Altimeter report: The state of social business 2013

“What was previously a series of initiatives driven by marketing and PR is now evolving into a social business movement that looks to scale and integrate social across the organization. The following report reveals how businesses are expanding social efforts and investments. As social approaches its first decade of enterprise integration, we still see experimentation in models and approach. There is no one way to become a social business. Instead, social businesses evolve through a series of stages that ultimately align social media strategies with business goals.” – Altimeter Group

Some highlights:

• In terms of social business maturity, most organizations are “intermediate,” with only 17% who are truly strategic in the execution of their social strategies.
• The lack of clear leadership, organization, and strategy means that many organizations experience some form of “social anarchy,” of siloed, uncoordinated social efforts.
• Top priorities for social include scaling for engagement, integrating data, and training/ education around social.
• Measuring the impact of social is maturing, with over half of organizations able to track the impact of social on marketing efforts.
• Lack of employee training around social media policies remains a significant risk area — only 18% of companies said that their employees have a good or very good understanding of their social media policies.