The word 'social' implies that communication is happening between two parties and the term 'media' is simply the platform or method by which people are 'doing' social. And 'marketing' is the act of promoting products and services that lead to sales opportunities.
To summarise, Social Media Marketing is the process of promoting people, brands, products or services using Social Media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn.
While the principles of marketing remain, the strategies and psychology of marketing on each platform can be vastly different.
From a business perspective, each Social Media website serves one or more purposes as a marketing medium, the use of which depends on the target market you wish to communicate with (and sell to).
Let's look at each of these platforms individually...
Facebook, the most popular of the Social Media websites has essentially two sides. Firstly, from a purely social perspective, it allow any individual to join and find, connect and communicate with anybody they choose, whether they be existing friends, school or university colleagues, family members, work colleagues and more.
The second side to Facebook is the business side. Facebook allows the creation of a 'Facebook Page' to anyone, but for business owners, they represent an opportunity to promote their products and services.
A Facebook Page is now an essential marketing tool for businesses of all shapes and sizes. They allow businesses the ability to attract 'fans' (past, present or future customers) as well as interact with these fans on the Facebook Page itself, primarily on the 'Wall' page.
A Facebook Page has multiple pages just like a normal business website would. The default pages contained within a brand new Facebook Page are; Wall, Info, Photos.
Business owners can also setup advertising within Facebook to drive visitors to the business's Facebook Page as a way of attracting more customers.
Twitter is what's known as a 'Micro-Blog'. Micro meaning small and a Blog is like a news-feed containing information about a person, company, topic, industry etc., etc.
Twitter allows you to 'post' information of 140 characters in length about anything you wish. While it's true purpose is unknown it serves as a broadcast medium for businesses, individuals, celebrities or anyone who wants to voice their option or expertise about any subject they choose.
YouTube
YouTube is a video sharing website and due to its popularity and vast resource of information on just about any topic you can imagine, has become the second largest search engine (after Google). This means that people use YouTube to search for video content about any topic they wish to search for. It's no doubt that online video one of the primary ways our society uses as a way to communicate, learn, share and engage with others.
YouTube allows anyone the ability to upload a video of their choosing onto their own YouTube account for public or private viewing.
LinkedIn serves two purposes. The first, it's a way for job seekers (or employers) to connect with each other.
Secondly, it's a business tool that allows business owners the ability to connect with and build a 'network' of contacts. Thinking of it like a business networking group, located online.
You can use LinkedIn to be introduced to someone via an existing contact in your network. It can be a powerful tool if your business is B2B.
Your choice of Social Media platform to choose to market yourself, your company or your products and services should be dictated by the type of customer you wish to connect with as well as the type of engagement and interaction you wish to have with the person.
Social media marketing is the use of a variety of social networking platforms and communities for marketing, customer service, public relations, and sales. They can include the most commonly used networks such as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter or they may be effectively managed through blogs or niche communities such as LinkedIn or any combination of options. Its goal is to attract attention about a specific company or event of interest. The buzz that is created is spread by word of mouth, otherwise known as virally. As more people talk about the product or organization, brand recognition is increased.
Social media marketing is not controlled the way traditional marketing campaigns are. Once it has been released on the Internet, it takes on a life of its own. It encourages user participation in a variety of discussion settings. Whether the buzz is created by a press release, advertisement, video clip or photo, the publicity that spreads like wildfire is just as uncontrolled. As a result, organizations that choose to promote themselves online should take care when crafting the campaign. Although the popularity of the Internet has allowed us to connect with people around the globe, sometimes the message gets lost.
There is so much information available today that most people are overloaded. In the last few years, social media marketing has gained acceptance as a useful and effective marketing method. When in its infancy, most organizations concentrated on getting as much news and information posted on the Internet as possible. They tried to have a presence in all of the most popular social networking communities as well as some of the niche blogging platforms. As Web 2.0 features became familiar to the user at large, target markets were more firmly defined.
Organizations are beginning to realize that they need to focus on the networks where their primary consumer has a web presence, rather than the largest networks. People care about what is going on in their community. This is as true for their online communities as it is in their physical location. By focusing social media marketing campaigns in these areas, brand recognition will increase and marketing budgets are used more efficiently. Once the right customer base has been found, the social media kpi attention results in an increased return on investment as well as revenue. Market research is more effective and the value of consumer feedback becomes priceless in understanding what the customer wants.