Saturday, June 4, 2016

Should a Business Adopt more than one Platform as its Primary Social Media Channel?


Social media is no longer considered a prevailing fashion, popular trend or emerging pattern. It is now solidly established as a persistent reality of an online presence and for marketers it is an imperative. The social media environment provides significant opportunity for brands and businesses to engage with their customers, prospects and target audience. Social media's potential for customer interaction and customer retention is also significant. Today's consumers are often deeply engaged in their chosen social media platforms and they frequently expect organizations will satisfy their needs, how and when they want (Sklar, 2013).

Sites focused on social media are evolving as a key channel to interact with customers to not only build a relationship, but it also provides an opportunity to build affinity and following for your brand. A strong and effective commitment to social media provides a chance to maximize customer engagement and nurture prospects. Today customers are also more informed and have more choice than ever before, so if their expectations aren't met, they will often move on quickly. Engaged customers, however generally reward consistently strong service by spending more and becoming influential brand advocates on social channels.

Social media engagements can help businesses build trust and loyalty through communications and conversations (Brown, 2014). Among these exchanges businesses can create opportunities through communications such as storytelling which offer the prospect to humanize the organization in the eyes of the consumer and target audience. For example in some cases telling personal stories about employees can help improve the image of the organization and initiate differentiation from close competitors.

Deciding Where to be Active

One of the primary questions to answer when deciding where to be in social media is defining where your audience is actually spending time. What social media outlets do they most frequent and where are they most active? Ultimately the decision of where to be on social media should be driven by understanding where your customers have gathered and creating a presence on the platforms that are most relevant to them. Organizations and businesses should also be mindful of the types of customers they have and those they consider as prospects, understanding there may be differences between the two. For example a brand or product may have an older customer base, perhaps dominated by the Baby Boomer cohort, but the organization may want or need a younger demographic. In this case marketing in robust manner on two or more platforms might be an effective strategy to reach both groups (Jones & Li, 2014). This strategy also offers an opportunity to speak and tailor content to different audiences.


For many consumers engaged in the digital environment, online networking has transitioned into a fixation and a way of life for a large number of users. Social media is changing the way we speak and engage with our partners, friends and family, and the brands and businesses we patronize. Right now there are a number of popular social media platforms and there are a handful which dominate in the category of registered users (Jones K. , 2013)


                  
          
It is obvious platforms such as Facebook with its nearly 1.6 billion active users is dominating. Other sites such as Whatsapp, Tumbler, Instagram and Twitter rank among the highest in registered users but there are other criteria to consider when making the decision on where create a presence (Statista, 2016). These considerations include the type of social platform and what users are doing when they engage.

           Platforms such as Facebook or Google+ are highly focused on exchanges between friends and family and are constantly pushing interaction through features like photo or status sharing. Other social networks like Tumblr or Twitter are more about rapid communication and are appropriately termed microblogs. Some social networks focus on community while others highlight and display user-generated content (Statista, 2016).  Understanding the premise behind social platforms is important when considering where to be active.

How does Content vs. Conversation Factor into the Decision?

One of the factors to consider when operating in the social media environment is the rate of engagement and dialog a brand or business may expect and its relationship to the amount of generated posts and communications an organization may anticipate.  In social media both of these factors are important and a business can and should expect to be active in both.

Creating and posting relevant content in the social media environment can help build brand awareness and assist organizations in constructing brand meaning through strong and favorable associations with consumers and its target audience. Posting, liking, sharing and tweeting are often the engagements brands are looking for when they post content. These actions help perpetuate positive association with consumers and ultimately build loyalty and affinity with a brand or product.

In generating dialog in the social media environment consumers can interact with their favorite brands by tweeting or posting to the company’s feeds or on their walls. Consumers can also complain about a product, or share their favorite aspects of the product or business. This conversation provides brands with an opportunity to directly engage with customers, prospects or just general social media users who have something to say (Brown, 2014). When brands respond and respond promptly they can create an opportunity to educate consumers about their product, right a wrong that perhaps occurred during a transaction or just let consumers know there is a voice associated with the business. Social media presents an incredible opportunity to rethink what it means to connect with and influence customers and direct conversation gives businesses an opportunity to speak openly with consumers and the ability to control dialog regarding their brand (Kaushik, 2011).  

Making the Choice

It is often the case many brands and organizations will opt to be active in just a few social media platforms depending on your brand and its objectives relative to the relationship with a target audience. For example a retailer focused on women clothing may choose to be active on Facebook and Instagram to engage directly with that target audience and showcase its products. Once an organization has made the decision to become active on one or more social media platforms it is vitally important to be consistent, remain active and by all means respond when a customer or prospect engages, has a complaint or simply has a question (Jones & Li, 2014). Once a business is ready to start it should also ensure it has effective social listening and communication tools in place and an understanding of how to effectively use them. Brands and businesses should also ensure they have adequate resources in place to communicate and respond with their target audience. From this perspective limited resources should also be a decision factor relative to the number of social platforms an organization can engage.

When an organization becomes active on social media it can provide a significant opportunity to establish brand identity and build a breadth and depth of awareness (Keller, 2011). Effective social media engagements build affinity, following and loyalty for a brand or product and acting effectively in this environment can be a significant part of a balanced marketing communication program. In the end brands should evaluate which social channels and engagement elements can provide the most value and then weigh the investment against the potential gains.

Works Cited

Brown, M. (2014, December). Which social media accounts really matter and why. Retrieved from Kissmetrics: https://blog.kissmetrics.com/which-social-accounts-matter/
Jones, A., & Li, C. (2014, June 12). Leveraging Social Identity: know and engage customers better to build more valuable relationships. Retrieved from Altimeter: http://getcommandpost.com/assets/2014/07/Leveraging-Social-Identity-Altimeter-Group.pdf
Jones, K. (2013, November 15). The growth of social media v2.0 . Retrieved from Search Engine Journal: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/growth-social-media-2-0-infographic/77055/
Kaushik, A. (2011). Best social media metrics: conversation, amplification, applause, economic value. Retrieved from Occam's Razor: http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/best-social-media-metrics-conversation-amplification-applause-economic-value/
Keller, K. L. (2011). Building customer- based brand equity:a blueprint for creating strong brands. Retrieved from Marketing Science Institute: http://mktg.uni-svishtov.bg/ivm/resources/CustomerBasedbrandEquityModel.pdf
Sklar, C. (2013, March 13). How to use social media to understand and engage your customers. Retrieved from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2013/mar/13/social-media-customer-engagement
Statista. (2016, April). Leading social networks worldwide as of April 2016, ranked by number of active users (in millions). Retrieved from Statista: http://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-users/




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