Fun and innovative use of social media
Social media has put the internet users in the driver’s seat and given them a lot of powers. This platform allows people from all walks of life to interact and connect on the information highway of the world. Friends, colleagues and business associates from near and far can interact in real time, and build and strengthen relationships.
Businesses and organizations can use social media to reach out to the millions of users on social networks. In the hands of a creative marketing manager this medium can be used in fun and innovative ways. For businesses, the most important function of social media is to help create a buzz about the brand and increase brand awareness. Some versatile ways of doing this include the following marketing on social media campaigns.
Thinking differently
It is important for brands to think of marketing techniques that are not obvious. Everyone enjoys a good laugh and likes to bring a smile to the face of a friend. The Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board sponsors the Cheese and Burger Society to promote Wisconsin Cheese. It uses fun applications, such as one, that allows you to send your friend a burger.
It is important that you use different social media tools such as blogs, videos and social network accounts to convey a message to your target audience. The American Express Open Forum on facebook attempted to reach out to community leaders and small business entrepreneurs. It ran a popular contest in partnership with facebook. The brand is well known for its use of comments and posts to encourage friends to express themselves.
Petco, a national pet supply company, encourage customers to reach out to the brand on facebook, twitter and the company’s business blog. Another interesting thing to note is the manner in which the company has used the info section. It lists what and how friends should or should not post.
Social media is also useful for political campaigns. The best example of this is the use of twitter by President Barrack Obama’s campaign staff. Social media gives individuals and businesses a chance to reach out to millions and the opportunity to focus on the target audience.
Depending on the demographics of your target audience you can choose to create a marketing strategy that will elicit the most response. To this end applications can be used to generate excitement and fun. Lynx created a pre-promotional campaign that allowed the users to play a game wherein Kelly Brook plays archangel and the player is her ideal match. The campaign on facebook was linked to the launch of the commercial that featured Kelly Brook.
It is important for businesses to invest in an application such as Storefront Social that will allow them to create a facebook store that does justice to their products and brand. The content, design and navigation of the store play a key role towards offering terrific shopping on facebook. It is vital that businesses think out-of-the-box, and to this end, they can choose from many apt applications. It is also imperative that businesses stay true to their core business values.