Marketing and Social Networks

Social media marketing is an addition to personal, small business, corporate, and non-profit organizations’ integrated marketing communications plans.

Social Media Outlets

Social networking websites allow individuals to interact with one another and build relationships. When products or companies join those sites, people can interact with the product or company. That interaction feels personal to users because of their previous experiences with social networking site interactions.

Social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and blogs allow individual followers to “retweet” or “repost” comments made by the product being promoted. By repeating the message, all of the users’ connections are able to see the message, therefore reaching more people. Social networking sites act as word of mouth. Because the information about the product is being put out there and is getting repeated, more traffic is brought to the product/company.

Through social networking sites, products/companies can have conversations and interactions with individual followers. This personal interaction can instill a feeling of loyalty into followers and potential customers. Also, by choosing whom to follow on these sites, products can reach a very narrow target audience

Social networks (Facebook, Orkut, MySpace, Bebo, LinkedIn) are not only changing the way that many people use the Internet, but they are also presenting marketing practitioners with new challenges when trying to reach and acquire customers online. At the same time, these social networks have their own challenges in trying to acquire and retain customers when many of the traditional principles of consumer behavior no longer apply. As social networks become more popular, a marketing dissertation in this area would be up to date and in line with current trends.