Thanks to my colleague passing along this recent eMarketer article, which points out the interesting differences in the way B2B and B2C marketers approach social marketing.
According to the article, which cites a new Business.com social media benchmark study, both sets of marketers are rapidly adopting social media, but they are going about it differently. For example, B2B firms are more likely to manage profiles on Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube, while B2C companies are more likely to be present on Facebook and MySpace. And, B2B companies are more likely to participate in discussions on third-party sites like Yahoo! Answers and LinkedIn and monitor company mentions on various social media, while their B2C counterparts are more likely to support a system of user ratings and reviews and manage online communities for customers and prospects.
Of the many interesting takeaways, the one that surprised me most was the apparent higher level of focus on social marketing of B2B marketers over their B2C colleagues. I’ve always thought of social marketing as a consumer-centric endeavor, but as a B2B marketer, I think the relatively small number of customers makes it easier to engage on social media.