Melcrum research reveals widespread adoption of social media behind the firewall

Preliminary findings from a new Melcrum global study on large organizations’ use of social media to engage employees, deliver strategy and drive business results reveals widespread adoption, a clear business case and visible return on investment for communicators.

Internal communicators are increasingly turning to Web 2.0 tools, such as employee and executive blogs, online video, and internal Twitter-style forums, to deliver key strategic messages, stimulate collaboration and knowledge sharing and boost productivity.

In a recent Melcrum member survey, 40% of respondents said the business case for social media within internal communication was clear and that there is visible return on investment, while 53% of the 2,212 senior communicators who responded said they were planning to increase investment in their organization’s intranet in 2010.

When asked about channels used for internal communication, online video and webcasts were cited as of increasing importance, with the intranet ranked as the most effective channel by 73% of senior communicators worldwide.

The business benefits of investment in social media highlighted included improved levels of employee engagement (21%), better communication with remote workers (16%), knowledge management and collaboration (25%), improving employee feedback (20%) and making business leaders more visible and accessible (14%).

“Many organizations have now moved beyond the experimentation phase and begun embedding social media into the way they do business,” said Victoria Mellor, CEO of Melcrum. “There is a fundamental shift happening with how information flows inside an organization. Peer-to-peer online networks are enabling real-time feedback from employees to inform decision-making, not to mention facilitating collaboration between remote workers,” she added.

Highlights of the research study will be presented at Melcrum’s London conference on February 9-10^th, 2010: “Social Media for Internal Communication”. The full findings will be made available to members of Melcrum’s Social Media Benchmarking Group and subsequently published as a major new research report in March 2010.

If you haven’t already completed the survey, there’s still time – just follow this link.

Lee, Gatehouse

Comments

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Thanks for that very interesting post. It looks like viral advertising is spreading to diverse fields of communication, web 2.0 is a very powerful tool, I wonder how web 3.0 will look like?

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There is a fundamental switch going on with how information moves inside an company. Peer-to-peer online systems are making it possible for real time suggestions from workers to inform decision-making along with assisting relationship between distant workers.

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Thank you for the interesting article. I think they can improve a lot more. But this version is not bad at all.