Benifits for Opting Digital Media for the Purpose of Advertisements
REPORT ON
“BENFITIS FOR OPTING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR THE PURPOSE OF ADVERTISEMENTS” SUBMITTED TOWARDS PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
DEPARTMENT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES,JAMIA HAMDARD
SUBMITTED BY:
OMER NISAR SIDDIQUI
MBA (2011-13)
SUBMITTED TO :
MR. SHAHNAWAZ ABDIN
DECLARATION OF THE STUDENT
I, the undersigned, hereby declare that this project entitled “BENIFITS FOR OPTING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR THE PURPOSE OF ADVERTISEMENTS” is a genuine and bona fide work prepared by me and submitted to the JAMIA HAMDARD UNIVERSITY, for the partial fulfillment of The Masters Degree in Business Administration.
The present work is of original nature and the conclusions drawn therein are based on the data collected by myself.
To the best of my knowledge, the matter presented in this dissertation has not been submitted for the award of any Degree, Diploma or Membership Either to this or any other Institute / University.
Place: Dubai, UAE
Name: Omer Nisar Siddiqui
Date: 28.06.2012
Acknowledgement
Sometimes words fall short to show gratitude, the same happened with me during this project. The immense help and support received from Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC. overwhelmed me during the project.
Much of my work to make this report would not have been possible without the constant guidance and support of certain key-people.
I would like to express my deep-felt appreciation and gratitude to Mr. Mohd. Nayeem Siddiqui - Sr. Manager, Online Ads Sales at Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC., Dubai, UAE for giving me this opportunity. I am very thankful to him for his guidance in whole project without him I was not able to complete this work. He did not give me his guidance but also his valuable time.
I am also very thankful to Mr. Binu Mathew – Vice President, Sales for his support in whole project, and gave me his valuable time.
Preface
World is widening up & we cannot be confined to one place. In the present era of globalization & liberalization it can never be possible to make a mark in today’s competitive environment. In India, business and industrial management activities is a base for the country.
With an outlook of the importance of practical aspects of business mgt. Jamia Hamdard has subscribed the subject, “Summer Training” as a part of syllabus of MBA where by the students have to take initiative training in the field of marketing in a company & have to study various aspects of marketing.
I am very glad to have got a chance of getting training in a reputed as well as one of the leading companies at UAE– “INTEGRATED ADVERTISING SERVICES FZ. LLC, DUBAI, UAE.” for a period of Six Weeks on all the aspects of management especially in marketing field.
Executive Summary
Social Media Marketing
Social Media Marketing differs from traditional product and service marketing, in that it does not depend on a mere unidirectional relationship between the advertiser and the consumer. Rather, the ultimate goal of Social Media Marketing is to, in essence, plant a seed and have the generated interest lead to conversations between people about your product and/or service. A successful Social Media Marketing campaign must be designed in such a way as to create a buzz. In order for this to occur, the marketer must work beyond merely creating a banner and having a social media site host it. In a sense, Social Media Marketing is something that works along a continuum and is ever-evolving. The success of such a campaign depends wholly on the marketer’s ability to entice social network users to discuss and promote a product.
In order for this to occur, a Social Media Marketing campaign must be carefully planned out in order to produce content which will appeal to the intended audience. Once the seed is planted the results must be monitored, the product or service promoted, and discussions closely tracked.
Social media marketing is an engagement with online communities to generate exposure, opportunity and sales. It seems that many marketers see the social media frontier as the next marketing gold rush. Given the low cost of entry, many marketing pros are doing more than just dipping their creative toes into this gold-laden water. If you 're in charge of marketing your business, you 'll want to closely examine what 's on the following pages. My team turned over every rock, looking for the "not so obvious" findings among this content-rich data. We set out to uncover the "who, what, where, when and why " of social media marketing with this report. Nearly 900 of your peers provided the kind of insight that previously has not existed. If you 're pondering starting social media marketing, it 's my hope that these findings will help push you over the edge.
The most significant benefit of Social Media Marketing is the fact that – especially considering the number of users of networks such as Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter – the possibilities for exposure and growth are limitless. Moreover, one cannot ignore the speed and ease with which news is able to spread among users of social networking sites and beyond. When considering how to first approach a Social Media Marketing strategy, it is of the utmost importance to understand your audience and the kinds of products/services that they are interested in. For instance, if your customers are the type to readily participate in online social networks, it may be beneficial to add a blog to your company website. In addition, you may request that interested employees add information/blog articles to your company site to generate interest – never forgetting to add the company logo and other features which will identify your brand into these entries.
Another way to use the popularity of social networking to the advantage of your corporation is to perhaps join one or more of the most popular social networking sites and begin discussions, groups, etc. around your relevant products and services. Many companies have seen a profound benefit to their bottom line from adding Social Media Marketing into their given marketing plans/strategies. Remember, Social Media Marketing is the future of online advertising, and in comparison to marketing in print or other media, is relatively effortless and inexpensive.
The number-one benefit of social media marketing is gaining the all-important eyeball. A significant 81% of all marketers indicated that their social media efforts have generated exposure for their businesses. Improving traffic and growing lists was the second major benefit, followed by building new partnerships. An unexpected benefit was a rise in search engine rankings reported by more than half of participants. As the search engine rankings improve, so will business exposure, lead generation efforts and a reduction in overall marketing expenses. About one in two marketers found social media generated qualified leads. However, only slightly more than one in three said social media marketing helped close business.
INTRODUCTION
The explosion of social media phenomenon is as mind boggling as that and the pace at which it is growing is maddening. Social media is all about networking and networking in a way that espouses trust among parties and communities involved. Any website which allows user to share their content, opinions, views and encourages interaction and community building can be classified as a social media. Some popular social media sites are: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Digg, MySpace, StumbleUpon, Del.icio.us, Scribd, Flickr etc. Trust and goodwill are the basis of social networking, and by marketing in the realm of social media you need to adhere to these fundamental notions. It is probably the only marketing platform that encourages fool proof communication and accountability among sellers as well as consumers. Global companies have recognized Social Media Marketing as a potential marketing platform, utilized them with innovations to power their advertising campaign with social media marketing. Many companies have seen a profound benefit to their bottom line from adding Social Media Marketing into their given marketing plans/strategies. Remember, Social Media Marketing is the future of online advertising, and in comparison to marketing in print or other media, is relatively effortless and inexpensive. Taking all of this into consideration, it becomes apparent that there is no reason not to at least attempt to integrate Social Media Marketing into your current marketing strategy and reap the benefits of this new medium. Social media marketing is a term that describes use of social networks, online communities, blogs, wikis or any other online collaborative media for marketing, sales, public relations and customer service. Common social media marketing tools include Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, Wikipedia, Orkut and YouTube
In the context of internet marketing, social media refers to a collective group of web properties whose content is primarily published by users, not direct employees of the property (e.g., the vast majority of video on YouTube is published by non-YouTube employees).
Social media marketing has three important aspects: 1. Creating buzz or newsworthy events, videos, tweets, or blog entries that attract attention, and become viral in nature. Buzz is what makes social media marketing work. It replicates a message through user to user contact, rather than the traditional method of purchasing of an ad or promoting a press release. The message does not necessarily have to be about the product. Many successful viral campaigns have gathered steam through an amusing or compelling message, with the company logo or tagline included incidentally. 2. Building ways that enable fans of a brand or company to promote a message themselves in multiple online social media venues. Fan pages in Twitter, MySpace of Facebook follow this model. 3. It is based around online conversations. Social media marketing is not controlled by the organization. Instead it encourages user participation and dialogue. A badly designed social media marketing campaign can potentially backfire on the organization that created it. To be successful SMM campaigns must fully engage and respect the users.
