By B.L. Ochman
Surely, as we head into Q2 of 2011, the Fortune 50 – if not all big companies – are now at least involved in social media and want us to find them everywhere they have an online presence.
Nuh-uh! Only 44% of the Fortune 50’s homepages have ANY social media icons – the examples of the little Twitter and Facebook symbols on the left – that link to a company’s social media pages. Call Inspector Clouseau if you want to find the rest.
In 2006, I wrote a post wondering why so many large companies were not linking to their blogs from their corporate websites. I revisited the question in 2009 and again in 2010. I found the biggest companies were not linking to their Facebook pages or Twitter streams from their company websites.
As we head into Q2 of 2011, I found that only 44% of the Fortune 50 have social media icons on their homepage. Why, I wondered, isn’t that number higher by now. To find out, I conducted a study.
This is the first in a series of posts that will examine how many of the Fortune 50 have really evolved past the toe-in-the-water phase, and how many are still in the head-in-the-sand era.
Blended homepages
Blended homepages are a growing trend. Seventy-six percent of the Fortune 50 now have what I call blended homepages – which include links to the company financial and other corporate information on the official, consumer-facing homepage.
Sure, many of those homepages link to staid, old-time “investor information” pages like AIG’s But others, like Target (who had a bumpy ride to social media enlightenment) have blended their corporate and consumer site and included Icons leading to all of the company’s online presence.
Verizon has actual humans on its investor pages, and has an up-to-date, friendly look on its homepage, which is completely devoid of social media icons.
You have to dig down through the teeny six point “About Us” at the bottom of the company’s homepage to find – the third link from the homepage – to get to a page about Verizon’s outstanding and robust social media presence.
Who’s handling social media integration?
Are companies still unsure how stockholders feel about social media? Are IT, marketing, PR, sales, legal and – of course- the bean counters, still fighting for control of emerging media. You bet they are!
I can agree that many of these old-time financial and corporate sites have earned some Google-juice over the years, and that’s why they’re still standing. But it’s time to accept the fact that any and all information that would appear on a company’s Investor Relations site is freely available in Google and other search engines’ financial pages.
Next in the series…
Other posts in this series will note how many of the Fortune 50 have official company Facebook pages; how many know enough about Twitter to protect their brand from hijacking by Verifying their accounts, and how many have a clear social media engagement policy for visitors to their online properties, and which two are totally without a single clue about Twitter.
Get out your trench coat and dark glasses. This is going to be fun.
Great article. I have noticed this burying of social media links at many websites. Putting the links at the bottom of the home page is a dumb idea.
i am going to talk more about this in a future post. two of the top 50 have the best-hidden Twitter symbols on the Internet.
What’s so astonishing about your survey results is that all of these companies can well afford to pay social media consultants like you to help them understand what they’re doing wrong, and fix it.
My pet peeve is that the vast majority of websites I visit don’t even have their phone number on their home page. You have to dig three layers into the site to find it.
I have some interesting observations of my own regarding Facebook pages, based on some research I did for a client last weekend. But I’ll save those comments for your next installment. Looking forward to reading it.
GREAT point Joan! you are so right about the phone numbers! and, in fact, the majority of corporation’s MOBILE sites don’t have phone numbers on the homepage either – or addresses – or directions. I will add those to the study!
Good article BL. Regarding the hidden social media icons, besides the internal control issues you mentioned above, I think some are also doing this for two reasons. One, they are not fully committed to it yet and two, their social media presence is not functioning at full capacity and they are still experimenting with it. Of course there are more reasons…
Joan, years ago I did some consulting with a client on AdWords, SEO, Conversion… and suggested putting their 800 number on the top right hand corner of every page of their Web site. Everything worked, but after three months they said:
“You know what really made the biggest difference in our business – putting our phone number in the top right hand corner.”
One of the best kept non-secrets in internet marketing :)
George: You and Joan are so right! Sometimes, everything old is new again! If you ask me, these days, snail mail could make a comeback. Who gets mail, or phone calls anymore? :>)
BL, this is lovely! I find it this whole subject both fascinating and shocking. I can’t wait for your next installment! Best, CB
Interesting article. Business websites should always provide ways to be contacted on every page to make it easy for visitors. This includes social links. The only reason a social link should be “hidden” is if the social page isn’t very good, but if that’s the case they shouldn’t have one at all.
Great article, looking forward to the series. Interestingly 3 years ago I suggested to a client that they put their phone at top right of their web site. They were most reluctant because “no one else did it…”