Communications executives are more important than ever, according to the study, “The Rising CCO,” an annual survey conducted by global executive search firm Spencer Stuart and global public relations firm Weber Shandwick with KRC Research. And those executives are calling social media their top ally.

Social media and user-generated content (UGC) have the potential to offer companies greater return on their communications investments, but it can also bring greater risk. Companies are now engaging customers via online communities, UGC contesting, reviews and blogging.

Chief Communications Officers are becoming more valuable in areas such as crisis communications, issues management, social media monitoring, reputation management and online engagement - all areas that frighten many stakeholders. This has been proven time and time again when strategies have gone wrong or reputations have been damaged. Social media has helped spread messages during a crisis or issues management for companies like Dominos, or most recently KFC.

With big brand names such as Sears turning to social media, communications experts can attest that UGC and customer engagement are a language in which CCOs must be fluent.

Forty-one per cent of CCOs in North America reported that they added social media as a communications tool to their departments in 2008, and that number is expected to grow 30 per cent in the following year, according to the study.

Moving up in the world, with 58 per cent of CCOs reporting directly to the CEO, Chief Reputation Strategist Leslie Gaines-Ross says, “CEOs who do not communicate using traditional and social media do so at their own peril.”