According to Lloyd Salmons, first chairman of the Internet Advertising Bureau social media council "Social media isn 't just about big networks like Facebook and MySpace; it 's about brands having conversations."
Social Network Marketing
Social network marketing or social level marketing is an advertising method that makes use of social network service and to increase their web presence. This ranges from simply advertising directly on social networking sites, viral marketing that spreads throughout the web, email, and word of mouth or providing niche social networking sites focused around the item being advertised.
Many sites include features where companies can create profiles. For example, on Facebook companies can create "pages" where users can become fans of this company, product, service, individual, etc. Many companies create MySpace pages for themselves. Companies sometimes invest in internet presence management, which can include social network marketing.
When you compare the spending on social media marketing from August 2009 to February 2010, overall there 's an increase of 60% in the budgets (from 3.5% to 5.6%). Similarly, the planning for the next one to five years shows a similar level of consideration as well: in August 2009, social media spending was thought to be 6.1% for the next year and 13.7% for the next five years; and now, it 's more like 9.9% in the next year and 17.7% in the next five years. And since this was a survey of CMOs, it 's a good indication that these budget predictions may get some traction, rather than just being a fond wish of pundits. It 's a relief to see something that doesn 't resemble a death spiral in this economy.
Why we need to consider social media marketing services? * Size: Facebook has over 250 million users globally. On an average, 70-100 tweets happen by the second. An average user on Facebook has 120 friends. This is the kind of enormity Social networking sites espouse and with this comes the license to communicate powerfully. But when such large numbers are involved, there is a danger of something going wrong and when it does, it happens in a big way. You may be a regular user of networking sites, but when you involve business with it, an expert should be hired to do what is best for your business. * Transparency: no cheat code involved. No black hat techniques allowed. Everything that happens in the social networking landscape is fool proof. You cannot fake authenticity in an attempt to get more people involved. Members can choose to associate with you or opt out. Opinions made on social networking platforms are taken seriously and the more authoritative you get, more seriously you are taken. When you win, you win in a big way. * Reach: It is possible to make your mark globally and do it quickly using social networking sites. * Boost website traffic: social media is probably the fastest and easiest means of redirecting traffic to your website. By simply placing your website URL in your profile, you can have all your profile visitors check out your website and a percentage of traffic is sure to get converted in course of time. This is the virtual way version of “word-of mouth”. * Branding: Buying a candy may have been impulsive all your life, but if it is discussed on a social networking site, you are likely to get brand conscious even a candy. Social media is a smart way to build brands. Social media platforms are known to be one of the most powerful and fast means of branding. Some of the big brands like Coke, Ford, Dell, IBM, Burger King are some of the well known brands have powerfully used social media platforms to endorse themselves.
Let’s look at a brand that gained in a big way by using the social media platform in marketing. Ford is a case in point here.
The economic crunch put the automobile industry in trouble and car companies were looking for avenues to market themselves and push sales. Ford played smart and Scott Monty, head of social media for Ford really understood that using social media for marketing is not all about putting up a banner ad on Facebook. He took the centre stage and got into the core and essence of social media, involving blogging, active participation on social networking sites, creating great network of people and communities and used the social media mediums the way they were meant to be used, but with a pinch of innovation. Here are some statistics that reveal how powerfully Ford used Social Media.
The experience factor
There is a direct relationship between how long marketers have been using social media and their weekly time commitment. For people just beginning with social media, the median weekly time commitment was two hours per week. However, for folks who have been doing this for a few months, the median jumped to 10 hours a week. And for people who have been doing this for years, their median is 20+ hours each week.
“No profession stands to influence social media more than public relations.”
The Use of Social Media Marketing
I asked two questions to determine the survey participants ' experience using social media to market their businesses.
Use of Social Media Marketing
I began by simply asking participants if they use social media to market their businesses. The overwhelming majority (88%) indicated they were employing social media for marketing purposes. Business owners were more likely to use social media marketing (90+%) than employees working for a business (81%). People aged 30 to 39 years were most likely to use social media marketing (92.8%).
Experience with social media marketing
When asked to rate their experience using social media marketing for their businesses, a significant 72% of marketers have either just started or have been using social media for only a few months. The largest group just getting underway with social media marketing was sole proprietors (30.2% reported just getting started) and owners of 2- to 100-employee businesses were the most experienced (29.3% reporting doing social media marketing for years). People aged 60 to 69 were significantly more likely to be just getting started with social media marketing than other age groups.
A significant 64% of marketers are using social media for 5 hours or more each week and 39% for 10 or more hours weekly. It is interesting to note that 9.6% spend more than 20 hours each week with social media.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Social media is not a strategy or a tactic it’s simply a channel.
Social Media is a Conversation Online.
Look who’s talking: * your customers * your employees * your investors * your critics * your fans * your competition.... * anyone who has internet access and an opinion
The conversation is not: * controlled * organized * “on message”
The conversation is: * organic * complex * speaks in a human voice
The conversation is powered by: * Social Networks * News & Bookmarking * Blogs * Microblogging * Video Sharing * Photo Sharing * Message boards * Wikis * Virtual Reality * Social Gaming
The power to define and control a brand is shifting from corporations and institutions to individuals and communities.
Usage - * 58% of internet users have visited a community or social networking site * 60% of Social Media users under 25-30 * 40% of Social Media users under 18-24 * 25% of users 25-29 do so daily * 63% of People get the New Product Information from Internet.
Reasons for using social media - * Younger users (under 45) use these sites for socializing * Older users use these sites to obtain and share information * Youth (15-18) use these sites for entertainment
Social Media can help you in all stages of your PR campaign -
* Research * Strategic planning * Implementation * Evaluation
TODAY, We are flooded with numerous social networking sites on the Internet like Orkut, Facebook etc. These social networking sites create a virtual world with the opportunities for making friends, chatting, sharing moments etc.
We see variety of people on these sites. We have freedom to categorise them, freedom to pick and choose them as our friend, as we do in our real life. But there is a big difference; we do not actually meet them.
Moreover, in today’s fast world, we have paucity of time; these sites furnish us with flexibility of time. We can contact our friends at our convenience and vice-versa.
Also, these sites breach the regional, national, cultural, social boundaries for making friends, knowing them, understanding their culture, tradition and providing us the opportunity for cultural synthesis.
However, the above said depicts only one side of the coin. If we are surfing on these social networking sites and putting our personal details on it, there is a chance of its misuse. In the past, we have heard of numerous abuses on these sites like morphing of photographs etc.
Also, most of the information put on the social networking sites is fake, concocted or half truths. While going through this information we feel annoyed on one hand and also develop the same habit of posting misleading information on the other. This way it adds negatively to socio-psychological behaviour of the human being. The people are getting addicted to these sites day-by-day. The numbers of users is on the rise. This proves that e-world is taking its toll over the real world. The people are getting secluded. For the sake of numbers, they have lots of friends, but in reality they are devoid of good friends. This again, affects human behaviour. People are becoming individualistic. Social values are vanishing.
In the end, I must reiterate that, we must not develop this opinion that social networking sites are inherently not good. Indeed, they are good, but we should take personal care that these sites should be used judiciously. We should post relevant information only and not very personal ones, so that, in future we do not regret it. Also, information posted should be authentic, so that it becomes a source of awareness not sensation. Finally, we must be vigilant that e-world cannot be a substitute for the real world. So, we need to learn to respect the real people...and real life.
