SOCIAL MEDIA BRANDING

From the very ancient time men has a tendency to be social so that he can solve all the type of social and personal issues through sociality. This sociality is been very used perfectly used by men in business and enchasing the profits through marketing of their business and products. If we talk about present time then to find out the solution of any issue arise in our personal or professional life then as an initial step we go and talk to our friends, relatives, well-wishers, and social friends and get benefited. Hence sociality or social mediums are not new to us. The difference is just that the format of sociality today has transformed a lot due to modern technology and new mediums of communications. Now internet has become a synonym of sociality. People these days are connected to each other through many social networking sites like face book, twitter. This medium thus provided by internet is known as social media. Social media these days just has not limited for connecting people in fact it has become a popular medium of branding of business, products, services or company called as social media branding.

These days social media branding is counted amongst those important works which a man has to do being the owner of a business. It is equally important to your business website. Social media attracts the conscious of customers for your products. Social media branding helps in convening your message to the customers in both direct and indirect way, makes you reliable, inspires your customers and builds a bridge between your product and the customer. The merits of social media branding will make you an effective brand in the market and customers trust your brand.

Social media branding has the potential to spread like a virus and showcase your product. Social media is having the facility to connect with the brand and to discover its actual priorities and values so that you will become interested in their products and services. Social media provides immediate reaction through its very effective and social online communication. It provides an opportunity to make its specialties mutual with the customers along with business. Thus today many of the business organizations know the importance of social media branding. Today the trend of social media branding has become more common. A strong brand can connect to more no of people through social media branding and can gain access in business. Prior to social media the marketing of your company but today it has started much before from the employees and the internal helpers of the company. Till today marketing and branding of any product was totally dependent on film actors, sportsperson, and other celebrities who are available at very higher prices. Today social media branding has become very cheap and personal. Not just your employees but your customers have also become agents of your product. This change is totally inspired from the concept of social media branding.

The conversations between human beings are defined as sociality. This statement is perfect for social media marketing. The meaning of branding and its aim has always related to the emotional feelings of the customers and this work is today done by the social media branding. Social media is today connecting customers with each other through face book, twitter, you tube and other social mediums. It is not just limited to advertisement and marketing but it also provides information about your business organization from the very initial stage. Till now the medium of branding was just a one way branding means the customers couldn’t get thechance to express their feedback about the product. Even if the customers give his feedback then

it couldn’t reach the company within time. Due to social media branding today has become two ways. The feedback about your product can be received at once through social media marketing weather its good or bad. If you are about to launch a new brand in the market then people start discussing about prior to its launch on social media sites. Indirectly it’s like branding of your product. It has also provided customers with a medium to raise their voice and they are using it without any fear. You can also become a part of social media revolutions. You don’t need to elaborate the merits and profits of your product as this will be done by others on a personal and more reliable basis.

WHY SOCIAL MEDIA BRANDING?

Many reasons can be counted as answers for the questions for why social media branding is used to promote your brand but here we are discussing only two of them:-

1. There is no other medium today in the world which can compete the potential of users of social media websites. Users of all age group could be find today these days on social media sites despite of their geographical locations. The targeted age group of your product can be found browsing easily on any of the website. This way you get a chance to connect to the targeted customers directly.

2. Social media marketing is almost free of cost. You can make your business page of your business, company or product on face book or google plus. Can also make account on twitter and you tube. It’s all free of cost on these social media sites. Whereas its very costly to do the same through electronic media or print media. Although there are options like face book ad, twitter also available but it depends on you to use them or not. Here we can only advice you to increase the no of your followers through the content on social media sites and not to go for paid ad services. When customers starts approaching you getting affected through your branding and ads means you are on the right track.

ROLE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN BRANDING:

Social media plays an important role in spreading the information related to your product, service, business, discovery and company through social media. According to a recent survey the amount of time customers are spending on social media has increased comparatively to the past years. In fact more of 60% of customers have got to know about the special brands or retailers through online branding. Active social media users not only read the online reviews about the brands but also share their reviews. As compared to male (72%) females (81%) shares their reviews more on social networking sites. Overall the result which comes out of this survey is that the reviews and comments through the users is very valuable for customers before buying any product. Social media plays an important role in protecting social media brands. 58% social media users say that they share their reviews just to make people aware of the bad experiences they had with the products. And one out of four users says that they share their reviews just to sew the company for their experience with the product. Many user brands use social sites to connect to the customers on customer social service level.

Because of Having all the information and figures personally companies are always curious to

know about the comments and the discussions that customers are posting about their products. Public comments on any social media sites are having more effective for any brand. If social media is praised for making impact on the market then it will not be at all wrong.

