROI of social media, but most small business owners are comfortable estimating whether the medium has turned a profit (see Figure 19). In this most recent wave in January, 25 percent believe that their investments in social media “made a profit” in the past 12 months, 15 percent believe they “lost money,” and 46 percent believe they “broke even”. The trend, compared to a year ago, is towards greater profitability. While many have found social media use has fallen short of expectations, owners generally think the activity pays for itself.
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