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10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded

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There is a paradigm shift in marketing. The world claims it, but how many can define it? Talk of Social Media Marketing? OMG- Oh my God, there is a sea change in the way social media marketing is done today. Well let’s demystify what it means? And to understand the 10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded, we must first understand what has changed? See the power point presentation below that shows in quite detail what has changed.

Now you are in a better position to understand what has changed. Isn’t it? Today there is a massive change in the way we live, communicate, consume entertainment and do business. What has made this shift possible? Give me one term? It’s “ICT- Information and Communications Technology”. It has shifted the power from the hands of the custodian to the Aam Admi.

Well lets dive a little deeper and further to understand “10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded”.

What are 10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded?

1. What is Social Media?

Social media includes web-based and mobile based technologies which are used to turn communication into interactive dialogue among organizations, communities, and individuals. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as- “A group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content”. Today Social media is accessible and used more from mobiles than desktop. This easy access makes use of it not only more but 24 x 7.

2. Classification of Social Media

There are six different types of social media platforms:

  • Wikipedia- used jointly by anybody who wants to contribute
  • Twitter- 140 character fast dissemination of post
  • YouTube- vast depository of content of any type specially videos
  • Facebook- Worlds most used social networking channel
  • World of Warcraft- virtual game site
  • Second Life- virtual world you can live in

3. SMM- The honeycomb framework defines how social media services focus on some or all of seven functional building blocks

  1. Identity
  2. Conversations
  3. Sharing
  4. Presence
  5. Relationships
  6. Reputation and
  7. Groups

4. Social Media vs. Traditional Media

  • Traditional media production and distribution  is controlled by the publisher only whereas social media is controlled by its users.
  • Traditional media presence is private or government owned whereas social media presence is by the people at large .
  • Traditional media production requires special skills and training whereas social media is extempore local language.
  • Traditional media takes time to be published whereas social media is instant.
  • Traditional media once created, cannot be modified whereas social media can be modified by comments etc.

5. Facebook is the largest and most used social media platform. Different ways it can be used are as stated below:

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  1. Profile/ Page/ Group– Set up your personal profile. Set up a Page of any type say Company or any other. Set up a group page of like-minded or people in a particular set up to exchange relevant information.
  2. Like, Comment, Share– 3 ways People can react to your post.
  3. Organic/ Paid– Your content could be organic or paid with great targeting options.
  4. Promoted Content/ Ads– You can promote your content or ads in multiple ways like- carousal ads, sponsored post, FB live etc.
  5. Reach/ Engagement/Impressions/ Clicks/ Conversion– FB analytics provide detail analysis of your posts.

6. How I use Facebook

  • Few friends and relatives
  • Industry friends
  • Follow Major Brands to receive all new updates
  • Follow Major Events like Lakme India Fashion Week/ Wills Lifestyle Fashion Week/ Designers shows/ Brand events/ Industry events etc.
  • Play Educational & Entertaining Games of major brands
  • Participate in various Contests
  • Receive updates of major TV shows
  • News etc.

7. Social Media Marketing Trends

Companies have found that social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are great ways to build their brand image. The major uses for businesses in social media are:

  1. To create brand awareness
  2. As an online reputation management tool
  3. Engagement and Word of Mouth publicity
  4. As a lead generation tool to intercept potential prospects
  5. Research and CRM
  6. Complaint redress and Feedback
  7. For recruiting
  8. To learn about new technologies and competitors
  9. Small businesses use extensively to promote & sell their products

8. Use of Social Media Marketing as a CRM tool

  • Mobile being the most preferred means to access internet, brands need to move beyond the ubiquitous card. They need to engage with their customers via social media and apps for instant connect. For example Shoppers’ Stop’s First Citizen initiative on Facebook.
  • All airlines promote offers and sell  vied different portals and their own websites. This is an industry wise trend with every category having its own channels of distribution.
  • Hotels uses social media to directly interact with their guests for feedback and provide them with more personalized experience.
  • Hero Moto Corp uses social media to have a satisfied customer. As they say “a satisfied customer is a repeat customer”.

9. Benefits of Social Media Marketing

With the kind of accurate targeting and measurable data available on these social media platforms, it makes great sense to be on it and achieve far higher conversion rates.

Benfits of sm mrktg.

10. Most popular Social networking sites and their market share

With reference to the graphic shown below, it is clear that Facebook is the largest social media platform by shear numbers and active users followed by YouTube. All other platforms are new and yet to achieve scale as that of the first two platforms.


Top15socialsites-mostpopularsites

The future of  Marketing is SMACSocial, Mobility, Analytics and Cloud

As we know that to achieve a “high” you have party drug called smack, so is the party drug for the IT Industry and Marketing also called SMAC. Because people like to have a chilling experience, as they live in The ICE Age- Information, Communication, Entertainment. Individuals and Companies that recognize this fact and provide a chilling experience i.e. the party drug called SMAC will achieve “the high” along with their Target Group, and those who don’t- God save them. If you understand the above “10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded” then you are in a far better position to make and win by a superior social media marketing strategy.

Images:  Plugingroup

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Sanjiv Choudhary

2 thoughts on “10 Essential Elements of Social Media Marketing Decoded”

  1. Interesting blog about marketing decoded and good steps given about 10 essentials elements of social media marketing.Thanks for sharing the blog.

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