Social Media Marketing (SMM) Services
Our social media services can be broadly classified into two categories: * Social media optimization services: A set of services which enhance the usability of your site using integration with social tools and application; improve site likability; allow easy sharing of site content on popular social sites; increase visibility on custom and niche search engines (Technorati etc.); easy tracking of updates on your website; encouraging discussions on your site and a whole lot more. * Social media marketing services: Positioning your business on social networks to improve online brand visibility, brand protection / reputation management, leads and /or sales generation and increase quality inbound links. To know more about our social media marketing services read on…
Some of the major social media marketing services Zitz offers are: * Social media audit * Social media optimization * Optimized blog development, design, maintenance and promotion * Brand management using social media monitoring * Social media profile creation and management (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr etc.) * Community building and monitoring * LinkedIn Direct Ads * Facebook Advertisement * Social bookmarking
Company Profile
Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC.
…A Professional Media Marketing Outfit in the Gulf
IAS Media – International Media Concessionaires since 1991
PRINT
TV
EVENTS
DIGITAL
RADIO
* Represents Publishers * Represents Satellite Television Stations * Represents Networks * Represents International Media Firms
List of Principles –
UK
* Condenast Traveler * Vogue * GQ * Tattler * House & Garden * Media & Marketing Europe
USA
* Condenast Traveler * Vanity Fair * Architectural Digest
INDIA
* The Times Of India Group * Malayala Manorama Group * Air India Inflight Video Entertainment * India Today * Outlook * Jetwings Inflight Magazine * Business World * Namaskar * Swagat * Kingfisher Airlines Inflight Magazine
HONGKONG
* South China Morning Post * Cathay Pacific * Dragon Air * China Air
JAPAN
* Nikkei Business Publications
SINGAPORE
* Singapore Airlines Inflight Media
PAN ARAB * Sony Entertainment Television * CNBC Africa * Manorama News * Neo Cricket
RUSSIA
* Izvestia * Afisa Mir
PAKISTAN
* Dawn Group * PIA Inflight Magazine – Humsafar
SRI LANKA * Serendib
CREDENTIALS
Methodology of Research
There are two general types of research approaches: scientific & ethnographic. According to Maylor and Blackmon (2005) the scientific (or objective) approach is more concerned with understanding the general patterns of people’s organizations and social system behavior as an opposite to an ethnographic (subjective) approach which is analyzing practices more than theories in greater depth and more than individual level. Moreover, the scientific studies are based on deductive logic and focused on testing theories and then arriving to the new knowledge rather than creating the knowledge in the process of research.
This research can be considered as a theory led scientific study, since the main objective of this research is to verify a set of theories that describe “what” is changing in the marketing communications environment and analyze consumer behavior according to these hypotheses. It could be viewed as knowledge verifying study and an extension of similar researches done in Indian market and others. Even though it is considered to be scientific research there are some appearances of ethnographic inductive logic. Maylor & Blackmon suggests that sometimes when there is scarcity of data it may be an acceptable to use two researches in one study. Sometimes it may not be possible to develop any hypotheses at all, if it is being investigated for the first time as there are no previous data is available. Therefore, in this study because the research subject is relatively new, the literature review was dedicated not to generate hypotheses, but to build up the theory itself and to prove that in changing media landscape there are new marketing communication tools and channels requiring greater consideration and that chosen hypothesis are valid. Furthermore, the findings in the literature review were adopted in the data analysis.
The success of quantitative study is based on the validity of data and statistical significance of the results that could be generalized. Therefore, appropriate data had to be collected and processed. A suitable way to verify the research hypotheses and capture opinions, behaviors, attitudes and facts is doing a survey. In a result, according to sample size and time frame the self-administered online questionnaire method was chosen for conducting the survey. In the short time frame it is framed it is considered to be one of the best tools to gather large amounts of valid data.
Social media is an important shift, as it summaries the importance of interaction, the consumer and the community. The term emphasizes the idea that as a collective it can have as much impact as any traditional media platform.
In truth, to claim social media as “new” is slightly misleading. From the beginning, the internet was founded on message boards, chat rooms and peer to peer communication. What has changed is the mass involvement that modern social platforms inspire. Contributing to the internet has never been as accessible and less technical. Innovations in web development, computing technology and the proliferation of broadband have come together in drive monumental consumer take up. This is why the phenomenon of social media is important now – it has the potential to impact on all our media consumption therefore shifting the emphasis from professional content producers to the consumer.
Social media represents a big improvement over Web 2.0 as a term to describe the changes that have impacted the internet. The idea that we switched from Web 1.0 to 2.0 was always a touch crude.
Objectives –
* To learn and understand the types of advertisements options that can be campaigned via digital media. * To learn and understand the technological advancement used for advertisements via digital media. * To learn and understand the process of planning required for advertisements via digital media.
Benefits of a Social Media Marketing
* More online conversations about your brand: A successful Social Media Marketing campaign leads to a lot more talk about your brand online. When your message works with your users, they will spread your message more effectively than tradition methods. * Quick turnaround: Hitting a front page of major social video, news and bookmark sites will send you huge amounts traffic and almost instantly. This doesn’t mean the traffic will equate to conversions, but it should generate momentum in the right direction. * Low costs: A comprehensive SMM strategy may provide a partial or full replacement of traditional advertising and marketing at a fraction of the costs. * Impact on search engine rankings: SMM campaigns bring you large amounts of back links that benefit you’re ranking in search engines. * Compatible with traditional marketing: No one says you have to approach and embrace SMM full on. SMM campaigns can be run alongside traditional marketing and advertising. * The power of recommendation: We know that initiators and influencers play an important role the buying process and you can reach these people with SMM. * Sidestepping ad blindness: Traditional online advertising methods, such as, banner ads are seeing drops in the level of their effectiveness. As ad blindness increases, social media marketing has the potential to send visitors to your website without traditional advertising methods. * Customer engagement: Unlike the traditional marketing mediums, social media generates high level of user participation and engagement. * Positive PR for the company: The interactive social media platforms offer a higher credibility because these are open, transparent, and carry third party opinions. A good word here goes a long way in building your company’s reputation. * Higher search engine rankings / presence: Social media has the power to expose your website / brand to large groups of people through active syndication. These results in higher visibility and multiple search entries. * Higher traffic to the site: Social communities can be leveraged as a great source of web traffic through intelligent content seeding. * Assistance in brand building: Gives a boost to your online brand building exercise by offering high visibility and an ability to tap the target audience. * Low cost high returns medium: Using social media is more cost effective than any of the traditional marketing methods. Moreover, the benefits in store far exceed the cost involved in setting up and executing a social media campaign. * Complements other marketing activities: Social media marketing can work in synergy with your other offline and online advertising activities. In fact, it actually complements your marketing program by offering additional channels.
Considerations while planning online campaign
Social Media Marketing can be unpredictable if sufficient planning has not been made. Consider the following points for any SMM campaign. * Target audience - Having a general idea of what your customers want is not enough for effective SMM. You should define in detail that your target audience is, what is it that they want, and how you offer content of value that is most relevant for their needs. Once you identify your target audience, you will be able to focus on what they have in common and crafting a strategy to draw in more of the same people. * Length of campaign - Although you may see traffic relatively quickly, it is important to note that a for real success in SMM, you must think and plan long term. It may be more damaging to abruptly end conversations with your customers than to never start one in the first place. Know your time scale objectives and work towards them. * Strength of product - Consider that your products or service will be exposed to a huge amount of potential customers almost instant. It is imperative to understand that you will be under scrutiny and having a product or service which just isn’t strong enough can have very negative side effects. If your product or services do not perform well, then maybe you need to re-evaluate your target and or the viability or appeal of your product.
