B2B companies 'set to increase social media spend'

15:00 1st June 2010

The amount of money spent by business-to-business (B2B) companies on marketing through social media is set to rise significantly, according to a new report.

Although the B2B sector has been relatively slow to embrace the potential of social media so far, eMarketer's study predicts a major shift in attitudes.

The report, entitled B2B Social Media Marketing Heats Up, suggests figures in the industry have observed the benefits of new media in other sectors and are now preparing their own marketing initatives based on these techniques.

"B2B participation in social media marketing is steadily increasing and marketers are beginning to see opportunities to generate quality leads and position themselves as thought leaders in their industries," explained author of the report Evelyn Jung.

However, she also pointed out that B2B operators are likely to use social media in a different way to marketers in business-to-consumer industries.

"B2B companies tend to have longer and more complicated messages to convey," Ms Jung said.

This suggests they will favour the development of customer communities, podcasts and blogs over other social media tools such as paid advertising on social networking portals.

According to a study published by Forrester Research in January this year, 49 per cent of B2B marketers are now maintaining corporate blogs, up from 32 per cent in 2008.