Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing is one of the newest ways to market your products and services to a relevant online audience and encompasses activities such as blogging, creating profiles on sites such as Facebook, Twitter, forums or other blogs and then interacting and engaging with consumers.

By engaging with social media you are extending your brand reputation online and monitoring what is being said about you. By ignoring it, you are leaving a gap which could be filled by competitors or negative PR. Businesses might like to use social media to raise awareness of their brand or improve their brand reputation, but one of the most useful, and least recognised, benefits of social media is your ability to listen to your customers.

WHAT IT IS

The new big thing

In its simplest form social media marketing primarily involves the creation of profiles on various online platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Google+. With these platforms you are then able to directly communicate with your customers and fine tune your offering to meet their needs.

WHY YOU SHOULD DO IT

Benefits that you receive

Social media marketing is unique from many other marketing methods in that it enables engagement between you and your consumer. Not only can you share your message with the public, but even more importantly, you can listen to their opinion of you, and interact to try and influence it. This engagement is the main benefit of social media marketing, however, there are many other side benefits:

  1. A new avenue for PR – proactive and defensive
  2. Increased brand awareness
  3. Increased site traffic
  4. Boosting your SEO campaign
  5. Testing new marketing campaigns (both on and offline)
 

SOME COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS

Clearing up confusion

1. Social Media is for young people – get the new kid to manage it The kids use Twitter and Facebook, they know what it is about, so you might think that they should be the ones to manage it. You might be surprised to know that the biggest group on Facebook is the 35-54 age group. Also, you need to consider if you really want the new kid answering questions about your product, your staff, your policies? The person behind the social media campaign needs to be helpful, friendly, articulate, knowledgeable and very diplomatic. Whoever it is, make sure they get a whole lot of PR training beforehand because your reputation is in their hands.

2. Social Media is a minefield – stay away! Sure, there have been some social media disasters, but just because some people get it wrong, doesn’t mean you can’t get it right. Social media is one of the biggest opportunities out there for your business right now, you just have to know how to approach it right. With proper management, planning, training and dedication, social media could help your reputation, provide PR, answer the burning questions of your customers and tell you what your customers are looking for next. Conversations about your company are likely already happening, the bigger risk might be to ignore this.
3. Social Media is for – Other businesses It seems that many companies are waiting to see what other companies do in the social media space, or they assume it isn’t for them at all. Don’t wait for your competitor to make a big splash when you could do that first. Of course, there may be some instances where this isn’t the case, where your company deals with very private information, or even national secrets! But if people are talking about your product, your brand, or even your competitors online, there is likely to be room for you to do some kind of social media to listen and participate in the conversation.
4. Social Media is Free While signing up for a social media account is still free, there are many other costs you mightn’t think of. While the media buying spend is low or non-existent, the labour spend is much higher. For example, monitoring an account, spending time reading and replying, creating new campaigns – these all take a lot of staff time. Also, some companies hire developers to help with the appearance of their profile pages and applications.
5. Social Media Gets Instant Results Sure, yours might be the company that gets instant Facebook/Twitter/YouTube success, but this will be the exception, not the rule. Social Media is foremost about listening and engaging, which means it is more of a slow-boil approach than you might think. This is an unanticipated aspect of social media marketing for many companies, which is why Facebook profiles, blogs and Twitter accounts are started with great gusto, then abandoned when results aren’t instantly forthcoming. Social media needs regular and ongoing commitment to see results. Don’t give up if you only have a handful of followers – work on your campaign to get more. Give people reasons to follow you, and make sure you follow others yourself.

HOW WE CAN HELP

Experience and knowledge

As experts in providing social media marketing services, MooMu Media can tailor a social media plan specific to your needs. The primary goal of this plan would be to develop and build a community based around your brand or the products and services that you provide. The follow on effects of this community would then be a combination of increased website traffic, increased brand awareness, an avenue to test new marketing campaigns, a boost to SEO rankings and an avenue to new PR channel. This community would also give you the opportunity to engage with your customers on a one to one level, allowing you to gain valuable feedback and insights into their perception of your business. This then translates into a positive boost to the image of your brand and shows that you value the opinion of your customers. MooMu Media will develop a plan unique to your business requirements, we then teach you how to use the various platforms selected for your plan and help build your online community and engage with your customers to meet your goals. Get in touch now to find out how we start building your social media presence today.