Social and Digital in Belgium: Trends, Budgets and Challenges 2012

Evolution of digital marketing budgets Belgium 2012

At the occasion of our latest Fusion Marketing Experience event in December, we joined forces with agency The Reference, to conduct a survey regarding the digital marketing evolutions in my home country, Belgium. The objective: give an overview of the landscape in Belgium in terms of budget, resource allocation, satisfaction, challenges and plans for 2012.

We targeted decision makers of digital marketing initiatives. Data were collected through an online survey and field work was conducted in November 2011.

The sample size: 150 respondents, who are responsible for digital within their company and an error margin of results of +/- 7,8%.

Key takeaways, an infographic and of course, a slideshare version with the main findings.

Moving further on the digital highway

It will probably not come as a surprise that Belgian marketers are increasingly embracing digital marketing. It’s a global phenomenon. However, as a euro zone country with specific economic challenges, there is still work to do.

Nevertheless, on average, 20% of the total marketing budget goes to digital marketing initiatives. Budgets grew by 5.5% in 2011 (year-on-year) and will continue to do so in 2012, despite the recession and other challenges. Noteworthy is that, among large industry players, the share of online marketing in the total marketing budgets tends to drop.

Spend on digital marketing Belgium 2012

A social presence but what’s next?

The main areas of investment are corporate websites (both brand and product sites). Next comes “social presence”. For most companies that’s an absolute priority: establishing a social presence. It even claims up to 12% of the total digital marketing budget. This finding scares me. Because having a social presence is utterly meaningless if you don’t have a goal and as is the case in many countries, the social presence is often more important than having a solid strategy or, at least, a well-defined goal.

55% of respondents plans to invest more in social presences this year. 7 out of 10 Belgian companies are currently present on social media. The budget for social is already more than half of the website budget. Social media monitoring and creating a social presence are often done in-house. The same goes for web analytics. Despite this in-house mainly focus, the survey shows employees often lack expert knowledge.

Search and email thrive

Search engine marketing and email marketing are still ranking high in the digital marketing priorities as well. Both tactics are especially used to fulfill one of the most strategic pillars of decision makers. And that pillar is called lead generation.

The budget for search engine optimization is now half of the budget for websites. Traffic and filling the pipe is a priority. Let’s hope the relatively high combined budgets for social and SEO don’t make businesses forget that traffic and interactions as such are meaningless and that converting websites offering a good customer experience are still key in digital marketing.

However, since most Belgian companies focus on establishing a web presence and generating traffic through email marketing, search engine marketing and their social hubs, it would surprise me if conversion and customer-centricity are getting proper attention. Another reason to think so is the simple fact that the budgets allocated to increasing conversions and efficiency are far lower than traffic building budgets all over the world.

Mobile websites: lagging behind?

A surprising finding is that only 49% are considering optimizing their sites for mobile  and only 23% of large companies (250+ employees) have such an optimized website. Mobile optimization should not be a consideration anymore.

Sales of smartphones and the likes are boosting worldwide and in Belgium, which has a good penetration, as well. So, offering mobile versions of websites seems like the least organizations can do in order to meet consumer expectations, especially at the start of a year where mobile Internet usage might even increase faster.

Challenges: data and ROI

Among the main challenges for marketers is the ability to turn the masses of data into insights. That’s not a surprise. Data silos, disconnected marketing tactics and a lack of an integrated customer-centric strategy is a challenge everywhere. It’s time to define common metrics across all customer interactions and move towards integration whereby the volume of data is reduced by focusing on the data that really matter: those that serve the customer experience and business goals.

Knowing the data challenges and corporate silos that exist everywhere, it should also not come as a surprise that 45% of respondents find it hard to determine ROI calculations. Furthermore, when it boils down to specific focus areas such as social and to web analytics, employees lack the knowledge while most as these efforts are done in-house, as mentioned before.

I think it is safe to conclude that, as far as social is concerned, most Belgian businesses are testing the waters and that the largest part of efforts go to traffic, while results, measurement, analysis and improvement don’t get the attention they deserve. However, is it any different in other countries?

More data in the slideshare and infographic below or on the survey page.