Fortune 500 Adopts Social Media

• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, July 23, 2013

Fortune Magazine annually compiles the “Fortune 500” list of America’s largest corporations. Because of the hugely influential role that these companies play in the business world, studying their adoption and use of social media tools offers important insights into the future of commerce, says the report. The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Marketing Research began studies on social media adoption among the F500 in 2008, and has repeated that study every year since.

According to the study in 2011, F500 blogging leveled off with only 23% hosting a public facing corporate blog.  However, In 2012, there was a leap forward and 28% hosted public facing blogs. That surge continues with the latest iteration showing 34% of these corporate giants creating and sharing content through blogs. A company was counted as having a blog if they had a public-facing corporate blog from the primary corporation with current posts. 

Adoption of this mature social media tool by these companies, says the report, signals the return of the online in-depth conversation, thought leadership and original content development popular with early corporate adopters of blogging.

In 2013, 171 companies (34%) had corporate blogs showing the largest increase in use of this tool since the 2008 study of the F500. These include two of the top five corporations (WalMart and Exxon), leaving the other three (Chevron, Phillips 66 and Berkshire Hathaway) without a public-facing blog.

Fortune 500 Corporations with Public Blogs (% of Total; 2010-2013)
Year	% of F500
2010	23%
2011	23
2012	28
2013	34
Source: U of Mass Dartmouth, July 2013

The 171 corporations with blogs come from 58 of the 75 industries represented in the 2013 study. The percent of corporations blogging varies by industry. 53% of the companies in the Telecommunications industry are blogging. Specialty Retail has 46% of their companies with corporate blogs.  In contrast, only two (13%) companies in the Motor Vehicles and Parts industry blog. Industries with no blogs include Tobacco, Pharmaceuticals and Toys and Sporting Goods. 

Corporate Blogs by Industry
	Number of Companies w/blogs	Percent
Telecommunications	9/17	53%
Specialty Retailers	10/22	46%
Food Consumer Products	5/15	33%
Utilities: Gas and Electric	6/23	26%
Aerospace and Defense	3/12	25%
Commercial Banks	4/18	22%
Chemicals	3/15	20%
Insurance: Property and Casualty (Stock)	2/10	20%
Motor Vehicles and Parts	2/15	13%
Source: U of Mass Dartmouth, July 2013

Since the first study in 2008, rank influences adoption of blogging in the F500. Those corporations ranked in the top 200, out blogged those in the bottom 200, which continues to hold with 47% of all F500 blogs coming from the top 200 corporations and 36% coming from those ranked 300-500 on the list. With nearly half of all F500 blogs coming from the top 200 corporations, rank continues to be a factor in the use of this tool. In 2013, 79% of the F500 blogs are kept current, take comments, have RSS feeds and take subscriptions.

These blogs are kept current with frequent posts on a range of topics. It appears that those companies that have made the decision to blog have utilized the tool well. There is frequent posting, on-going discussion and the ability to follow the conversation easily through RSS or email subscriptions. While there are more blogs this year, this level of engagement has been typical. Those companies that choose to blog, use the tool effectively.

77% of the F500 have corporate Twitter accounts with a tweet in the past thirty days, a 4% increase since last year. Eight of the top 10 companies (WalMart, Exxon, Chevron, Phillips 66, Apple, General Motors, General Electric and Ford Motors) consistently post on their Twitter accounts.

The 387 500 corporations with Twitter accounts come from 72 of the 75 industries represented in the F500. The Commercial Bank industry has 94% and the Food Consumer Products industry has 93% of their companies on Twitter. Companies in the Specialty Retail industry have 91% of their companies on Twitter. Other industries listed have half or more of their companies using this platform.