* Time constraints - Obviously, with any small business, time is an important factor. Depending on what your product or service is you may find it more efficient to allocate a larger portion of time on a few targeted sites rather than spreading yourself too thinly across multiple sites. * A definition of success - You must set short term, medium term and long term targets for you campaigns. Without clear goals and objectives, your campaigns will fail.
Social Media Influences People * 91% say consumer reviews are the #1 aid to buying decisions - JC Williams Group * 87% trust a friend’s recommendation over critic’s review - Marketing Sherpa * 3 times more likely to trust peer opinions over advertising for purchasing decisions - Jupiter Research * 1 word-of-mouth conversation has impact of 200 TV ads - BuzzAgent
People are using Social Media
Social Media sites are the fastest-growing category on the web, doubling their traffic over the last year. * 73% of active online users have read a blog * 45% have started their own blog * 39% subscribe to an RSS feed * 57% have joined a social network * 55% have uploaded photos * 83% have watched video clips
A successful Social Media campaign can prove to be one of the key catalysts in growth for a small to medium sized business. It can increase brand exposure and PR for a fraction of traditional advertising costs and effort, as well as provide large scale market research and product refinement ideas at no extra charge.
Soon, SMM will join SEO as being important aspects of any site owner’s marketing strategy. The speed in which trends evolve on the internet is can often be daunting, but SMM by large companies can be emulated in whole or in part even by very small businesses. It’s not the money. It’s the content marketing mindset that separates success and failure. Big ideas can beat big budgets.
Since the social web allows you to interact with others, create and promote content that can get links and viral attraction, you can – with the right strategy – reach key influencers using this medium. We all know what blogs alone can do, and they are pretty search engine friendly out of the box.
Social media expansion is important because this provides foundations for broader / faster mindshare, along with supporting your search engine marketing objectives. You *can* convert traffic if you target appropriately (research needed), and do not spam. Read each point below to get a deeper understanding. * Assistance: Limit talking about yourself, at least initially – provide ways to help others instead. This is probably the most important tip in the social media workplace. Say you are building your new del.icio.us profile, make sure to bookmark other useful resources and sprinkle yourself lightly. It’s about “them”, not “you”. * Process: Don’t become a “me too” – establish a process and goals for how to get there. Like SEO programs that have a process (keyword research, competitive review, content analysis, etc), build out a similar map. Too many companies dive in too fast, with no real plan and they are simply peeing in the pool, and no good results come from that. * Contribute: Be the one to create (quality) content. While community is Queen in Social Media, quality content is still King, and always will be. Studies show that people are reading much online, but a much smaller group is contributing content. * Connect: Reach out to the influencers in your niche, be polite, honest, sincere, and you’d be amazed what brand can do for you. * Position: Position yourself in front of consumers’ passions. It can and will create a powerful outcome for your brand. * Blog: Make sure you have setup a blog. These numbers are not to be overlooked. I think Technorati is tracking over 110 million blogs now, and growing at a furious pace, even excluding splogs (spam blogs). * Link: Use links out to other blogs and websites in general. Links are what search engines and users make good use of – and search engines would not survive without them. Give others the love too.
Social media marketing is an engagement with online communities to generate exposure, opportunity and sales. It seems that many marketers see the social media frontier as the next marketing gold rush. Given the low cost of entry, many marketing pros are doing more than just dipping their creative toes into this gold-laden water.
Observations & Learning
* Top three questions marketers want answered: * What are the best tactics to use, * How to do I measure the effectiveness of social media and * Where do I start? * Marketers are mostly new to social media: A significant 88% of marketers surveyed are using social media to market their businesses, BUT 72% have only been doing so for a few months or less. * How much time does this take? A significant 64% of marketers are using social media for 5 hours or more each week and 39% for 10 or more hours weekly. * The top benefit of social media marketing: The number-one advantage is generating exposure for the business, indicated 81% of all marketers, followed by increasing traffic and building new business partnerships. * The top social media tools: Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and Facebook were the top four social media tools used by marketers, in that order. * Social media tools marketers most want to learn about: Social bookmarking sites were ranked of highest interest, followed closely by Twitter. For example, we look at which tools are used by those who invest the most time in social media marketing and the benefits achieved by those who 've been at this for years.
Highlights * Social media is a global phenomenon happening in all markets regardless of wider economic, social and cultural development. If you are online you are using social media * Asian markets are leading in terms of participation, creating more content than any other region * All social media platforms have grown significantly over. Video clips are the quickest growing platform, up from 31% penetration in Wave 1 to 83% in Wave 3 * 57% have joined a Social Network, making it the number one platform for creating and sharing content 55% of users have uploaded photos 22% of users have uploaded videos * The widget economy is real 23% of social network users have installed an application 18% of bloggers have installed applications in their blog templates * Blogs are a mainstream media world-wide and as a collective rival any traditional media 73% have read a blog * The blogospheres is becoming increasingly participatory, now 184m bloggers world-wide. The number one thing to blog about is personal life and family * China has the largest blogging community in the world with 42m bloggers, more than the US and Western Europe combined * Social media impacts your brands reputation 34% post opinions about products and brands on their blog 36% think more positively about companies that have blogs
Review of literature
In the literature review the social media environment was analyzed and the main changes were indentified. It was noticed that the interactivity is much more personal in social media and is based on human to human interaction. Moreover, it was indentified that social media is changing the communication processes as the power shifts from company to consumer and the meaning of the message itself is changing (content become the message). The various web 2.0 properties were grouped and defined. The research found that social media environment comprises the features of medium and tool and s suitable for marketing to postmodern consumer.
Comparative study of various Media
The Evaluation
Based on campaign objective & budgets the media mix is further optimized to select most relevant mix of media
An inside look into a Media Planner’s media recommendation -
Media
Role
Purpose
Satellite Television
Drive imagery/Build awareness
High Reach/Low involvement
Cost effective. Focused presence in key and relevant genres
Awareness
Magazine
Drive Imagery
Reaching out to the Core TG
Low spill over
Awareness
Radio
Reminder medium
Available just prior to point of purchase Awareness/
Engagement
Cinema - Multiplex
Reach out to high networth individuals. Captive audience
Awareness
Internet
Build relevance to the TG
Highly interactive.
Bridges the consideration gap
Awareness/
Engagement
Dailies
High Reach. Creates News Value - Launch/Promos
Awareness
Recommendations
Experiment with Social Media * Experiment personally before professionally * Try a variety of social media tools * Be yourself, make some friends, and share
Make Social Media central * Spend time upfront planning how you will use social media
Think POST: * People * Objectives * Strategy * Technology
Listen before participating * Find where your audience is participating and indentify the influencers * Read industry blogs (including comments) * Google your company name & your competition * Find tools that can you listen
Be Transparent & Honest * Avoid puffery (people will ignore it) * Avoid evasion and lying (people won’t ignore it) * Companies have watched their biggest screw-up 's rise to the top 10 of a Google search * Admit your mistakes right away
Commonly used social media tools
By a long shot, Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and Facebook were the top four social media tools used by marketers, with Twitter leading the pack. All the other social media tools paled in comparison to these top four. Owners of small businesses were more likely to use LinkedIn than employees working for a corporation. Another interesting finding was that men were significantly more likely to use YouTube or other video marketing than women (52.4% of all men compared to only 31.7% of women). A close examination of which tools experienced social media marketers are using compared to those just getting underway provides further insight.
