American CMOs' Social Media Spending Plans, February 2014 [TABLE]

Table - American CMOs' Social Media Spending Plans

Heady forecasts about social media spending are one thing (and they’re certainly an indicator of enthusiasm), but actual spending is another. And results from the latest edition of The CMO Survey from Duke’s Fuqua School of Business indicate a continued gap between plans and follow-through on the part of US CMOs. Indeed, if CMOs’ previous forecasts are to be believed, social should occupy some 10% of marketing budgets by now. Yet this latest survey finds current social spend at an average 7.4% of budgets, a figure unchanged from 2 years ago.

That’s probably a function of continued difficulties in social media integration and ROI measurement. When asked how well social media is integrated with marketing strategy, CMOs on average rated its integration a 3.8 (on a 7-point scale, where 7 represents “very integrated”). That score has been stuck at that level for 4 of the 5 previous surveys (which are conducted twice a year), with the August 2013 score only marginally higher at 3.9. Read the rest at MarketingCharts.