Wildfire PR recently released the results of research they performed with the top 50 companies in the 2009 Deloitte Fast Tech; a list of the fastest growing technology companies in the UK. The research, focused on the use of social media by these companies, highlight the fact that most companies are leveraging social media for one-way, push-style, communications.
While I would urge you to read the report yourself, time permitting, here are some of the highlights, or lowlights, of the report:
- 74% of the companies were on Twitter.
- 72% of the companies were on LinkedIn.
- 48% of the companies have a corporate blog.
- Only 20% of the companies have a Facebook page.
The report notes that most communications, as I have already noted, are just for one way push. Comments are mostly left unanswered. Most of the value of being on social channels is lost. If you are purely using social networks and social communities because you feel you have to, and have no desire or time to engage, you are wasting your time and money. Worse, you are wasting the time of your customers, losing valuable social currency.
Are you just pushing out information and not listening, not replying? What is holding you back?