Companies need social media presence according to study

US marketing and branding company Cone Inc. has just published a survey on using social media to promote businesses, with pretty dramatic findings. According to the survey, 93 percent of Americans believe a company should have a presence in social media, while an overwhelming 85 percent believe a company should not only be present but also interact with its consumers via social media. In fact, 56 percent of American consumers feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment.

When asked about specific types of interactions, Americans believe:

• Companies should use social networks to solve my problems (43%)
• Companies should solicit feedback on their products and services (41%)
• Companies should develop new ways for consumers to interact with their brand (37%)
• Companies should market to consumers (25%)

Cone also point out that this is a marketing lifeline for desirable but elusive prospects such as men in general, particularly, young men, and wealthy households. I think anyone would say these figures are high, but a little thought suggests they shouldn’t really be so surprising. In online marketing, the classic AIDA rules, Attention, Interest, Desire, Action, are more like:

• Get attention
• Drive to your website
• Encourage interaction
• Move to action

The middle two points can be weak points in the chain, and this is where I think social media make marketing more effective.

Why ‘driving to your website’ is hard

People come online with a view formed already of where they want to go. Particularly, I suspect, men. Most men I know like to (in theory at least) do their shopping with a kind of military attitude – decide on the shop/s, what they’ll buy, how much they’ll pay, and what time they’ll be home again. If we imagine them transferring that mentality to the web, diverting them is going to be much harder than interacting with them where they are, and much easier if you have already started the interaction there.

Really encourage interaction!

People like the feeling that they are the one holding the remote control. No matter how friendly your website is, users don’t normally get that sense, because you decide the content and the rules. Social media offers a “home space”. If users can interact with you there, they don’t relinquish control.

In Europe, too?

Social media sites, YouTube, Flickr, MySpace, Facebook etc, are doing pretty well in Europe. Facebook is apparently having difficulty getting the numbers in Germany, and actually hiring students to introduce them, but I think this reflects their being a little slow to localize, and maybe a preference for local rather than US sites. So with younger people social media are important, and the US experience is definitely relevant. For the rest of the market, we may still be a few years behind the US in using web features, so perhaps there is time to let this develop. But there’s no disadvantage to being on the scene early.