Social marketing will outpace traditional ads by 2012

Here is another reason to invest in social media and conversational marketing: according to a recent study by TWI Surveys, Inc., social marketing efforts will outpace traditional marketing by 2012.

by Kristina Knight

Social marketing is still very low on the totem pole right now but over half of the study respondents indicated that by 2012 their social spending would exceed that of traditional ad spending. Also, about 81% of online marketers said conversational spending would be at or equal to their traditional ad spending.

Jen McClure, executive director of the Society for New Communications Research, which commissioned the study said, "... this research indicates that the industry is currently in a state of cautious experimentation with regard to social media and conversational marketing."

Spending for conversational media will begin soon according to the report. About 67% of survey respondents said they would begin upping their conversational spending in the next year.

According to Nielsen//Netratings latest report on social websites, MySpace is still king of the mountain with roughly 58 million users (24% chance YoY) followed by Facebook (18 million users, 138% change) and Classmates (13 million users, no change). Windows Live Spaces is also showing considerable growth with 10 million users, an increase of 32% YoY.