Conclusion The evolving media landscape and changing consumer behavior presents new challenges for marketing practitioners. The growth of social media properties forces marketers to consider new tools in approaching the postmodern consumers. As summarized in the findings, these tools vary depending from the consumers’ group media channel and SMP itself. It is clear that this media/marketing is here to stay, but as it is still developing and changing therefore the constant monitoring of SMP tools is required by marketing professionals and academics.
The research achieved its main goals and showed that the consumers welcome company’s initiatives to communicate through social media and that the web 2.0 applications can be used successfully as the new tools in marketing communication mix. Even though, as this research just tested the theory that social media is effective marketing tool and channel, the further possibly qualitative, research is needed in order to understand the effectiveness of every tool on the consumers’ behavior.
Thus we can now clearly understand the various benefits as well as utilities of Social Media and therefore we can conclude that it is the most beneficial form of media in terms of advertising and marketing.
Bibliography
Websites – http://www.omnipresentad.wordpress.com http://www.stateofthemedia.org http://www.business-inteligence.com/advertising-and-something-else-newspaper-vs-ads-online.html www.google.com www.wikipedia.com
Magazine and journals -
Medium Matters: Newsreaders’ Recall and Engagement with Online and Print Newspapers - Arthur D. Santana, Randall Livingstone and Yoon Cho
Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project - The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Reports on Digital Media and Learning | November 2008
Media Marketing – Magazine.
Bibliography: Websites – http://www.omnipresentad.wordpress.com http://www.stateofthemedia.org http://www.business-inteligence.com/advertising-and-something-else-newspaper-vs-ads-online.html www.google.com www.wikipedia.com Magazine and journals - Medium Matters: Newsreaders’ Recall and Engagement with Online and Print Newspapers - Arthur D. Santana, Randall Livingstone and Yoon Cho Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project - The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Reports on Digital Media and Learning | November 2008 Media Marketing – Magazine.
“BENFITIS FOR OPTING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR THE PURPOSE OF ADVERTISEMENTS” SUBMITTED TOWARDS PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
DEPARTMENT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES,JAMIA HAMDARD
SUBMITTED BY:
OMER NISAR SIDDIQUI
MBA (2011-13)
SUBMITTED TO :
MR. SHAHNAWAZ ABDIN
DECLARATION OF THE STUDENT
I, the undersigned, hereby declare that this project entitled “BENIFITS FOR OPTING SOCIAL MEDIA FOR THE PURPOSE OF ADVERTISEMENTS” is a genuine and bona fide work prepared by me and submitted to the JAMIA HAMDARD UNIVERSITY, for the partial fulfillment of The Masters Degree in Business Administration.
The present work is of original nature and the conclusions drawn therein are based on the data collected by myself.
To the best of my knowledge, the matter presented in this dissertation has not been submitted for the award of any Degree, Diploma or Membership Either to this or any other Institute / University.
Place: Dubai, UAE
Name: Omer Nisar Siddiqui
Date: 28.06.2012
Acknowledgement
Sometimes words fall short to show gratitude, the same happened with me during this project. The immense help and support received from Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC. overwhelmed me during the project.
Much of my work to make this report would not have been possible without the constant guidance and support of certain key-people.
I would like to express my deep-felt appreciation and gratitude to Mr. Mohd. Nayeem Siddiqui - Sr. Manager, Online Ads Sales at Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC., Dubai, UAE for giving me this opportunity. I am very thankful to him for his guidance in whole project without him I was not able to complete this work. He did not give me his guidance but also his valuable time.
I am also very thankful to Mr. Binu Mathew – Vice President, Sales for his support in whole project, and gave me his valuable time.
Preface
World is widening up & we cannot be confined to one place. In the present era of globalization & liberalization it can never be possible to make a mark in today’s competitive environment. In India, business and industrial management activities is a base for the country.
With an outlook of the importance of practical aspects of business mgt. Jamia Hamdard has subscribed the subject, “Summer Training” as a part of syllabus of MBA where by the students have to take initiative training in the field of marketing in a company & have to study various aspects of marketing.
I am very glad to have got a chance of getting training in a reputed as well as one of the leading companies at UAE– “INTEGRATED ADVERTISING SERVICES FZ. LLC, DUBAI, UAE.” for a period of Six Weeks on all the aspects of management especially in marketing field.
Executive Summary
Social Media Marketing
Social Media Marketing differs from traditional product and service marketing, in that it does not depend on a mere unidirectional relationship between the advertiser and the consumer. Rather, the ultimate goal of Social Media Marketing is to, in essence, plant a seed and have the generated interest lead to conversations between people about your product and/or service. A successful Social Media Marketing campaign must be designed in such a way as to create a buzz. In order for this to occur, the marketer must work beyond merely creating a banner and having a social media site host it. In a sense, Social Media Marketing is something that works along a continuum and is ever-evolving. The success of such a campaign depends wholly on the marketer’s ability to entice social network users to discuss and promote a product.
In order for this to occur, a Social Media Marketing campaign must be carefully planned out in order to produce content which will appeal to the intended audience. Once the seed is planted the results must be monitored, the product or service promoted, and discussions closely tracked.
Social media marketing is an engagement with online communities to generate exposure, opportunity and sales. It seems that many marketers see the social media frontier as the next marketing gold rush. Given the low cost of entry, many marketing pros are doing more than just dipping their creative toes into this gold-laden water. If you 're in charge of marketing your business, you 'll want to closely examine what 's on the following pages. My team turned over every rock, looking for the "not so obvious" findings among this content-rich data. We set out to uncover the "who, what, where, when and why " of social media marketing with this report. Nearly 900 of your peers provided the kind of insight that previously has not existed. If you 're pondering starting social media marketing, it 's my hope that these findings will help push you over the edge.
The most significant benefit of Social Media Marketing is the fact that – especially considering the number of users of networks such as Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter – the possibilities for exposure and growth are limitless. Moreover, one cannot ignore the speed and ease with which news is able to spread among users of social networking sites and beyond. When considering how to first approach a Social Media Marketing strategy, it is of the utmost importance to understand your audience and the kinds of products/services that they are interested in. For instance, if your customers are the type to readily participate in online social networks, it may be beneficial to add a blog to your company website. In addition, you may request that interested employees add information/blog articles to your company site to generate interest – never forgetting to add the company logo and other features which will identify your brand into these entries.
Another way to use the popularity of social networking to the advantage of your corporation is to perhaps join one or more of the most popular social networking sites and begin discussions, groups, etc. around your relevant products and services. Many companies have seen a profound benefit to their bottom line from adding Social Media Marketing into their given marketing plans/strategies. Remember, Social Media Marketing is the future of online advertising, and in comparison to marketing in print or other media, is relatively effortless and inexpensive.
The number-one benefit of social media marketing is gaining the all-important eyeball. A significant 81% of all marketers indicated that their social media efforts have generated exposure for their businesses. Improving traffic and growing lists was the second major benefit, followed by building new partnerships. An unexpected benefit was a rise in search engine rankings reported by more than half of participants. As the search engine rankings improve, so will business exposure, lead generation efforts and a reduction in overall marketing expenses. About one in two marketers found social media generated qualified leads. However, only slightly more than one in three said social media marketing helped close business.
