Source: North American Technographics Media and Marketing Online Survey, Q2 2008 Base: US online adults who use each type of content *Trust is defined as a 4 or 5 on a scale from 1 (don’t trust at all) to 5 (trust completely)/

Company Blogs are not getting it right so far

If brands are looking at social media to get closer to and trusted by their target audiences, these numbers clearly show they are having a hard time.

Taking a closer look, there seem to be four distinct groups:

The number one trusted source of information is the people we know, no surprise there.

Second, are the automated neutral information resources such as Consumer Reports, Search Engines and Yellow Pages.

Third, is traditional media, headed by the good old Newspaper, followed a close second by Social Networking site profiles from people you know. Magazines, Radio, and Online content sites and TV tied right behind, and Wikipedia a noticeable drop behind that. There is a tight competition between old and new media in this group.

Fourth, is a group comprised of personal and company communications. Email from a company or brand leads the trust level of this group. Despite the hated spam, email seems to hold as a trusted vehicle, perhaps because of its one on one nature. Although blogs are becoming such a powerful and influential communication vehicles, it’s surprising to see them rate so low in the trust level of this study. Personal blogs and particularly, Company Blogs have the least credibility. Why? Companies can’t figure out how to relate to their audiences at a personal level (which is what Social Media is about), but they are trying with tools like Tweeter (see GM’s small but telling effort with Tweeter http://twitter.com/GMBlogs ), and eventually, the smart ones will find the right voice to connect and be trusted.

A note from Forrester Research who commissioned this research:

A note about how we collect data. The data comes from an online survey we conducted in Q2 of this year. Our online panel is as representative as we can make if of the US online adult population (18 and older). Companies use our data all the time, and I believe it’s the best available survey of its kind; we’ve been conducting surveying consumers since 1997. In this case, we surveyed over 5000 people. We asked them to rate how much they trust information sources on a five-point scale, from 1 (don’t trust at all) to 5 (trust completely). Respondents could also answer that they didn’t use a particular information source. In this case about 80% of those we polled said they did use corporate blogs. Of those who used them, only 16% rated them 4 or 5 on the five-point trust scale.