Social Media is one of the most powerful and effective means of interaction among people where people can create share and exchange their views in virtual communities and networks. There are many technical and business jargons for the term but in simple words for a common man social media or social networking are just internet based tools which helps people to interact with each other, collaborate, listen and engage with each other. Facebook is the best example for social media that you could find in presently. There are however many other social networking platforms such as twitter, MySpace, YouTube, LinkedIn, blogs, Wikipedia and many more.
Use of Social Networking
The uses of social media are innumerable and the concept is still evolving with technology and time. The basic concept behind the term is to interact and people usually use it to keep their friends and family updated on their lives. Many people use it to share pictures, ideas, recipes, places they visit and the list goes on and on. With the availability of internet on cell phones and tablet PC it has become even more accessible. Many corporate and organizations now use social media to be the best platform to discus news, events, product launches, customer interactions and feedbacks. However you have to keep things updated and frequent checks are mandatory. It has become a common trend to use this advantage for PR activities for companies as it caters to a wide spectrum of audience.
Here are some social networking tools which you can use
1. Facebook
One of the strongest social networking sites at preset with billions of members worldwide. You can open an account, create a profile, add pictures, videos, share your status, promote your business, launch a product create a page, play games and many more features. Most of the companies now-a-days create a page in this site for connecting with a larger audience.
2. Twitter
Twitter is a micro blogging site where a twitter member send message in the form of a tweet with 140 characters or less. Many twitter members can follow you or add you as a friend but you get to choose whether you want to allow them or not.
3. LinkedIn
You can find similar features like Facebook and twitter in LinkedIn but it concentrates more on career and business communities. It gives you the advantage to search for jobs and appoint a professional.
4. Blogs
Blogs are a website where an individual or group of people could record opinions, experience and content that they want to publish with pictures, videos and so on. A company uses the blog to communicate and interact with their customers and stake holders. It could be a personal blog of an individual or company or many people together.
The Management
Building an online community and using it to interact with customers is bound to give mileage to your business. An online community can help companies interact with a larger audience, getting feedbacks, marketing insights and surveys. However it is very important to analyze your stand before you decide to enter the domain. There are a few things which you should practice
1. Track your Customers
By just opening a page in any popular social site is not going to help as you need to know where you can find the maximum customer traffic. Once you find a place where people already congregate just join as members as the customers have already formed a social platform and relationships. The idea is to participate in a platform where your customers are gathered already and then you could build towards being the resource and forging relationships.
2. Build relationship before you broadcast
Broadcasting is not going to help and this could prove to be very futile for your business. Sending out marketing messages in your broadcast and using business jargons will not yield good results. The key lies in building a relationship and listening to your customers by way of chat rooms and discussion forums is the way to go about it.
3. Increasing your response time
The best way to build relationship with your customers is to listen to your customers and be there for your customers every day. When you respond to the customers it gives them the impression that you care and value them. This will help create a forum where you and your customers could throw questions on each other with responses.
4. Human touch
In social networks it is relationship that counts and not just any sales pitch. To build a relationship with customers you have to be a resource and a machine. In the profile picture of the company try to add human face rather than a brand logo, as it helps makes customer interactions friendlier and human. Dropping the corporate tone in your conversations will help in achieving more penetrations.
5. Value for people
It is very important that you value your customers and treat them with respect in interactions. People need a reason to be a part of the social circle and you have to give them a reason to be there in the social network. You need to use your social space to converse with them, educate people and then talk about your product.
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