INTRODUCTION
The explosion of social media phenomenon is as mind boggling as that and the pace at which it is growing is maddening. Social media is all about networking and networking in a way that espouses trust among parties and communities involved. Any website which allows user to share their content, opinions, views and encourages interaction and community building can be classified as a social media. Some popular social media sites are: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Digg, MySpace, StumbleUpon, Del.icio.us, Scribd, Flickr etc. Trust and goodwill are the basis of social networking, and by marketing in the realm of social media you need to adhere to these fundamental notions. It is probably the only marketing platform that encourages fool proof communication and accountability among sellers as well as consumers. Global companies have recognized Social Media Marketing as a potential marketing platform, utilized them with innovations to power their advertising campaign with social media marketing. Many companies have seen a profound benefit to their bottom line from adding Social Media Marketing into their given marketing plans/strategies. Remember, Social Media Marketing is the future of online advertising, and in comparison to marketing in print or other media, is relatively effortless and inexpensive. Taking all of this into consideration, it becomes apparent that there is no reason not to at least attempt to integrate Social Media Marketing into your current marketing strategy and reap the benefits of this new medium. Social media marketing is a term that describes use of social networks, online communities, blogs, wikis or any other online collaborative media for marketing, sales, public relations and customer service. Common social media marketing tools include Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, Wikipedia, Orkut and YouTube
In the context of internet marketing, social media refers to a collective group of web properties whose content is primarily published by users, not direct employees of the property (e.g., the vast majority of video on YouTube is published by non-YouTube employees).
Social media marketing has three important aspects: 1. Creating buzz or newsworthy events, videos, tweets, or blog entries that attract attention, and become viral in nature. Buzz is what makes social media marketing work. It replicates a message through user to user contact, rather than the traditional method of purchasing of an ad or promoting a press release. The message does not necessarily have to be about the product. Many successful viral campaigns have gathered steam through an amusing or compelling message, with the company logo or tagline included incidentally. 2. Building ways that enable fans of a brand or company to promote a message themselves in multiple online social media venues. Fan pages in Twitter, MySpace of Facebook follow this model. 3. It is based around online conversations. Social media marketing is not controlled by the organization. Instead it encourages user participation and dialogue. A badly designed social media marketing campaign can potentially backfire on the organization that created it. To be successful SMM campaigns must fully engage and respect the users.
According to Lloyd Salmons, first chairman of the Internet Advertising Bureau social media council "Social media isn 't just about big networks like Facebook and MySpace; it 's about brands having conversations."
Social Network Marketing
Social network marketing or social level marketing is an advertising method that makes use of social network service and to increase their web presence. This ranges from simply advertising directly on social networking sites, viral marketing that spreads throughout the web, email, and word of mouth or providing niche social networking sites focused around the item being advertised.
Many sites include features where companies can create profiles. For example, on Facebook companies can create "pages" where users can become fans of this company, product, service, individual, etc. Many companies create MySpace pages for themselves. Companies sometimes invest in internet presence management, which can include social network marketing.
When you compare the spending on social media marketing from August 2009 to February 2010, overall there 's an increase of 60% in the budgets (from 3.5% to 5.6%). Similarly, the planning for the next one to five years shows a similar level of consideration as well: in August 2009, social media spending was thought to be 6.1% for the next year and 13.7% for the next five years; and now, it 's more like 9.9% in the next year and 17.7% in the next five years. And since this was a survey of CMOs, it 's a good indication that these budget predictions may get some traction, rather than just being a fond wish of pundits. It 's a relief to see something that doesn 't resemble a death spiral in this economy.
Why we need to consider social media marketing services? * Size: Facebook has over 250 million users globally. On an average, 70-100 tweets happen by the second. An average user on Facebook has 120 friends. This is the kind of enormity Social networking sites espouse and with this comes the license to communicate powerfully. But when such large numbers are involved, there is a danger of something going wrong and when it does, it happens in a big way. You may be a regular user of networking sites, but when you involve business with it, an expert should be hired to do what is best for your business. * Transparency: no cheat code involved. No black hat techniques allowed. Everything that happens in the social networking landscape is fool proof. You cannot fake authenticity in an attempt to get more people involved. Members can choose to associate with you or opt out. Opinions made on social networking platforms are taken seriously and the more authoritative you get, more seriously you are taken. When you win, you win in a big way. * Reach: It is possible to make your mark globally and do it quickly using social networking sites. * Boost website traffic: social media is probably the fastest and easiest means of redirecting traffic to your website. By simply placing your website URL in your profile, you can have all your profile visitors check out your website and a percentage of traffic is sure to get converted in course of time. This is the virtual way version of “word-of mouth”. * Branding: Buying a candy may have been impulsive all your life, but if it is discussed on a social networking site, you are likely to get brand conscious even a candy. Social media is a smart way to build brands. Social media platforms are known to be one of the most powerful and fast means of branding. Some of the big brands like Coke, Ford, Dell, IBM, Burger King are some of the well known brands have powerfully used social media platforms to endorse themselves.
Let’s look at a brand that gained in a big way by using the social media platform in marketing. Ford is a case in point here.
The economic crunch put the automobile industry in trouble and car companies were looking for avenues to market themselves and push sales. Ford played smart and Scott Monty, head of social media for Ford really understood that using social media for marketing is not all about putting up a banner ad on Facebook. He took the centre stage and got into the core and essence of social media, involving blogging, active participation on social networking sites, creating great network of people and communities and used the social media mediums the way they were meant to be used, but with a pinch of innovation. Here are some statistics that reveal how powerfully Ford used Social Media.
The experience factor
There is a direct relationship between how long marketers have been using social media and their weekly time commitment. For people just beginning with social media, the median weekly time commitment was two hours per week. However, for folks who have been doing this for a few months, the median jumped to 10 hours a week. And for people who have been doing this for years, their median is 20+ hours each week.
“No profession stands to influence social media more than public relations.”
The Use of Social Media Marketing
I asked two questions to determine the survey participants ' experience using social media to market their businesses.
Use of Social Media Marketing
I began by simply asking participants if they use social media to market their businesses. The overwhelming majority (88%) indicated they were employing social media for marketing purposes. Business owners were more likely to use social media marketing (90+%) than employees working for a business (81%). People aged 30 to 39 years were most likely to use social media marketing (92.8%).
Experience with social media marketing
When asked to rate their experience using social media marketing for their businesses, a significant 72% of marketers have either just started or have been using social media for only a few months. The largest group just getting underway with social media marketing was sole proprietors (30.2% reported just getting started) and owners of 2- to 100-employee businesses were the most experienced (29.3% reporting doing social media marketing for years). People aged 60 to 69 were significantly more likely to be just getting started with social media marketing than other age groups.
A significant 64% of marketers are using social media for 5 hours or more each week and 39% for 10 or more hours weekly. It is interesting to note that 9.6% spend more than 20 hours each week with social media.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Social media is not a strategy or a tactic it’s simply a channel.
Social Media is a Conversation Online.
Look who’s talking: * your customers * your employees * your investors * your critics * your fans * your competition.... * anyone who has internet access and an opinion
The conversation is not: * controlled * organized * “on message”
The conversation is: * organic * complex * speaks in a human voice
The conversation is powered by: * Social Networks * News & Bookmarking * Blogs * Microblogging * Video Sharing * Photo Sharing * Message boards * Wikis * Virtual Reality * Social Gaming
The power to define and control a brand is shifting from corporations and institutions to individuals and communities.
Usage - * 58% of internet users have visited a community or social networking site * 60% of Social Media users under 25-30 * 40% of Social Media users under 18-24 * 25% of users 25-29 do so daily * 63% of People get the New Product Information from Internet.
Reasons for using social media - * Younger users (under 45) use these sites for socializing * Older users use these sites to obtain and share information * Youth (15-18) use these sites for entertainment
Social Media can help you in all stages of your PR campaign -
* Research * Strategic planning * Implementation * Evaluation
TODAY, We are flooded with numerous social networking sites on the Internet like Orkut, Facebook etc. These social networking sites create a virtual world with the opportunities for making friends, chatting, sharing moments etc.
