FAZIT Company Survey by ZEW– Many Companies in Baden-Württemberg are Sceptical of Social Software Applications

More than 75 per cent of the companies in Baden-Württemberg working in the IT and media sector or selected ICT (Information and Communication Technology) user industries know social software applications. From 2005 to 2008, the knowledge concerning applications such as weblogs, wikis, podcasts or social bookmark services, which support information gathering, communication, interaction and cooperation on and via the internet, has thus grown by 13 per cent. Although social software applications have increasingly gained recognition, only seven per cent of the companies are currently using them. These are the findings of the seventh representative FAZIT Company Survey conducted by the Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), Mannheim, in November and December 2008 among roughly 1,000 companies in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg.

Social software applications enable companies to bundle information across administrative sectors and efficiently manage them, coordinate project partners, document development processes or give products more publicity. They further make it possible to detect trends and new business concepts but also to recruit employees. In spite of these interesting opportunities, just seven per cent of the interviewed companies are currently applying them according to the FAZIT survey. Additional eight per cent plan to introduce them in the coming two years. 63 per cent of the companies, however, are not willing to introduce social software applications in the near future.

The IT and media sector have the highest demand for social software applications. Ten per cent of these companies use weblogs, wikis or similar applications and an equal share plans to introduce them within the next two years. Contrary to this, banks and insurances have barely made use of social software so far.

About half of the companies in Baden-Württemberg that already apply social software or plan to do so in the next two years use the corresponding applications to exchange knowledge and communicate with cooperation partners. Approximately 40 per cent of these companies apply social software applications for securing existing knowledge as well as building and maintaining good customer relationships. Social software is less often used for working on joint projects with partners (29 per cent) or increasing the efficiency of business processes (26 per cent). In less than 25 per cent of the companies, the application of social software is used for the stimulation of innovation and public relations work.

The FAZIT Company Survey

The "Research Project for Current and Future IT and Media Technologies and Their Use in Baden-Württemberg" (FAZIT) is a research project of public utility sponsored by the federal state of Baden-Württemberg. Around 1000 Baden-Württemberg-based companies from the sectors IT and Media participate in the current survey (software, data processing service providers, IT and media hardware, telecommunications, audio-visual media, printing and publishing, advertising and promotion, content providers) as well as companies from other branches using IT and media technologies (chemical industry, engineering, medical technology, metrology, control technology, control engineering, automobile, transportation, banking- and insurance industry, research and development and technical service providers).

For further information please contact

Dr. Bettina Müller, Phone: +49/621/1235-352, E-mail: bettina.mueller@zew.de