Corporate Twitter Accounts by Industry
	Number of Companies w/Twitter Accounts	Percent
Commercial Banks	17/18	94%
Food Consumer Products	13/15	93%
Specialty Retailers	20/22	91%
Chemicals	13/15	87%
Telecommunications	14/17	82%
Utilities: Gas and Electric	18/23	73%
Aerospace and Defense	8/12	67%
Insurance: Property and Casualty (Stock)	9/17	53%
Motor Vehicles and Parts	8/15	53%
Source: U of Mass Dartmouth, July 2013

43% of the Twitter accounts belong to the companies in the top 200 on the list, while 36% come from those ranked in the bottom 200. Those ranked higher in the 2013 F500 are more likely to adopt Twitter than their lower ranked counterparts, following the same pattern as blogging.

70% of the F500 are now on Facebook. Nine of the top 10 companies have Facebook pages. The 348 corporations with Facebook pages come from 72 of the 75 industries represented in the F500.

Corporate Facebook Pages by Industry
	Number of Companies w/Facebook Pages	Percent
Specialty Retailers	21/22	96%
Telecommunications	15/17	88%
Aerospace and Defense	10/12	83%
Commercial Banks	14/18	78%
Chemicals	11/15	73%
Food Consumer Products	11/15	73%
Insurance: Property and Casualty (Stock)	11/17	65%
Utilities: Gas and Electric	10/23	44%
Motor Vehicles and Parts	6/15	40%
Source: U of Mass Dartmouth, July 2013

Last year one hundred fifteen companies (23%) had neither a Twitter account nor a Facebook presence. This year that number has dropped to eighty-four companies (17%).

Facebook pages among the F500 follow the same pattern of adoption by rank as Twitter and blogging. 41% of the top 200 have a corporate Facebook page while 38% of the bottom 200 use this tool. Rank clearly impacts social media adoption.

Eighteen companies are new to the Fortune 500 list, listed with their 2012 rank in the Fortune 1000:

New To The Fortune 500 List
Industry	Corporation	2013 Rank	2012 Rank	Change in Rank
Securities	KKR	277	854	+577
Telecommunications	Level 3 Communications	398	541	+143
Telecommunications	Windstream	414	544	+130
Utilities: Gas and Electric	Northeast Utilities	402	527	+125
Engineering, Construction	Quanta Services	397	513	+116
Internet Services and Retailing	Facebook	482	598	+116
Construction and Farm Machinery	Joy Global	446	535	+89
Pharmaceuticals	Actavis	432	515	+83
Internet Services and Retailing	Priceline.com	473	539	+66
Wholesalers: Food and Grocery	United Natural Foods	474	520	+46
Real Estate	Simon Property Group	497	543	+46
Wholesalers: Food and Grocery	Andersons	472	517	+45
Trucking, Truck Leasing	J.B. Hunt Transport Services	486	521	+35
Airlines	JetBlue Airways	495	524	+29
Securities	Jones Financial	491	516	+25
Computer Software	CA	499	522	+23
Insurance:	American Financial Group	485	505	+20
Insurance:	Old Republic International	496	511	+15
Source: U of Mass Dartmouth, July 2013

Additional social network considerations among the Fortune 500:

• 69% of corporate YouTube accounts were found in the 2013 F500, a 7% increase from last year.
• In 2012, 2% of F500 companies had Pinterest accounts. This year that number has grown to 45 companies or 9%. 
• 35% of the 2013 Fortune 500 have active Google+ accounts. 19% have Google+ corporate accounts that have not yet become active. 
• 9% of the 2013 F500 have a corporate Instagram Account, although 1 is inactive. 
• 9% of the 2013 F500 have corporate Foursquare accounts for use on mobile devices. 
• 59% of the companies using social media link to their tools from their corporate homepages.  All of the others require additional searching to locate these engagement tools.

The report concludes by noting that these business titans are choosing from a myriad of new communications tools while continuing to adopt the more mature tool of blogging.  These behemoths prefer Twitter to Facebook and are experimenting with new tools such as Google+, Foursquare and Instagram.  This is a group that now seems comfortable and even excited with its newfound ability to engage its vendors, partners, customers and others in ways that could not have been imagined when most of their corporations began. 

The study was conducted by Nora Ganim Barnes, Ph.D., Ava M. Lescault, MBA and Stephanie Wright, Charlton College of Business Center for Marketing Research, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth 

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