Social intranet prevalence rising, but satisfaction low, report finds

Let’s start with the good news: Most companies have at least one internal social media tool available to their employees. According to a recent Prescient Digital Media/International Association of Business Communicators survey of 1,401 organizations around the world, about 61 percent do.

Now for the bad news: Most employees and executives are less than thrilled about the tools they have. Only 28 percent of each group rated their satisfaction with enterprise social media as “good” or “very good,” according to the survey. About 31 percent of employees said they felt the tools were “poor” or “very poor.” A higher percentage of executives, 35 percent, said the same.

What does it mean that social intranets are growing but people still don’t seem to like them? It’s all connected, explains Toby Ward, president and CEO of Prescient.

The most popular tools

Of the 15 internal social media tools about which researchers asked organizations, the most prevalent by far was the blog. Three-fourths of the organizations surveyed had some sort of intranet blogging. Nearly as many, 65 percent, had discussion forums, and 63 percent used instant messaging.