Taking the Mystery out of Social Media Marketing

Q. Why are we dedicating a whole series to social media marketing?
A. Before you know it, social media will no longer be a bonus web feature or optional marketing tool—site users have now come to expect some form of social media and organizations worldwide have discovered its benefits and will not be jumping off the SMM bandwagon any time soon.

Q. What is Social Media?
A. Before we discuss how social media marketing can help you meet your business goals, let's take a look at what social media is and where it all started. Social media is a general term that refers to online social interaction created by people using Internet publishing technologies and it all started with people talking to people on the Internet about "stuff" that interested them. The most popular “content” social media communities are Twitter, Facebook MySpace, LinkedIn, Other methods that are considered social media are blogs and forums, social bookmarking sites such as Digg and Stumbleupon, and sites where you can review and rate products and services such as Epinions, and BizRate. There are also social media sites where you can exchange pictures, audio and video like Flickr, YouTube, and Podcast, to name just a few. When you think about the definition, even text messaging and email can also be considered social media.

Social media is a way for anyone, anywhere in the world, to share news and information, stories and opinions, pictures, audio and video on the Internet. Social media can be used as a method to form and build relationships (both business and personal), as well as a create a sense of “community” around shared topics and interests.

Q. What is Social Media Marketing?
A. Social media marketing (SMM) is a form of Internet marketing. SMM attempts to attract an audience within social media networks and communities -- first through dialog and engagement and then targets them with marketing messages.. Another way to look at social media is that it’s customer service in a public forum. The marketing power that social media can generate is off the charts. For example, I may have 100 people in my network that read my blog and one day I write about how great of an experience I had with a particular service. Each one of the people in my “community” gets excited and then shares that knowledge with several hundred people in their circle…and each one of those people could have hundreds of people in their network (you get the picture).

What are the Benefits of Social Media Marketing? Social media, when used as a marketing tool, engages your customers directly, builds and strengthens relationships and over time forms loyalty and trust. Eventually, social media marketing can positively affect your bottom line. Here are more benefits to consider:

• Brand Recognition and Monitoring – Social media marketing creates and/or builds your brand awareness. Social media attracts brand and product evangelists (fans) and puts you and your business into conversations. It also helps you see in an almost “real time” manner, what people are thinking about your brand, it’s offerings, it’s image, etc. It also allows you to take action, if your brand appears somewhat “tarnished” to someone in your audience.


• Relationship Building – Engaging in social media networks and communities builds and strengthens relationships and creates trust between you and your audience.


• Increases Website Traffic – Once links are added to your social media sites, viewers can find and arrive at your website quickly. Additional visitors to your website, means more possible sales, increased SEO ranking benefits, and more. With social media networking, you’re also gaining an audience that you may not necessarily reach through a specific web search.


• PR Support – Social media marketing IS a form of PR. Good or bad, your messages and the comments offered by your viewers provides an excellent platform for PR and can support traditional public relations efforts.


• Market Research Tool – Your social media sites can be used as a market research tool, because it can provide direct feedback from your audience. Ask a question about your products or services and you’ll get many answers.


• Lead Generation – Social media creates a circle of influence online. The social media communities you develop are platforms for viral marketing.


• Measurable Results – With the help of professionals, (like Archer, of course), you can incorporate specialized social media analytics tools into your plan, which can track trends and statistics. Archer can also teach you how to analyze the results and make recommendations to help you improve your outcome.


• Business Collaboration – Social media not only connects you to your customers, and your customers to other customers, but through social networking, you may find opportunities to collaborate with various businesses within your industry (yes, even competitors), as well as organizations that can help you with your marketing efforts.


• Customer Care – Attending to customers’ comments, problems and questions quickly and conversationally in an open and genuine manner can not only solve issues that arise, but also show the entire network and the communities that you’ve created, that you are responsive to the needs of your customers and that you actually "care" – you know, create those "warm fuzzies" that are sometimes missing from traditional marketing methods.


• Reasonably Priced – Engaging in a social media marketing campaign is relatively inexpensive. Your time is going to be your largest investment. Professional services needed to help you with a highly-successful social media marketing campaign would include the initial setup on various sites, in addition to providing you with the tools and services that you’ll need to be successful.

Archetype

Connect with us online!