WHY SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS TAKE ADVANTAGE OF SOCIAL MEDIA

The decision to use social media for marketing allows businesses to obtain very positive results. The benefits may be both within the economic sphere, as referring to the reduction of costs for the marketing or the increase in revenues in the long run, both to aspects such as reputation and brand awareness (brand awareness).

Among the main advantages associated with the use of social media marketing must emphasize the speed of communication through the instruments used, which improves the company positioning on search engines online and promotes rapid indexing of content on the Internet; the possibility of reducing the cost required to develop marketing strategies obtaining, at the same time, more than satisfactory results; the ability to be in constant communication with users potentially interested in the information about the enterprise. Finally, businesses that offer customers a technical support service can take advantage of additional benefits.

Increased speed of updates with respect to search engines

Users who want to search for content on the web using search engines. Their operation is quite complex, as are the complex dynamics that allow web content to be indexed in the engines themselves. The main search engine is Google, which shows a series of results divided by pages; the number of connections that can be displayed within each page varies depending on the settings chosen by the user. Statistics show that the vast majority of users, to carry out an online search, choose to display only the connections that are in the highest positions of the list, while those found in the bottom of the page are displayed by a minority; even only 5% of users view the contents on the second page of the search. The objective of Search Engine Optimization, as previously mentioned, is to analyze and optimize the variables that affect the operations of indexing the contents of the web pages on search engines, in order to ensure that such contents vested with a high position in the result list research.

The process of indexing the contents within the search engines is a slow process, and the results of the optimization variables for the positioning of pages are obtained only with the passage of time more companies publish and share content and the more you check the possibility that such contents vested with high positions in search engines. The slowness of the indexing described above makes it particularly difficult for the company to promote individual advertising campaigns. Consider the case of a company that decides to launch a promotional campaign for a period of one week, or who choose to offer discounts and free gifts to the first user who submit a comment, message, or respond to a question, of course, the time spent by search engines to index and to highlight the web pages related to these initiatives is sometimes greater than the duration of the initiatives, precluding any possibility of successful enterprises. With the use of social media such issues are resolved, because the communication takes place instantly, and users can view the contents even before they are present on search engines.

Every single social media tool has an internal search engine can quickly find the content published, and every piece of content, it is instantly indexed. Also, for some social networks like Facebook, the search system is particularly "smart" in that it takes into account the personal characteristics of the user: if, for example, a teenage girl entered as search keywords "Paris Hilton", a of the first pages that will be displayed will be the personal profile of the rich heiress Paris Hilton; in the case in which the research was carried out by an adult woman, probably one of the first results page would display the Hilton Paris. With social media, then, for example, a firm may offer free tickets for a show that will take place the next day, or even organize promotional campaigns lasting a few hours or even minutes.

Consumers receive information to which they are potentially interested

Through social media, users have the opportunity to choose the topics on which to be continuously updated, for example, by following a certain channel on YouTube, users can automatically see on your profile all the videos that are posted by a particular user, or on Twitter when you choose to follow a profile, or on Facebook by clicking "like" within the pages. Firms that adopt social media as a communication tool can therefore exploit the advantage of being in contact with a group of people claiming to be interested in their own upgrades: this implies a potential increase in the possibility of obtaining income and increase sales through commercial communications and information that is shared.

The awareness by companies that users who follow her through social media are people interested in the brand and the company itself, also allows you to create targeted marketing strategies and direct to the public for fan only, then a public non-generic and new but already informed about the brand and on the company. Finally, the formation of virtual communities also allows companies to be particularly friendly, conversational and fun with users, so that users have the same feeling of talking to a real person, an integral part of their lives.

Get good results at minimal cost

The use of social media by businesses may result in the incurrence of costs that can vary depending on your budget and strategies that you want to pursue. To obtain a winning strategy through social media is not only necessary that the company is forced to spend huge sums of money, but enough to have the right skills to exploit to its own advantage all the tools at its disposal.

Reduction of costs

One of the positive aspects of using social media marketing is the fact that the costs for marketing are lower than those incurred for strategies that leverage traditional channels of communication such as advertising, advertising in radio or magazines. As has been previously stated, the use of social media is absolutely free and the amount of costs to be incurred depends exclusively on the will of the company. The outlay required for the creation of textual or visual content such as images and logos is almost equal to zero, except for certain categories of video particularly elaborate. The cost items to be taken into particular consideration are only those relating to remuneration for those involved in the management of communication through social media, but communication itself is done absolutely free. In addition, social media is a place full of information about users, their habits and their taste: the data collected through social media allow, therefore, reducing the costs related to analysis of the market and consumers.

Given the many benefits that social media marketing is able to provide businesses, the low share of the costs necessary to operate successfully through social media is clearly favorable compared to the costs to be incurred in marketing through the traditional channels of communication.

The benefits in the long run

Even beyond the economic aspect, the use of social media brings many benefits for the company in the long run:

Loyalty: the continuous interaction with users strengthens the bond-enterprise user. The user can actively participate in the life of the company, making their own contribution and sharing their experiences and feel part of a community of people bound by a common interest; the company may well strengthen the loyalty of its customers and generate competitive advantage against competitors.

Reputation: This is another aspect that suffers a strong influence because of the dynamics that govern social media. The companies that are able to establish direct contact and effectively with their users-customers are able to increase their reputation and enhance the brand.

Visibility: the social media presence allows companies to be using a storefront available to all network users, both those directly involved as members of a page and those indirectly involved as friends of the members.

Customers: the mass of users present on social media is a new market in which firms can enter in order to identify and intercept potential new customers.

Feedback: the interaction with users allows you to get feedback on their products and services and understand what are their strengths and weaknesses to improve them to be more competitive.

The special case of technical

Some companies offer to their customers through social media, the ability to use a technical support service for its products or services. These companies enjoy additional benefits in terms of reducing costs and benefits in the long run. The views expressed by the users that are online can be a major pitfall for companies: a possible negative comment User assumes a significant redundancy in the network when it is published under the watchful gaze of others. It is therefore in the best interest of companies to succeed, not to hide or remove the negative content, but to provide a service that is able to hear and resolve the problem encountered by the user in a transparent and public. The speed of online communication through social networks like Facebook or Twitter can be a side business to be immediately responsive to face the problems of the customers, on the other hand the user to request immediate assistance. Some companies have understood how the presence of a service center dedicated exclusively to social media can be a valuable tool to improve their reputation and customer loyalty: for example, Safaricom has established a technical staff exclusively dedicated to instant messages on Twitter.

The problems that are expressed by users and solved by the technical staff through social media take on huge significance than those who are resolved through traditional means such as call centers and service centers. In fact, all users, including those who are not really enterprise customers can verify firsthand that the company works and is willing to listen to the demands of the customer, in a friendly, accurate, timely, and most importantly, effective . The technical support service with social media is also used in cases where customers do not manifest their problems directly to the business: for example, when a user publishes a negative comment on your profile in Facebook or through Twitter, companies can intercept the comment and enter into the discussion, trying to establish communication with the customer, understand the reason for his discontent and resolve the problem.

In addition to the benefits that can be obtained in terms of reputation and customer loyalty, service through social media allows you to reduce the firm's costs relating to traditional technical assistance instruments: for example, the manufacturing company of computer Lenovo has detected a reduction in costs of 20% due to the decrease in the total number of calls received by the call center business from customers requiring technical assistance: most customers have, in fact, preferred to contact the company via social media , instead of exploiting the traditional instruments.