Social media is gaining momentum in businesses, with the adoption of social media tools set to progress rapidly over the next two years, as business leaders are getting increasingly supportive, showed a new study from International Data Corp (IDC).
Over a quarter (28.6%) of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in Western Europe with 20 to 499 workers currently use some form of social media for business purposes, with adoption set to increase in two years’ time.
IDC’s survey entitled “The evolution of Social Media among Western European SMBs” shows a strong link between company size and the level of adoption of social media for business purposes: the larger the corporation the higher the adoption of social media tools.
According to the findings, 56% of higher end mid-market companies with a payroll of between 250 and 499 people will have adopted social media by the middle of 2014, compared to 40% of small SMBs with between 20 and 49 staff. The new study, released on Monday, leverages the findings of the recent IDC European Vertical Markets Survey 2012, which surveyed 1,603 Western European companies, including 791 SMBs.
The results further show a higher maturity at SMBs in using social media for customer facing and marketing processes. However, SMBs fail to identify how to effectively leverage social media tools into other processes.
Social media adoption among SMBs in Western Europe is moving at a fast pace, yet cost remains a challenge in the current economic climate, said Nina Bonagura, senior research analyst at IDC European Industry Solutions. So, providing clear ROI measures, best practices and evidence-based business cases highlighting the social media benefits in meeting business goals, is essential, the analyst added.