Australian directors drop the ball on social media

Australian companies have a high amount of interest in social media but a particularly low level of awareness regarding new trends and methods, the author of a report on social media use in businesses has said.

Deloitte partner Katherine Missi says Australian companies should develop plans and strategies for using social media in order to keep customers actively engaged online.

The comments come after the company conducted a comprehensive review of social media use in US companies, and found about 39% of respondents are having so much success they are instructing full-time employees to manage their online communities.

Compared to the US, Missi says, Australian companies have some way to go in adopting social media in day-to-day operations.

“The US are certainly a few years ahead in terms of being actively experimenting, and also using it in quite a serious way. I think their adoption of broadband, ecommerce and online has led to them being an early adopter of social media also.”

The company conducted a “straw poll” of companies within the ASX200, and found businesses are interested in social media but unaware of how to implement new ideas.

“These directors…hadn’t read a lot about it, but the take out was that they were going to speak with their boards about how social media is changing the way they will interact with customers.”

“Of course if you go to other levels in these organisations, certainly there would be a higher awareness with employees, but it was just intriguing that these trends hadn’t filtered up to the board.”

Missi said one of the biggest obstacles to starting up a social marketing campaign is “reluctance to relinquish control” of how customers view the company, but says businesses must nevertheless start campaigning online.

“You need to look at two different areas. There is the external market of social media, but also internal, so using social media with your employees as well. Many businesses are doing this to share skills, organise events and so on.”

“But there are so many ways it can help. It can bring your brand alive in communities where it is not currently active, promote products and keep engaged with customers.”

Missi says a number of companies in Australia are using social media to their benefit, but the amount is not as high compared to the US where many companies have already established healthy online communities.

“There is a major supermarket chain here that is beginning to use Twitter to promote deals, and one outstanding activity to me is that a media organisation here has been using social media quite well to promote themselves, whereas others have dug their heels in quite far.”

“Unfortunately it’s very fragmented and hard to give an overall picture…but compared to the US, the take-up is quite slow here and I think that will improve as these directors of bigger companies go back to their boards and discuss new things.”