We see variety of people on these sites. We have freedom to categorise them, freedom to pick and choose them as our friend, as we do in our real life. But there is a big difference; we do not actually meet them.
Moreover, in today’s fast world, we have paucity of time; these sites furnish us with flexibility of time. We can contact our friends at our convenience and vice-versa.
Also, these sites breach the regional, national, cultural, social boundaries for making friends, knowing them, understanding their culture, tradition and providing us the opportunity for cultural synthesis.
However, the above said depicts only one side of the coin. If we are surfing on these social networking sites and putting our personal details on it, there is a chance of its misuse. In the past, we have heard of numerous abuses on these sites like morphing of photographs etc.
Also, most of the information put on the social networking sites is fake, concocted or half truths. While going through this information we feel annoyed on one hand and also develop the same habit of posting misleading information on the other. This way it adds negatively to socio-psychological behaviour of the human being. The people are getting addicted to these sites day-by-day. The numbers of users is on the rise. This proves that e-world is taking its toll over the real world. The people are getting secluded. For the sake of numbers, they have lots of friends, but in reality they are devoid of good friends. This again, affects human behaviour. People are becoming individualistic. Social values are vanishing.
In the end, I must reiterate that, we must not develop this opinion that social networking sites are inherently not good. Indeed, they are good, but we should take personal care that these sites should be used judiciously. We should post relevant information only and not very personal ones, so that, in future we do not regret it. Also, information posted should be authentic, so that it becomes a source of awareness not sensation. Finally, we must be vigilant that e-world cannot be a substitute for the real world. So, we need to learn to respect the real people...and real life.
Social Media Marketing (SMM) Services
Our social media services can be broadly classified into two categories: * Social media optimization services: A set of services which enhance the usability of your site using integration with social tools and application; improve site likability; allow easy sharing of site content on popular social sites; increase visibility on custom and niche search engines (Technorati etc.); easy tracking of updates on your website; encouraging discussions on your site and a whole lot more. * Social media marketing services: Positioning your business on social networks to improve online brand visibility, brand protection / reputation management, leads and /or sales generation and increase quality inbound links. To know more about our social media marketing services read on…
Some of the major social media marketing services Zitz offers are: * Social media audit * Social media optimization * Optimized blog development, design, maintenance and promotion * Brand management using social media monitoring * Social media profile creation and management (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr etc.) * Community building and monitoring * LinkedIn Direct Ads * Facebook Advertisement * Social bookmarking
Company Profile
Integrated Advertising Services FZ. LLC.
…A Professional Media Marketing Outfit in the Gulf
IAS Media – International Media Concessionaires since 1991
TV
EVENTS
DIGITAL
RADIO
* Represents Publishers * Represents Satellite Television Stations * Represents Networks * Represents International Media Firms
List of Principles –
UK
* Condenast Traveler * Vogue * GQ * Tattler * House & Garden * Media & Marketing Europe
USA
* Condenast Traveler * Vanity Fair * Architectural Digest
INDIA
* The Times Of India Group * Malayala Manorama Group * Air India Inflight Video Entertainment * India Today * Outlook * Jetwings Inflight Magazine * Business World * Namaskar * Swagat * Kingfisher Airlines Inflight Magazine
HONGKONG
* South China Morning Post * Cathay Pacific * Dragon Air * China Air
JAPAN
* Nikkei Business Publications
SINGAPORE
* Singapore Airlines Inflight Media
PAN ARAB * Sony Entertainment Television * CNBC Africa * Manorama News * Neo Cricket
RUSSIA
* Izvestia * Afisa Mir
PAKISTAN
* Dawn Group * PIA Inflight Magazine – Humsafar
SRI LANKA * Serendib
CREDENTIALS
Methodology of Research
There are two general types of research approaches: scientific & ethnographic. According to Maylor and Blackmon (2005) the scientific (or objective) approach is more concerned with understanding the general patterns of people’s organizations and social system behavior as an opposite to an ethnographic (subjective) approach which is analyzing practices more than theories in greater depth and more than individual level. Moreover, the scientific studies are based on deductive logic and focused on testing theories and then arriving to the new knowledge rather than creating the knowledge in the process of research.
This research can be considered as a theory led scientific study, since the main objective of this research is to verify a set of theories that describe “what” is changing in the marketing communications environment and analyze consumer behavior according to these hypotheses. It could be viewed as knowledge verifying study and an extension of similar researches done in Indian market and others. Even though it is considered to be scientific research there are some appearances of ethnographic inductive logic. Maylor & Blackmon suggests that sometimes when there is scarcity of data it may be an acceptable to use two researches in one study. Sometimes it may not be possible to develop any hypotheses at all, if it is being investigated for the first time as there are no previous data is available. Therefore, in this study because the research subject is relatively new, the literature review was dedicated not to generate hypotheses, but to build up the theory itself and to prove that in changing media landscape there are new marketing communication tools and channels requiring greater consideration and that chosen hypothesis are valid. Furthermore, the findings in the literature review were adopted in the data analysis.
The success of quantitative study is based on the validity of data and statistical significance of the results that could be generalized. Therefore, appropriate data had to be collected and processed. A suitable way to verify the research hypotheses and capture opinions, behaviors, attitudes and facts is doing a survey. In a result, according to sample size and time frame the self-administered online questionnaire method was chosen for conducting the survey. In the short time frame it is framed it is considered to be one of the best tools to gather large amounts of valid data.
Social media is an important shift, as it summaries the importance of interaction, the consumer and the community. The term emphasizes the idea that as a collective it can have as much impact as any traditional media platform.
In truth, to claim social media as “new” is slightly misleading. From the beginning, the internet was founded on message boards, chat rooms and peer to peer communication. What has changed is the mass involvement that modern social platforms inspire. Contributing to the internet has never been as accessible and less technical. Innovations in web development, computing technology and the proliferation of broadband have come together in drive monumental consumer take up. This is why the phenomenon of social media is important now – it has the potential to impact on all our media consumption therefore shifting the emphasis from professional content producers to the consumer.
Social media represents a big improvement over Web 2.0 as a term to describe the changes that have impacted the internet. The idea that we switched from Web 1.0 to 2.0 was always a touch crude.
Objectives –
* To learn and understand the types of advertisements options that can be campaigned via digital media. * To learn and understand the technological advancement used for advertisements via digital media. * To learn and understand the process of planning required for advertisements via digital media.
Benefits of a Social Media Marketing
* More online conversations about your brand: A successful Social Media Marketing campaign leads to a lot more talk about your brand online. When your message works with your users, they will spread your message more effectively than tradition methods. * Quick turnaround: Hitting a front page of major social video, news and bookmark sites will send you huge amounts traffic and almost instantly. This doesn’t mean the traffic will equate to conversions, but it should generate momentum in the right direction. * Low costs: A comprehensive SMM strategy may provide a partial or full replacement of traditional advertising and marketing at a fraction of the costs. * Impact on search engine rankings: SMM campaigns bring you large amounts of back links that benefit you’re ranking in search engines. * Compatible with traditional marketing: No one says you have to approach and embrace SMM full on. SMM campaigns can be run alongside traditional marketing and advertising. * The power of recommendation: We know that initiators and influencers play an important role the buying process and you can reach these people with SMM. * Sidestepping ad blindness: Traditional online advertising methods, such as, banner ads are seeing drops in the level of their effectiveness. As ad blindness increases, social media marketing has the potential to send visitors to your website without traditional advertising methods. * Customer engagement: Unlike the traditional marketing mediums, social media generates high level of user participation and engagement. * Positive PR for the company: The interactive social media platforms offer a higher credibility because these are open, transparent, and carry third party opinions. A good word here goes a long way in building your company’s reputation. * Higher search engine rankings / presence: Social media has the power to expose your website / brand to large groups of people through active syndication. These results in higher visibility and multiple search entries. * Higher traffic to the site: Social communities can be leveraged as a great source of web traffic through intelligent content seeding. * Assistance in brand building: Gives a boost to your online brand building exercise by offering high visibility and an ability to tap the target audience. * Low cost high returns medium: Using social media is more cost effective than any of the traditional marketing methods. Moreover, the benefits in store far exceed the cost involved in setting up and executing a social media campaign. * Complements other marketing activities: Social media marketing can work in synergy with your other offline and online advertising activities. In fact, it actually complements your marketing program by offering additional channels.
