With successful social media campaigns from Kraft Mac & Cheese, Dell Computers, Pepsi and various other “big box” retailers, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that marketers in 2011 are looking to increase their social media spending, however what might surprise some users are the amounts being thrown around.

In a recent poll given to executives and marketers at big box firms including Colgate-Palmolive, Mini USA and Bank of America among others, executives said they planned on increasing their social media ad spends by more than 10% in 2011 on average when compared to 2010. The poll also revealed that of those companies polled, 70% said they would increase spending to those 10+% levels.

When compared to the 13% overall ad spend on TV ads (approx. $68.7 billion) the social media spending number is still rather small ($26 billion last year) however social media as a medium is still rather new and undiscovered and underutilized ad channels are still being implemented and tweaked for launch, which in turn will allow for a more rich marketing experience than what is current offered via TV ads.

The polls also revealed that half of respondent will take care of their own social media campaigns, while 50% will use a mix of in-house and agency help to master the social media space.

Of all company’s involved 87% also marked social media as “important” or “very important” to their overall campaigns, while 80% of overall respondents said they would implement some type of iPad spending on advertising or iPad App development in 2011.