Social media Marketing (SMM)
What Is Social Media Marketing
social media, the newest craze for consumers and business's from all around the world . whilst researching forms of marketing and in more detail we came across many forms of information describing social media but by far Wikipedia's information explained it in a simplified way and shows the use social media has and also the way in which because of its abilitys is growing at a rapid rate
Social media marketing is a term that
describes use of social networks, online communities, blogs, wikis or
any other online collaborative media for marketing, sales, public
relations and customer service. Common social media marketing tools
include Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, Wikipedia and
YouTube.
In the context of Internet marketing, social media refers to a
collective group of web properties whose content is primarily published
by users, not direct employees of the property (e.g., the vast majority
of video on YouTube is published by non-YouTube employees).
Concept
Social media marketing has three important aspects:
Creating buzz or newsworthy events, videos, tweets, or blog entries that
attract attention, and become viral in nature. Buzz is what makes social
media marketing work. It replicates a message through user to user
contact, rather than the traditional method of purchasing of an ad or
promoting a press release. The message does not necessarily have to be
about the product. Many successful viral campaigns have gathered steam
through an amusing or compelling message, with the company logo or
tagline included incidentally.
Building ways that enable fans of a brand or company to promote a
message themselves in multiple online social media venues. Fan pages in
Twitter, MySpace of Facebook follow this model.
It is based around online conversations.
Social media marketing is not controlled by the organization. Instead it
encourages user participation and dialogue. A badly designed social
media marketing campaign can potentially backfire on the organization
that created it. To be successful SMM campaigns must fully engage and
respect the users.
According to Lloyd Salmons, first chairman of the Internet Advertising
Bureau social media council "Social media isn't just about big networks
like Facebook and MySpace, it's about brands having conversations."
Best practices for social media marketing are arguably elusive today and
its merits relative to traditional marketing are debated. However a
growing consensus suggests social media marketing and Social Media are
here to stay. Nielsen published a report indicating that blogs and
social networks are key components of the emerging social web. The
social web, comprising social media websites and applications is the
milieu within which social media marketing takes place.
Studies
According to a 2009 CMO Survey, currently 3.5% of marketing budgets is spent on social media marketing, with that figure predicted to grow to 6.1% within 12 months and 13.7% within five years. The survey also found that social networks (e.g., Facebook and LinkedIn) are most favored by marketers, followed by video sharing sites (e.g., YouTube), image sharing sites (e.g., Flickr), blogs, and microblogs (e.g., Twitter and Seesmic). According to the 2009 Digital Readiness Report, "Essential Online Public Relations and Marketing Skills," a majority of organizations are now contemplating hiring social media specialists In a 2007 study by eMarketer, commissioned by MySpace, it was predicted there would be a $1230 million spend on social network marketing. In a 2008 study by Forrester Research evaluating the social network marketing programs, only one of the 16 major firms it had reviewed had received a passing grade, with half of the programs scoring a zero or lower.
Social Media Marketing and Businesses
Social Media has started to become a viable
marketing venue for businesses. They have especially become popular for
media outlets to use. CNN has a podcast and a facebook. In addition to
CNN, as a company using social media, their employees use different
social media. For example Anderson Cooper, of Anderson Cooper 360 has a
blog, a facebook and a twitter. Facebook seems to be the leading social
media outlet for businesses by having pages from different companies
such as Dots, New York and Company. Twitter comes in 2nd place and
Myspace comes in 3rd place.
“A customer oriented mindset stemming from deep social interaction
allows a company to identify and meet customer needs in the marketplace,
generating superior profits." - Wetpaint and Altimeter, The Engagement
Report
Social Media Potential for Business to Business
Business technology buyers participate socially more than adult US
consumers. Forrester surveyed technical and line-of-business
decision-makers who buy technology. Socially, this is an extremely
active group compared to US adults or many other groups. Almost all
(91%) read blogs, view videos, or listen to podcasts online, and just 5%
don’t participate in any social activity at least monthly. More than
three fourths of respondents say that peers influence their purchase
decisions, more so than any other media or information source.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_media_marketing