The Social Media Advantage

The association between marketing and media is pretty old. For marketing purpose, mainly the print media, advertisement media and digital media are used. However, many businesses are exploring other media types, like the newly famed social media. Social media is also called as human media. The new way of communicating is not about Social Networks, Community Managers, complex technologies, social-hype or last-generation software. It’s actually about human relationships, connectivity, resonance and sticking together to the people. This is what Human Media is all about. As a result, social media is becoming a catalyst for higher marketing and popularity growth.

There have been several researches done on how brands are using social media as their trump card to connect with people, and it is a real connection. Marketing is no more about telling your story, but carefully listening to your potential customers’ story and show successfully how your product will be the perfect answer for their requirements. For such type of commercialization, social media has been proven to be the ideal tool.

Now-a-days, marketers are placing high value on social media. This number goes up to 90%

(Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-industry-report-2011/).

This statistic shows that social media is playing a crucial role in marketing. The utilization of social media as a tool for marketing, gives rise to two most important areas, which are measurement and integration. Without these two, all preparations of marketing through social media will be fruitless. It is important to monitor the ROI of social media and incorporate social media activities accordingly.

Dealing with social media as a marketing tool is not a cinch. It requires a lot of research, dedication and investment of time and money. Market research for social media is poles apart from the conventional market research. Connecting with ‘people’ on the social network requires some fundamental and some high-level skills, in order to find compatible audience, connecting with them at their level, and achieving their trust.

The self-employed (67%) and small business owners with 2 or more employees (66%) were more likely to strongly agree.

(Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-industry-report-2011/).

Social media is closely associated with video marketing. If videos are used effectively, these can create a wave of popularity amongst the viewers. These viewers can, in turn, become potential clientele for the product. Videos can gain popularity at a great deal through social networking.

There are various advantages that come with social media marketing. The first and foremost advantage is that one can increase business exposure with the help of social media marketing. This also helps in increasing traffic and meliorating search rankings.

Even with a minimal time investment, the vast majority of marketers (81% or higher) indicated their social media efforts increased exposure for their business.

(Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-industry-report-2011/).

Social media reduce overall marketing expenses: A significant percentage of participants strongly agreed that overall marketing costs dropped when social media marketing was implemented.

(Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-industry-report-2011/).

The Social Media Winners

1. American Express OPEN:

American Express OPEN is the company's division dedicated to helping small business owners succeed. It has based its marketing strategy around the social web, realizing that social media has become a priority for small business owners.

Since 2007, AMEX OPEN has relied on its OPEN Forum to provide business advice and insight. The social site includes a blog with frequently updated content, and a large collection of videos that users can rate and share via other social networking channels. In the site’s "Idea Hub," forum members can network with one another and with industry experts, as well as customize topics to their specific interests.

The social site has been extremely successful, increasing unique visitors 525% over the past year – from 160,000 in December 2008 to nearly 1 million in December 2009.

2. HSBC:

To target business entrepreneurs and provide them with an active forum to share and gain knowledge, HSBC has created The HSBC Business Network for both customers and non-customers.

It's evident that the HSBC Business Network truly thrives on its members. The site includes a network of blogs, and invites members to create their own blog to share their personal experiences with other entrepreneurs. Currently, the network is made up of 148 blogs from members.

The site’s homepage is populated with content from users: the most popular recent blog post, forum post and user profile.

3. Microsoft Advertising:

Microsoft Advertising has been using social media as a vehicle to listen to, educate, support and market to their customers and potential customers since 2006. However, the past year has seen a distinct effort from Microsoft to reach customers through social web participation.

An adCenter Community site as well as blogs, Twitter accounts, Facebook presence, videos, photos and social media coverage of industry events along with proactive listening and community manager participation have been instrumental for growing the adCenter community and providing customers with an opportunity to be involved with how Microsoft does business with them.

4. Archer:

The social media strategy for Archer Technologies, provider of risk and compliance solutions, and a 2009 Forrester Groundswell Award winner for B2B social media, revolves around two components.

First, the Archer Community is an online social network that gives customers a forum to interact, share best practices and provide feedback to help drive Archer product development. The second component is the Archer Exchange (pictured above), an online marketplace that enables clients to download applications developed by other clients or by Archer.

The two social sites have been successful at driving website traffic and attracting new members: The Archer Community receives 20 new members, 4,000 unique visits and 400+ downloads every week, while the Archer Exchange boasts 17,000 unique visits, 90,000 page views and 1,200 downloads.

But the real benefit has been enhanced product development as a result of user feedback and sharing. Archer tells Forrester that its Archer Community directly helped form its Business Continuity Management, Mobile GRC and Data Feed Manager applications.

5. Cree:

LED Manufacturer Cree is embracing social media to build awareness and promote the benefits of LED technology, rather than directly sell products.

At the center of its latest campaign, "LED Revolution," is an interactive social website. On the site, visitors can submit their bad lighting photos (think bad 1980s office fluorescent lighting) to win LED recessed down lights. The site’s blog is posted to almost daily, and humorous videos encourage visitors to, “Break Your Fluorescent Shackles!” Cree also leverages Facebook and Twitter in a push/pull approach for the website.

Commonly Used Social Media Tools:

(Ref: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-industry-report-2011/).

Challenges In Using Social Media As Marketing Instrument

The top question marketers most want answered is how to monitor, measure and track the ROI of social media activities. The next question is how to connect and manage all aspects of social media. Many marketers are not sure of the ways in which they can convert fans and followers into paying customers. There is no specific data available of how many social media–generated leads it takes to yield a sale.

The users (marketers) are also not certain of what are the best ways to keep the customers interested and get them to refer their business to their friends. Marketers want to understand how to use and optimize their experiences with major social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and blogs.

A significant number of marketers cannot successfully locate their ideal audience among the countless masses using social media. There is not just enough knowledge about the best practices in social media marketing. Marketers are still interested in how to manage the time required to conduct social media marketing.

It is observed that outsourcing of social media is underutilized. Only 28% of businesses are outsourcing some portion of their social media marketing. If this is improved, social media marketing can grow and become a major source for lead generation.