How Social Media Marketing Has Changed Business

Established businesses have gone through the biggest paradigm shift to get on board with social media in a big way and it’s because startups have proven it works and we the consumer have taken to it big time.

We Are Social say 46% of worlds population are on social media and that more than 4 billion of us are now using the Internet. Therefore in the stages of technology adoption curve, it would be a far assumption to say that even the businesses in the ‘laggards’ (those most reluctant to change) phase; are now using social media on some level for their brand.

Innovators and Early Adopters

In the tech adoption curve the innovators and early adopters are mostly the startups and serial entrepreneurs. They eagerly jump on board and try out new systems and social media and SMM has proved mostly successful when launching a new brand, product or service to take their competitors on.

Tweakyourbiz say these businesses have been more driven and organised with their campaigns starting with their goals – what they want to achieve from their social media presence.

While a social media marketing (SMM) campaign can be all a business needs when they know what they’re doing and do it well, there are plenty of examples of businesses getting it wrong. 🙁

The platforms like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn can help a business win big and also lose face. Check out this article on top 10 social media disasters.

Influencers

Using influencers is to promote your wares can be all you need to see your product sales soar and the top social media influencers can earn millions in revenue for making it happen.

As mentioned earlier it’s the businesses with deep pockets and hundreds of thousands and some have millions of followers that have come under fire on social media when they get a promo wrong like the advert from Pepsi. It caused such an outcry on Twitter the campaign was subsequently pulled.

Just think how much the advert would have cost to create only to provide a negative result for the business. Even large operators can not afford to get it wrong too many times, so what happened with the Pepsi advert?

Two social media rules where broken when they used the wrong influencer and choose the wrong message says Tabitha Naylor of Social Media Today in her article titled Influencers Can Hurt Your Business.

Avoid These Social Media Mistakes

Can business avoid social media marketing mistakes? Yes there are some fundamental etiquette must dos for businesses and more importantly what to stop doing including:

• Too much selling
• Losing your temper
• Being too personal
• Not giving enough

Treat your followers with respect and remember ‘relevancy’ it what you have to share is in no way relevant to your followers don’t share it!

It’s not only businesses that get it wrong even using the biggest stars can manage a ‘fas paux‘. Do you remember the Ratner Effect we have that article here. Gerald Ratner took over his father’s jewellery business and in 1991 in front of lots of media when asked:

How can you sell this for such a low price?

Ratner replies:

because it’s total crap

He didn’t have social media to blame to blame for the demise of his business but we do today so it’s fundamental to know how to make it work for your business.