The vast majority – 70% – of B2C marketers are moderately to highly engaged in social media, followed closely by 63% of B2B marketers, according to Webmarketing123’s new “State of Digital Marketing 2012 Report.” The report examines lead generation, marketing budgets, and measurement of ROI for both B2B and B2C marketers using social media in the US.
The report found that 52% of US B2C marketers and 41% of US B2B marketers planned to increase their social marketing budgets in 2013, while an additional 46% of B2C and 56% of B2B marketers will keep them the same (eMarketer).
B2B and B2C marketers are spending their social media budgets in different ways. The majority (65%) of B2C marketers spend money on Facebook, vs. only 40% of B2B marketers. Nearly four in ten (39%) of B2C marketers spend money on Twitter, vs. only 30% of B2B marketers. LinkedIn, however, sees a significantly higher spend from B2B marketers (39%) than from B2C marketers (only 23%).
But can marketers tell if that spending is effective? Four in ten (40%) of marketers reported they are unable to measure the impact of social media. But working with an agency generally led to better results: marketers working with an agency were twice as likely (21%, vs 10% for in-house) to be satisfied with the performance of their social media program performance.
The report also revealed that the percent of marketers who generated leads from specific social media platforms corresponded fairly closely to the percent of marketers spending on those platforms. Two-thirds (67%) of B2C marketers generated leads from Facebook, 43% generated leads from Twitter, and only 21% generated leads from LinkedIn. For B2B marketers, LinkedIn generated the most leads (44%), vs only 39% for Facebook and 30% for Twitter.
In terms of generating sales, 39% of B2C marketers did so with Facebook, 19% generated sales from Twitter, and only 9% did so from LinkedIn. For B2B marketers, 23% generated sales from LinkedIn, 19% from Facebook, and 14% from Twitter.
Check out the full infographic from Webmarketing123 below, or download the full study here:
