• by Erik Sass , Staff Writer @eriksass1, May 6, 2013

Roughly nine out of ten (88%) business executives use LinkedIn “often” or “very often,” according to a survey of 139 suits by DHR International, a corporate headhunting and management consultancy, as reported by BusinessNewsDaily. What’s more, 73% said that LinkedIn is their favorite social network, leaving Facebook and Twitter in the dust.

In terms of frequency of use, 65% of suits surveyed said they use social media daily, while 27% said they use it on a weekly basis (and no more frequently). On average they spend between 30 minutes and an hour per week on social media, with a quarter saying they use it for between one to two hours and one in five using it more than two hours a week.

As their choice of LinkedIn suggests, most execs are obviously focused on social media for professional purposes. Towards that end, nine out of ten execs said they would use social media more if it was more helpful to their business, and 86% said they would turn to social media if they wanted to get a new job.

Of course there are plenty of other benefits to using social media, especially when it comes to rallying the troops. Last year I wrote about a survey by BRANDfog which asked employees for their views on their bosses’ use -- or failure to use -- social media. 81% of respondents said they believe that CEOs who engage in social media are better equipped than their peers to lead companies in the contemporary business environment, including “communicating values” and shaping a corporate reputation; 82% said they were “more likely” or “much more likely” to trust a company whose CEO and top execs use social media; and 78% said they would prefer to work for a company whose leadership is active on social media.

Most survey respondents also agreed that CEOs can use social media to improve engagement with a number of important stakeholders: 89.3% said top execs can use it to communicate better with customers, 84.7% said with employees, and 66.3% with investors. 71% of respondents said C-suite engagement with social media can result in better brand image.