It’s nice to see that nearly half of the small and medium sized businesses who were surveyed are adopting the new kid on the block into their traditional marketing strategies. And why wouldn’t they? Social media provides SMBs with an opportunity to level the playing field against much larger companies by engaging directly with their customers in a cost effective manner.
In a recent Zoomerang survey, 1180 SMB decision makers provided insight into how they use social media tools to interact for business purposes. The results provide surprising statistics and highlight several opportunities for those SMBs who may still be on the fence about embracing social platforms to enhance their marketing efforts.
Here are the key takeaways from the survey:
- Of those that use Social Media, the most frequent channels used for marketing are Facebook (86%) followed by Linkedin (41%), Twitter (33%), Google + (17%), YouTube (14%) and the company blog (13%).
- The top three things businesses want to know from customers via Facebook are: customer satisfaction with products/services, customer satisfaction with service provided, and ideas for new business promotions.
- Surveyed businesses use a company website or email newsletter for marketing promotion most frequently.
- Two-thirds of the small businesses surveyed are not advertising on Facebook. (via Facebook ads or Sponsored Stories)
- Of the SMBs surveyed, an astonishing 79% have not used a daily deal website offering. Of those who use daily deal sites, Groupon is the most popular.
Another interesting find, according to the survey results, is that SMBs named connecting with customers (28 percent) as their reason for using Facebook, yet, only 10 percent of them find that offering specials/discounts on Facebook are an effective way to reach their customers.
You can check out the survey results and download the charts and graphs from the survey by visiting www.zoomerang.com/marketing-digital-world-survey-results-2011/
Zoomerang has answered the need for consumers and businesses to connect on Facebook by introducing a new survey application, Zoomerang Surveys and Polls for Facebook. The free and easy-to-use Facebook application not only allows users to poll their friends on their thoughts and ideas directly on Facebook, but also provides real-time feedback. Businesses can survey customers and prospects on their opinions towards certain products or services as well as what they would like to see offered, giving businesses key, real-time insights into consumer attitudes. As an added benefit, users can add photos and video in their question and answer choices. Plus, Facebook sharing options allow the survey or poll to spread virally to reach people beyond one’s immediate network.
Do these result surprise you? Are you an SMB who is using social media channels to connect with your customers? We would love to hear your feedback in the comments section below.
Subscribe by 
Follow us on 
Fan us on 
