3 in 10 marketers do not believe that social networks are so key to their strategies

Social networks have become an almost indispensable tool for businesses, and in fact, are now few who do not have any social networks. In addition, investment in these platforms is growing every year, as is professionalized use by companies. Taking all this into account, one dare say that marketers consider social media as essential to their marketing strategies.

But it is not, or at least not for all 3 in 10 marketers believes that social networks do not play a role, according to a new survey of Internet Advertising Bureau more than 180 agencies and brands. For most of them, in terms of marketing disciplines, society was still considered a stage “adolescent”.

Respondents claimed that only 43% of its Twitter, Instagram and other social campaigns were integrated into their overall marketing functions, while half of recognized brands that never measured the ROI of social media. The agencies were more likely to measure results, although 35% acknowledged that they did “half”.

Despite all this, the agencies said they planned to invest 33% more in social media over the next 24 months, while among brands also an increase of 21%, which, according to the IAB, could be expected to help social to “enter adulthood” networks. Currently, about 45% of the budget for this game is dedicated to payment campaigns, but the percentage is expected to increase rapidly, as has happened in other disciplines of digital marketing. An increase in data and information also enable social stop consist only of “many fans gather” and skip to offer more sophisticated content and then measure the impact.

As for the reasons leading brands to be active in social networks, the main objective was to increase brand awareness (for 79% of respondents) and increase brand engagement and traffic to the site (for 75%).

Advertising on social networks will experience a boom in 2016

The investment marks in ads social platforms grew by 33.5% during 2015, according to data from Hootsuite and forecasts suggest that social advertising in 2017 and represents 17% of all online advertising. The next could be the year of its peak.

A trend that marketers must consider (especially those who still doubt its relevance), but that is by no means the only marking the 2016 in the social field. The rise of video on social networks (businesses posed the challenge of creating relevant content and quality video), communication via instant messaging applications (like WhatsApp), employees as brand ambassadors or using networks internally by social enterprises are other changes that will transform the media over the coming months.