Social media networking is very important for the companies because it is like one of the easiest way for them to attract customer’s conscious. It is a chance for them to get through to the desired customer and also making their presence in the market. Till know what all they were doing that the marketing team use to find out the targeted audience and then they involve with the customer in the conversation in order to convince them to buy the product. And now social media is providing you the chance to stand with the customer on this platform instead of pressurizing them to buy product any way.

Thus we can notice that social media is playing very important role in branding. Although it is a initial stage for social media still it is very popular amongst the young generation. People of different age groups had left an impact on social media sites like face book, twitter, youtube. Keeping all these facts in mind we can easily conclude that social media will go a long way and many of the companies are also expecting their business to get profited through social media.

SOCIAL MEDIA BRANDING STRATAGIES

In this time when presence of social media is effecting branding in many ways then it becomes important to decide some strategies for it. In fact for the social media communications and brand development this is really important to keep any business growing strategically. A very smartly planned business strategy is one of the best ways to maintain good relations with the existing as well as new customers. Every social media instrument in working in that direction where people are trying to predict about your company and products. Thus it is important for you to gather all your efforts for social media branding and maintain strategy for it.

There is process which is supposed to be followed for any social media branding campaign. Under this process first step is to define the targeted customers and the purpose of using social media. After doing this the social media branding campaign should be planned step by step. Although this process can be enhanced later on if you gain lead in your business. After deciding the process of social media branding it takes to find out a suitable platform. If your content is comprised more of conversations and pictures then face book is more suitable medium and if it is comprised of information then twitter will be a better option. In the last step of social mediabranding you need to keep an eye on the internet traffic. for that you can also take help of google analytics and paid services like just enough who will provide you with all the necessary information about the success of your ad campaign. This will help you to decide that weather your product is successful or not and if it is not then that ad campaign should be immediately stopped. Success or failure of your product holds your position strong on social media sites. Some strategies of social media branding are:-

1. Message or content: describe your product in very few words. Your message or content should in very brief, reliable and introductory brand message instead of a sales oriented content like all traditional advertisements.

2. Profile or account: build an appropriate, suitable and interesting profile of your business, company, services. Involve the corporate identity of and background in your profile and make it as special as you can. This is your company’s page so the maximum use of your corporate identity will be useful. You can go for 1:2 ratios like make at least two profiles which are business oriented. Both of them don’t look as if are made for branding otherwise users will lose their interest in that.

3. Target users: users are very important in social media branding. Identify your target users and connect them with you. Find out some extra time on social media sites and talk to them.

4. Behavior and manners: social media branding is a kind of advertisement and marketing but its behavior and manner is completely different. Stay away from many tricks of business and marketing on social media websites and be socialite. Pass important information to your users and relatives instead of trying to sale your product to them. Always be humble while talking t the users. A sense of humor will always keep your conversation light and familiar. Stay away from controversial content and try to learn user’s behavior and follow it.

5. Integration: social media branding is just not limited to the logo of your company, business, product or service in fact it is also about to know what people think about your company, product or service through their activities and comments.

MERITS OF SOCIAL MEDIA BRANDING:

When it comes to branding of your company and product then you can’t find any reason to say no to the social mediabranding. In fact we get lots of benefits from it. The profits are as follow:

1. Identification: use of social media is one of the strong instruments for making an identity of your product. With limited content and continuous efforts on social media sites you can build a good image of your company with values, profits, prestige.

2. Community: when it comes to develop a community then there are no other option better then social media sites. When your followers on social media sites become a part of your community then you get benefited of getting directly connected to them. It clearly means that you can find out that what challenges they are facing or what they do like about your offers and what not/ you can involve in the conversations with them going online.

3. Repeat exposure: it’s an old marketing saying that a customer goes for demo and description of any product almost 6-8 times before buying it. So as a benefit of social media website you can repeat the demo of your product a no of time on them free of cost. You have a lot of chances to make them remind about your offers.

4. Authority: social mediacan be a strong medium to make your impact in the field of trainers, advisers, writers, speakers and other service based business. They can share important information and answers to the questions to the targeted audiences. Thus you can compulsorily build your fans club.

5. Influence: as your fan following increases, your impact also increases. Having sufficient social media users count forms a snowball effect for you which attracts new

customers, media interviews, joint venture partnerships and all other kind of opportunities.

6. Website traffics: use of social media branding increases user traffic on your website. With sharing content on a social media site through your website you provide users a reason to visit your website.

7. Competitive advantage: it is the initial stage of social media branding and the reality is that maximum of companies are not doing good performance on social media websites and many of them are not even there on social media websites. In that case you have a good opportunity of leading them in every sense. Looking on the other side of it by avoiding social media branding you are avoiding a superb beginning and thus providing your competitors a chance to take off your would be customers.

8. Speed: you get the profit of speed on social media websites because on social media websites reactions are received immediately. Due to this specialty of social media sites customers connect to your business immediately.