Only 49% of the largest U.S. institutional asset managers actively use one or more social media platforms, according to a study released Wednesday by BackBay Communications, a financial services marketing and public relations consulting firm.
BackBay examined Pensions & Investments’ most recent list of the 200 largest U.S. money managers by institutional assets under management, segmenting them into four asset tiers ranging from approximately $9 billion to nearly $5 trillion.
It then looked for each company’s presence and activity across Facebook, Google+, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube. A firm was designated active on social media if it had at least one post in 2015.
The analysis showed that the firms in the study varied widely in their usage of social media.
In general, it found, adoption and strategies around social media tended to be more common among the biggest ones. Some 74% of the 50 firms with the most assets under management were active users, compared with about 56% of the next largest quartile.
Only 44% of the firms in the third quartile were active on social media, and just 22% of the fourth quartile firms were so engaged.
The LinkedIn and Twitter platforms each were used by roughly 38% of the 200 largest firms. Facebook trailed with usage by 23% of the asset managers.