Banbury: C4B says 32% of businesses have no social media strategy

32% of businesses in the UK are yet to develop a social media strategy, according to a new report released this month by design, marketing and print specialists Catalogues 4 Business (C4B). 

The report, which questioned over 100 UK organisations across a diverse mix of businesses – B2B, B2C as well as a combination of industry sectors, revealed that while social media has risen in the past year with over two thirds of businesses implementing it into their operations, alarmingly one third still don’t have a plan in place.

The low-cost options of email marketing and social media are being heavily used within businesses, 66% and 67% respectively. This rate has increased since last year's report by C4B which showed that in 2012 just over half of businesses deployed social media.

Ian Simpson, C4B managing director, commented: “With social media and digital marketing so widely used nowadays, it is shocking that some businesses still haven’t deployed it. You would currently expect all companies to have social media within their mix, and more importantly have a purpose and end goal in mind.”

According to the report, one in five businesses use photo-led social media platforms which enable the customer to physically see the products or services that are being offered, as in catalogues for example.

The report also found that 50% of companies that use social media have a catalogue, along with 82% of companies that use email marketing.

Simpson commented: “Companies that don’t sell via a catalogue but deploy social media, are missing out on key interaction between the two platforms. Customers today still like to see the products and services available to them online as well as 'physically' on paper.”

Another revealing statistic from the survey is that 39% of companies’ websites are not yet designed to work on mobile devices. The report states that a majority of companies have an information website but only half have e-commerce – a significant 39% are not focused on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) which means that they are missing out on valuable traffic for their organisation.

The report also shows that one in 10 companies do not even know their web statistics, and a further 15% are unsure how to even measure the effectiveness of their websites.

Simpson concluded: “It is vitally important to monitor your website traffic. One in 10 companies not knowing their web statistics is huge. When asked how often the companies look, 7% said never, 6% didn’t know and a shocking 14% look less than every month. In order to keep customers happy, you need to know how your website is used, when and why. The same goes for catalogues and other offline marketing tools.”