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Social Media is empowering businesses and individuals to get found in cyberspace. Traditionally, marketeers relied on tools such as
newspapers, print media, radio and television – PUSH strategy in marketing, where there is little demand for the product or service until it is pushed out to the consumer. This was expensive marketing. Many companies like P&G, Merck and Home Depot used these tools to reach out to the masses, in hope that a fraction of that population will gravitate to their message.
There is a paradigm shift now and many companies are leveraging the internet to reach a targeted set of audience. Social media tools such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter are being leveraged to spread a targeted message to reach relevant audience. This is more like a PULL strategy in marketing, where a customer requests a product or service (by following you on Twitter or becoming a fan of your product or service on Facebook).
The objective is to get found by people who care about what you have to offer. It requires a creative approach and leverage to spread the word using social media. Your website visitors can find what they are looking for and that increases the opportunity to do business development for your company or find customers, exponentially. Social media provides metrics, is scalable and is a lot of fun. It is the new way to drive traffic to your website and market your products or services.
To be found and leverage social media, sign up on facebook, twitter, linkedin and flickr – if you haven’t already. There is an entropy of the marketing messages in the cyberspace. If you are innovative and creative, you can build strong relationships online, network with people in your industry, build a community and an identity. You do this offline when you go to industry events, send snail mail and make customer calls. This is limited by geography and available customer databases. Social media is your opportunity to discover customers worldwide, connect with people who you did not know existed and get found or discovered across cultures and national boundaries.
In my next post, I will share some companies have built competency in listening online and how they used social media for branding. So, stay tuned…
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Contributed by Deepika Bajaj, President and Founder, Invincibelle, LLC. Invincibelle helps women who live and work in a multicultural world to accelerate their professional growth. You can follow Deepika on Twitter at invincibelle.