50% of Brand followers on Twitter would buy from them

A recent study by The Drum does go some way to quantifying social media ROI, but is it telling us anything we don’t already know?

The study shows that Twitter users who choose to follow their favourite brands on the social media platform are also more likely to buy and recommend products from those brands. This goes some way to putting a value on a follower or a like.

The survey, which polled almost 1,500 consumers found out that 60% of a brand’s followers would recommend it and 50% of them were more likely to buy at least one of its products.

However, brand following is yet to gain momentum, as the study indicates that at present just one in five users follow brands, and almost 80% of them follow fewer than 10 companies. In addition, 84% of Twitter users only passively read the tweets of brands they follow, with only 23% actively tweeting to show some form of engagement with the brands.

When asked what the main reasons for following a brand were, the respondents gave various answers. Almost two-thirds of them said that they were customers of the company and just over 60% wanted to get instant information about the brand. Less than half of the polled were interested in receiving discounts and promotions, whereas one in three aimed to gain access to exclusive content. Finally, 28% said they wanted to have information on the brand that they can retweet and share with others.