Social Marketing

Posted by Justin Harrison on January 5, 2010

Social marketing is a part of the Web 2.0 development that uses social networking sites and blogs to market your product or business on the world wide web. This kind of advertising makes for a more personal connection between you and your customers.

Social marketing is unobtrusive marketing. If you are too pushy and members begin to see you as a salesman type, they will probably remove you from their friend list. You should endeavour to be seen as an authority in your field, and to build up relationships with possible customers by facilitating open discourse with them. By nurturing good relationships with customers, and opening up online communication with them, you will be able to get trustworthy feedback which you can use to improve your product or service, and which will also help you better understand the particular consumer group you are trying to reach. The simplest ways in which to do this are through blogging or through the more popular networking sites such as uTube or MySpace where members are able to and happy to comment on your work.

When you start a business, the first thing you need to really think about is, what product or service is needed. And once you figure that out, then you can tailor your product or service to the needs of the public. And then you can figure out how to market it. And make sure you start a web page and come up with an idea that will really catch people’s attention.

Do some research and look for people who have blogs and then talk to them, tell them what your product/service is. And be honest and tell them all about it. If the blogger is interested then they will be willing to help you and before you know it, you will start to see a lot of people on your site and you will have a lot of business.

When you gain potential customers on our site, remember to be open and honest and if the customers have questions or concerns, be there to answers any questions they may have. And answers the questions in a timely manner. Don’t ignore your customers. Because this will turn them away from you and this will give you negative feedback and that could spell trouble for you.

Social marketing is cheap. In fact, with the exception of a time investment, there are no explicit costs. Therefore each successful lead generates a net positive return. If you don’t have much capital then social marketing is the most budget-friendly technique to generate interest in what you have to offer.

If you use the internet to draw customers in, there is no over head costs, because you can do this yourself. And then you will have more money you can put into your company. Any one who can use a computer can set up a company web page. This is so easy to do. I mean people use the computer everyday for everything.

Justin Harrison is a leading Internet Marketing consultant responsible for the Internet Marketing strategies behind some of the biggest online brands including Amazon, BBC, MasterCard and many others.