August 14, 2015
Social Media Marketing – My View…. Written by Charlene Plows
”Every day I walk down the street and tell passers-by what I have eaten, how I feel, what I have done the night before and what I will do for the rest of the day.
‘I give them pictures of my wife, my daughter, my dog and me gardening and on holiday, spending time by the pool.
‘I also listen to their conversations, tell them I “like” them and give them my opinion on every subject that interests me… whether it interests them or not.
‘And it works. I already have four people following me: two police officers, a social worker and a psychiatrist.’”
Above courtesy of ‘The Oldie’ via Daily Mail
SO my friends:
- Do you really have a million friends?
- Does everyone really need to see pictures of you in your bikini?
- Do I care if you are enjoying a cup of tea?
- Do I need to see pictures of your pets?
The answer to all of the above is categorically NO!!!
BUT Does Social Media Work for business ……
As we all know, there are so many pros and cons for Social Media but if used responsibly I do believe Social Media is a remarkable tool which can help promote businesses.
Through Linked In, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter you can engage with your clients on a regular basis at very little costs.
There are many potential benefits of Social Media Marketing and just a few are:
- reduced marketing costs
- increased traffic to your website
- improved ranking on search engines
- greater customer engagement
- greater access to international markets
- opportunity for customer feedback
- opportunity to conduct market research about your customers
- improved networking opportunities with customers and other businesses
On the flip side, however, Social Media Marketing ROI is Hard to Define.
A recent study highlighted that up to 89% of digital marketers really want to know the ROI of their social media efforts. But:
- Only 37% can measure the results of their SMM
- while another 35% say they are really not sure if they are measuring ROI properly
- and 28% say they really don’t know how to measure ROI at all.
Social Media attracts all sorts of people, sometimes providing an easy platform to hide behind to allow for occasionally malicious comments. Negative comments can often be turned around to positive experiences for clients but this requires a high level of management to prevent this medium producing a detrimental effect on your business. Such elements include spammers, scammers, trolls and other individuals intent on doing harm to your online reputation.
I personally wouldn’t recommend simply relying on Social Media alone and do believe you need to mix it up to work, so why not throw in a little Direct Mail for true client engagement?
Well anyway, that’s my view and I’m sure this will open up a can of worms but there you have it.
Charlene Plows is Head of Client Services at Romax. cplows@romax.co.uk
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