Social media: A powerful business tool


There was a time when social media came and took the center stage. Skeptics then overlooked its power thinking that it was just a latest buzzword with no practical advantages. Even today, there are a few people who advocate for conventional marketing methods. Now, this is a serious lack of understanding. Social media can be used as a powerful business tool for marketing and branding your business.

Reports show that a huge percentage of marketers have used Facebook, Twitter, G+ & others for getting more customers. Impressed, isn’t it? Want to replicate such success stories for your business? Well, if social media is used wisely, achieving those results for your business (no matter how big or how small it is) won’t be distant dream! Read on to know the benefits of social media and how you can you channelize them and make your own success story…

  1. Brand Recognition. The current marketing scenario asks you to grab every possible opportunity to increase your visibility. Social media can give a voice to your business to let people know what you have to sell. Your business will be accessible to new customers, and familiar and recognizable for existing customers. For example, an apathetic user will have a new found interest in your brand after seeing it on multiple networks. Similarly, regular newsfeed will increase the chances of a Twitter user to stumble upon your business profile.
  2. Brand loyalty. Regular and interesting news updates on your page will keep your users hooked to it and they will look forward to the latest product launches or services. This way, your customers feel connected to you and as they hit the ‘like’ button or comment on your updates, your page appears on the timeline of people in their circle too. Your business may also have the advantage of word-of-moth referrals too! Now, this is called, “having a cake and getting to eat it too”.
  3. Increased rate of conversion. Regular news feeds and status updates help you build a following on social media. Any new update in the form of blog posts, images and videos will give your users a chance to react in the comment section. This gives you an opportunity to connect and interact with your new customers, recent customers, and old customers. You can also let your audience know about your new launches and product releases which may eventually result into conversions. Not that every conversation may result into a conversion, but sheer number of opportunities cannot be overlooked!
  4. Revenue. Social media can go a long way in helping you generate revenue. And how to achieve that? Social media helps you build a community. Once you have a good following you can advertise your products or services through posting regular updates in the form of images and videos. Provide links that can forward the users to your business’ social media page or sometimes to your website. This enables you to fetch benefits from social media without needing to have a channel.
  5. Research. Social media helps you know your competitors’ stand in the market. You can just visit their pages and know what is happening in their circle, how many followers they have and why and their latest updates. You also get to know what your customers have to say about your products or services. This valuable exercise will help you validate your business practices and improvise them in the coming future.
  6. Recruitment. You can also use social media to let people know about new vacancies in your company. There are many job networking sites that can help you attract skilled people through social networks.
  7. Search-engine discoverability. How your business performs on search results is a lot affected by your influence on social networks. If you have a large social following, chances are that you appear higher on search rankings. This is also a well known SEO strategy.
  8. Social Media helps you find new business partners. Social media offers you a platform to connect with other entrepreneurs and business owners. You can have real conversations with people which could have been otherwise impossible, due to social or geographic limitations. If the wavelengths match, you get new business associations and new distributors for your business.