SMEs using social media marketing

Almost half of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) utilise social media marketing by allowing employees to use networks in the workplace, it has been revealed.

The findings from Fresh Business Thinking come after the BBC's Dragons' Den's Theo Paphitis called for Facebook should be banned in the office in his column in the Mail.

Paphitis suggested that allowing workers to access Facebook or Twitter accounts wasted the time of the company and that while businesses may have found the internet a useful tool for marketing purposes, it also encouraged "time-wasting".

He added that the ease of communication the web allows is also its "Achilles' heel".

And social networking is also "hopelessly addictive", he said, stating that users were like smokers after their "latest fix".

However, Lea Pachta, of Fresh Business Thinking, revealed that in a recent survey 70 per cent of SMEs claimed to market their products and services over the internet, while 45 per cent employed social media marketing as part of this strategy.

"Banning social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter may not be the wisest for SMEs, as internet marketing can be an effective way how to promote one's company," she stated.

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