Marketing Tools of Tomorrow, Today
Social Media can be generally defined as communication platforms generated and sustained
by individuals’ contributions. Social Media shifts the focus from broadcasting information
to users, to encouraging people to share their own information and experiences.
The ensuing collection of personal shared wisdom has the ability to influence readers’
views on the focus topic of the media platform.
Designing and implementing a successful Social Media marketing campaign requires
a process similar to traditional marketing strategies and begins with determining
the goals of the campaign and the target market aim at hand.
Increasing brand awareness through social media communities is the most common and
achievable goal for a campaign. Social Media is like word of mouth advertising;
it is an indirect approach to sales. Customizing and spreading content which highlights
differentiated qualities of products and services appeals to a target market. The
goal of increasing brand awareness through social media will be achieved when the
user becomes interested in the information they received indirectly and in turn
navigates directly to your website. Social Media platforms enable the delivery of
your content intended to increase familiarity and visibility of your products and
services
Reputational Management can be augmented by monitoring the user content published
on selected Social Media platforms and directly responding to the comments. Although
both positive and negative comments may be made in such forums, future visitors
to the platform will not only review the content of users but will have the opportunity
to review how an organization responds (if at all).
Building a network of “players” who are able and willing to provide a link to your
website can funnel interested parties directly to your website. Cater Social Media
content to attract members of social sites to offer their readers a link to your
website can lead directly to e-commerce sales. Caution needs to be used because
a strong sales approach may dissuade many users who actively filter spam advertising.
Increase sales by attracting relevant visitors with the need and ability to purchase.
Focusing attention on the most relevant forums will increase the likelihood of a
purchase from a media viewer. Using a more targeted approach with industry specific
content to people with the highest shared interests will increase the likelihood
of people moving from the media platform to your website.
The mass dissemination of information over the internet has opened the opportunity
for marketing gains from Social Media campaigns. Designing and organizing content
to allow the dynamic customization of information for each goal and on each platform
will allow a firm to improve the effectiveness of investments. Social Media exposure
works best when incorporated within the context of an overall marketing strategy
which includes search engine optimization and offline approaches.
iNamics has successfully designed, implemented and monitored Social Media marketing
campaigns for firms with various goals, target markets and social platforms. Our
collective experience has shown the shot gun, mass approach is expensive and has
limited effectiveness. A set of mini-campaigns customizing content toward a target
client group on a specific platform is more successful. Once launched a mini-campaign
can be monitored and tweaked to leverage the experience gained from the efforts.
As a result iNamics can offer a free initial consultation in order to design the
goals and determine the target market which will answer content and platform questions.
Successful campaigns are not static. They require a monitoring, feedback and continuous
improvement loop. We recommend an hourly rate for such work in order to customize
the service to changing needs and objectives.
Social Media Marketing Campaign Quote
Mini-campaign approach – Free initial consultation