Social Media Marketing - Out With The Old, In With The New

Social Media Marketing - Out With The Old, In With The New

Solaris Ataya | 31/08/2009

Stumbled across a social media statistic quoted in an article by Lyndon Antcliff and it doesn't surprise me.

"18-34 year olds now spend 4.3 times more time on social media than with TV, radio, newspapers, mags & books combined"

Knowing others as well as myself who fall within this age bracket, I have observed the growing interest and subliminal interactions of many whom have leaped into this realm of ‘social media’ (online). As for the ‘4.3 times’ more, I am curious to know the sample size of the assessment with which this has been based upon, however through own observation, I have seen how this growing trend of online social media is communicating with people on a ‘many to many’ level as opposed to the long-established mediums such as TV that communicate on a less personal level of ‘one to many’.

Striving for that little bit of more independence in our lives, we want to socialize and communicate on a more personal level, have our say and share our thoughts and opinions and as such the ever increasing tailored marketing strategies continue, in hopes of touching the ‘inner self’ of one’s target audience.

So what does this all mean? Is this proclamation really true? Whilst I am not surprised that a growth is on the rise towards using social media marketing as an effective marketing strategy, and rightly so for its potential, it would only be naive to overlook that potentially a number of people would too be concurrently viewing TV and other mediums whilst on an infamous social media network such as Facebook, Twitter, Digg or StumbleUpon just to name a few.

The benefits of tailoring a social media strategy via a prominent social media network should be considered as part of an effective marketing tool. A conversational hype that positively spirals into ‘viral’ marketing could create a rippling effect that gets people talking about your business, increases your brand awareness, creates publicity and more.

tags: Social Networking ,  Social Media Marketing ,  Web Marketing ,  Twitter ,  Facebook