The Social Media Examiner, an excellent resource for all the latest in social media, just published their annual industry report. Over 3000 social media marketers provided valuable insights into the “who, what, where, when, and why” of social media marketing.

In addition, they’ve made the following download of their 41 page report absolutely free (click link below)!

2011 Social Media Marketing Industry Report

In this report, you’ll find the following:

• The top 10 social media questions marketers want answered
• How much time marketers invest with social media activities
• The top benefits of social media marketing and how time invested affects results
• The most used social media tools and services
• Marketers’ future social media plans
• Activities social media marketers are outsourcing
• And much more!

During a recent talk by Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks, he referred to social media as “a train that has left the station and is not coming back”. Schultz went on to say that he is positioning Starbucks to be “relevant” technologically to its customers as much as Google. In other words, social media is not a fad and it ain’t going away. It has changed the landscape of human communication and marketing. Companies and organizations that don’t see this may find themselves irrelevant to many in the public.

Many thanks to Michael Stelzner and the team at Social Media Examiner for putting this together! Here’s a brief video synopsis of this report by Michael:

Social Media Marketing Industry Report 2011 from Michael A. Stelzner on Vimeo.