New BIA/Kelsey Report Examines the Media Reseller Opportunity for SMB Social Ad Solutions

Companion webinar will present key report findings with a focus on how social media has become an integral advertising channel for SMBs, and what media resellers need to know to successfully support SMB social advertisers.

CHANTILLY, Va. (March 9, 2016) – Social media has quickly become a potent, metric-driven direct response lead generation channel for small-to-medium-sized businesses (SMBs), enabling SMB advertisers to realize higher ROI on social advertising than through search and directory advertising alone, according to a new sponsored research report from BIA/Kelsey. The report, titled, Social Advertising: How SMBs Are Fueling the Growth in Online Advertising, examines social advertising by SMBs, with a view to how resellers can deliver cost-effective social ad solutions for SMBs with platforms that automate campaign creation and optimization at scale.

“The challenge now facing media resellers is how to adapt and educate their sales teams, as well as update their value propositions to sell social media-based SMB lead generation products and solutions,” said report author Abid Chaudhry, senior director of industry strategy and insight, BIA/Kelsey. “This is a change in the reseller script for social media.”

SMBs have ranked social media No. 1 in total spend and effectiveness for the past two years, according to BIA/Kelsey’s Local Commerce Monitor (LCM) Waves 18 and 19. The data indicate social advertising is vital to SMB marketing success today and will remain so for the foreseeable future.

LCM Wave 19 also revealed 73.2 percent of SMBs used social media in some capacity to advertise or promote their businesses, representing a one percent increase over the previous year. SMBs spent an average of 21.1 percent of their total media budgets on social, more than any other media channel.

According to the report, the current marketplace for SMB media reseller-based social media solutions is still heavily focused on presence and reputation management offerings. As mobile technology and device proliferation has dominated consumer media technology trends, finding effective ways to reach customers online across multiple platforms has become critical for small business advertisers. Social networks are the cross-device media that link advertisement to attribution.

Upcoming Webinar & Report Availability

Social Advertising: How SMBs Are Fueling the Growth in Online Advertising is a BIA/Kelsey Sponsored Research report, sponsored by Tiger Pistol, which provided proprietary data for analysis in the report and offers reseller partners a scalable social ad platform for SMBs.

BIA/Kelsey will present key findings from the report during a free webinar on March 30, titled, “Social Advertising: The New Frontier for SMB Ad Campaigns.” All registered attendees will receive a free copy of the report. Register here for the webinar.

About BIA/Kelsey

BIA/Kelsey defines, organizes and analyzes the multibillion-dollar Local Commerce Universe (LCU) for media, technology companies, brands and agencies competing in today’s multiplatform, interactive local media and marketing arena. LCU, the firm’s proprietary vision for tracking the evolving local marketplace, provides an effective framework for delivering meaningful data-driven analysis, consulting and valuation services, competitive intelligence and state-of-the-industry conferences. Learn more about BIA/Kelsey at https://www.bia.com.

For more information contact:
Eileen Pacheco
For BIA/Kelsey
(508) 254-1440
eileen@tango-group.com