Customers play an important role in today’s business environment. The decision of the purchase of the product usually depends on their reviews, referrals, which people prefer to do through Google search. To sustain in such environment, the business need to regularly participate in the communities to interact and influence the masses. The online reputation has to be managed through social media. Thus in order to expand the business and widen the customer base, Social Media Marketing (SMM) is very essential.
The activity of driving the website traffic through social media sites in known as Social Media Marketing.
What is Social Media?
Social Media facilitates to participate in Social networking. The visibility of the business can be improved by share the posts on various social media platforms. For news updates, marketing, education and entertainment, Social Media is considered as one of the best sources.
Briefly describe the history of Social Media Marketing
Though social media is a new trend, the roots stretch way long back to the beginning of the computer era. The first progenitor of the social media, Usernets was launched in 1979. Usernets facilitated the users to post on the news groups. Then launched Bulletin Board Systems (BBS), which was more advanced and facilitated the users to login and interact. The precursors to BBS are the online services like progidy. Later came the instant messaging of internet chat.
The social networks were developed in 90s when dating sites and forums were on the peak, but which did not facilitated the users in making the friends list. To overcome this feature, Six degrees was launched which facilitated in creating the profile and listing the pears. Later a sensation was created in social media by the emergence of blogging. Some other websites like BlackPlanet and MiGente have emerged which facilitated in profile creation and adding of the friends.
Post 2000, in 2002 Friendster was launched by Apple which was used by millions. In 2003, Hi5, Linkedin and MySpace were launched. Facebook was launched in 2004 and washed out MySpace, Orkut, Multiply, etc., and is still expanding.
Since 2000, Social Media has bloomed to horizon and is still expanding limitlessly. In addition to this sharing of media, other real-time updates were introduced like Twitter, Tumblr, etc. Also the advertising system of the Facebook was launched in 2007.
What is the Importance of Social Media?
The most powerful channel of marketing in Social Media, which can change the game of the business. It facilitates with the flexibility in communicating at both the personal levels and business levels.
The search media is used by the business owners to improve on search rankings, leads, sales and traffic by reducing the marketing expenses. On personal front social media is used for connecting with the friends and the near ones.
What is Social Media Strategy for Business?
Any business gets a great boost from a wisely implemented Social Media Organization (SMO) strategy. The setting of the clear and well-defined business goals and objectives leads to obtain maximum benefits out of social media. Any well-defined and well-laid SMO strategy needs to have the following points as the backbone:
- The goals set must be measurable and achievable.
- Know the customers
- The market and its trends need to be researched.
- Reflect the presence of the business on more social networking platforms.
- The core topics related to the business need to be chosen and are used in content.
- Set Social Engagement parameters
- The use of the resources needs to be planned.
- The results are to be traced.
What are the Key concepts of Social Media strategy?
The key concepts of the SMO Strategy are as follows:
- Aim for building reputation by depicting oneself as a trusted source or business.
- Encourage more engagement and sharing.
- Be an authorized name in your industry.
- Gear up originality.
- Keep it social.
- Master over the media platforms.
- Optimize every single point that hinders the efforts.
How a Business Profile is created in Social Media Marketing?
The business profile created must have a well-defined personal and proficiency statement of the business and should be very powerful and impactful
- The competitor’s business has to be studied, their strong points need to be analyzed and they have to be added to the business.
- The prominent features which enables the business to stand out among others need to be added.
- Include the milestones achieved by the company.
- Address and other details need to be added
- Data and statistics need to be included.
- The renowned vendor to be listed
- In order to get noticed by the web crawler, some keywords need to be added.
What is Brand Awareness in Social Media Marketing?
The degree to which a brand name is known is termed as Brand awareness. The trust of the customer is solidified by using the brand name and hence the brand name should overshadow the products. The promotion of the brand name facilitates in growing the business and getting over the obsolete state of the business.
Social Media Marketing helps in branding the business and to increase the public profile. This can be done by:
- Choosing appropriate Social Media Channel for the business.
- Finalizing the social content strategy
- Developing a strong social content strategy.
- Participate in good conversation with the customers to let them feel more connected.
- Track all the metrics such as potential reach, conversation share, links etc.
What is Social Media Engagement?
The process by which potential customers are reached and are interacted with the help of Social Media is known as Social Media Engagement. It is done with the intention of drawing the attention towards a particular product or a service. This channel also facilitates the customers to share the relationships with the vendors.
In order to grab more out of less, the social media engagement norms need to be strategized.
- The fans are reached by using the Social Channels.
- The events organized are announced using Social Media platforms.
- The posts of the audience are to be entertained.
- Participate in valuable and educational conversations by using the Social Media Circles.
- Participate in Social Media groups.
The engagement efforts are traced by measuring the engagement level. It is measured in terms of ratio between the social platforms used to the social platforms not used for engaging. It is considered that the bond with the audience is stronger if the level of the ration is higher.
What is Viral Marketing in Social Media Marketing?
Virtual Marketing includes the hot infectious topic. It is known as ‘exposing an idea’ for a cause. In order to boost the message, the message is sent viral by passing from one to another.
The social media channels use Social Media Viral Marketing for creating the brand awareness by spreading the messages.
Examples of Viral Marketing
ALS Ice Bucket Challenge – Increased media attention is received by the ALS Association by socking the world, where the celebrities also participated.
Ashton Kutcher hits 1M − Ashton has been a seeding strategist who influenced his fans by an influencing message that went viral.
Hotmail went viral – By the link in the footer of the mail sent from the Hotmail account saying ‘Want a free email account? Sign-up for Hotmail today’, which spread viral and became a hit.
