The Power of “Social” in Social Media

The Power of “Social” in Social Media - Although direct e-mail and flyers in the Sunday newspaper are still great ways to attract new customers or engage with the ones you have, social media enables marketers (that’s you) to work in a new dimension. 

With social media marketing, you are able to do more than just sell your product — you can leverage the power of your customers to tell others about your products, services, or brand within the context of their social networks. Social media is also powerful because you can find customers who are already talking about your specific product or company or about something related to your industry.

According to a June 2011 blog post by ClickZ, social media is a proven success for marketing very “sexy” products, especially those that are focused on consumers. When companies offer money or discounts to customers in exchange for “liking” them on Facebook, many of their customers (and new customers) sign up for the offer (see Figure 1.1). The challenge has been for companies who are also trying to attract new customers and get them to take deeper action, such as signing up for a new bank account or buying a product.

However, companies are finding that social media is indeed a very powerful way to get people to encourage others to take action. For example, a ClickZ blog post reports that Discover Card created a social media referral program that rewarded card holders $50 for each friend they got to become a card holder. And Zecco Trading, an online investing site, offered its customers $75 for every friend who opened and funded a new Zecco Trading account. The company realized a big increase in new accounts by offering incentives.

Social media is an explosively powerful way to get customers to influence their friends to take favorable action toward your brand, product, or service. It just takes creativity and thinking through who to best use on Facebook to influence those decisions. 

TIPS

Half the success in getting the most out of Facebook is knowing how to use
it. The other half is knowing what creative ways you can use to engage your
audience to take profitable action.

So do you see why Facebook can be so powerful? Facebook has a billion users, all connected in one way or another. Diving into this swimming pool of connectivity means that your customers and potential customers can engage with your brand through photos, coupons, videos, surveys, polls, and so many other things.

1.1 Businesses offer discounts to consumers for liking their Facebook Pages.