Considerations while planning online campaign
Social Media Marketing can be unpredictable if sufficient planning has not been made. Consider the following points for any SMM campaign. * Target audience - Having a general idea of what your customers want is not enough for effective SMM. You should define in detail that your target audience is, what is it that they want, and how you offer content of value that is most relevant for their needs. Once you identify your target audience, you will be able to focus on what they have in common and crafting a strategy to draw in more of the same people. * Length of campaign - Although you may see traffic relatively quickly, it is important to note that a for real success in SMM, you must think and plan long term. It may be more damaging to abruptly end conversations with your customers than to never start one in the first place. Know your time scale objectives and work towards them. * Strength of product - Consider that your products or service will be exposed to a huge amount of potential customers almost instant. It is imperative to understand that you will be under scrutiny and having a product or service which just isn’t strong enough can have very negative side effects. If your product or services do not perform well, then maybe you need to re-evaluate your target and or the viability or appeal of your product.
* Time constraints - Obviously, with any small business, time is an important factor. Depending on what your product or service is you may find it more efficient to allocate a larger portion of time on a few targeted sites rather than spreading yourself too thinly across multiple sites. * A definition of success - You must set short term, medium term and long term targets for you campaigns. Without clear goals and objectives, your campaigns will fail.
Social Media Influences People * 91% say consumer reviews are the #1 aid to buying decisions - JC Williams Group * 87% trust a friend’s recommendation over critic’s review - Marketing Sherpa * 3 times more likely to trust peer opinions over advertising for purchasing decisions - Jupiter Research * 1 word-of-mouth conversation has impact of 200 TV ads - BuzzAgent
People are using Social Media
Social Media sites are the fastest-growing category on the web, doubling their traffic over the last year. * 73% of active online users have read a blog * 45% have started their own blog * 39% subscribe to an RSS feed * 57% have joined a social network * 55% have uploaded photos * 83% have watched video clips
A successful Social Media campaign can prove to be one of the key catalysts in growth for a small to medium sized business. It can increase brand exposure and PR for a fraction of traditional advertising costs and effort, as well as provide large scale market research and product refinement ideas at no extra charge.
Soon, SMM will join SEO as being important aspects of any site owner’s marketing strategy. The speed in which trends evolve on the internet is can often be daunting, but SMM by large companies can be emulated in whole or in part even by very small businesses. It’s not the money. It’s the content marketing mindset that separates success and failure. Big ideas can beat big budgets.
Since the social web allows you to interact with others, create and promote content that can get links and viral attraction, you can – with the right strategy – reach key influencers using this medium. We all know what blogs alone can do, and they are pretty search engine friendly out of the box.
Social media expansion is important because this provides foundations for broader / faster mindshare, along with supporting your search engine marketing objectives. You *can* convert traffic if you target appropriately (research needed), and do not spam. Read each point below to get a deeper understanding. * Assistance: Limit talking about yourself, at least initially – provide ways to help others instead. This is probably the most important tip in the social media workplace. Say you are building your new del.icio.us profile, make sure to bookmark other useful resources and sprinkle yourself lightly. It’s about “them”, not “you”. * Process: Don’t become a “me too” – establish a process and goals for how to get there. Like SEO programs that have a process (keyword research, competitive review, content analysis, etc), build out a similar map. Too many companies dive in too fast, with no real plan and they are simply peeing in the pool, and no good results come from that. * Contribute: Be the one to create (quality) content. While community is Queen in Social Media, quality content is still King, and always will be. Studies show that people are reading much online, but a much smaller group is contributing content. * Connect: Reach out to the influencers in your niche, be polite, honest, sincere, and you’d be amazed what brand can do for you. * Position: Position yourself in front of consumers’ passions. It can and will create a powerful outcome for your brand. * Blog: Make sure you have setup a blog. These numbers are not to be overlooked. I think Technorati is tracking over 110 million blogs now, and growing at a furious pace, even excluding splogs (spam blogs). * Link: Use links out to other blogs and websites in general. Links are what search engines and users make good use of – and search engines would not survive without them. Give others the love too.
Social media marketing is an engagement with online communities to generate exposure, opportunity and sales. It seems that many marketers see the social media frontier as the next marketing gold rush. Given the low cost of entry, many marketing pros are doing more than just dipping their creative toes into this gold-laden water.
Observations & Learning
* Top three questions marketers want answered: * What are the best tactics to use, * How to do I measure the effectiveness of social media and * Where do I start? * Marketers are mostly new to social media: A significant 88% of marketers surveyed are using social media to market their businesses, BUT 72% have only been doing so for a few months or less. * How much time does this take? A significant 64% of marketers are using social media for 5 hours or more each week and 39% for 10 or more hours weekly. * The top benefit of social media marketing: The number-one advantage is generating exposure for the business, indicated 81% of all marketers, followed by increasing traffic and building new business partnerships. * The top social media tools: Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and Facebook were the top four social media tools used by marketers, in that order. * Social media tools marketers most want to learn about: Social bookmarking sites were ranked of highest interest, followed closely by Twitter. For example, we look at which tools are used by those who invest the most time in social media marketing and the benefits achieved by those who 've been at this for years.
Highlights * Social media is a global phenomenon happening in all markets regardless of wider economic, social and cultural development. If you are online you are using social media * Asian markets are leading in terms of participation, creating more content than any other region * All social media platforms have grown significantly over. Video clips are the quickest growing platform, up from 31% penetration in Wave 1 to 83% in Wave 3 * 57% have joined a Social Network, making it the number one platform for creating and sharing content 55% of users have uploaded photos 22% of users have uploaded videos * The widget economy is real 23% of social network users have installed an application 18% of bloggers have installed applications in their blog templates * Blogs are a mainstream media world-wide and as a collective rival any traditional media 73% have read a blog * The blogospheres is becoming increasingly participatory, now 184m bloggers world-wide. The number one thing to blog about is personal life and family * China has the largest blogging community in the world with 42m bloggers, more than the US and Western Europe combined * Social media impacts your brands reputation 34% post opinions about products and brands on their blog 36% think more positively about companies that have blogs
Review of literature
In the literature review the social media environment was analyzed and the main changes were indentified. It was noticed that the interactivity is much more personal in social media and is based on human to human interaction. Moreover, it was indentified that social media is changing the communication processes as the power shifts from company to consumer and the meaning of the message itself is changing (content become the message). The various web 2.0 properties were grouped and defined. The research found that social media environment comprises the features of medium and tool and s suitable for marketing to postmodern consumer.
Comparative study of various Media
The Evaluation
Based on campaign objective & budgets the media mix is further optimized to select most relevant mix of media
An inside look into a Media Planner’s media recommendation -
Media
Role
Purpose
Satellite Television
Drive imagery/Build awareness
High Reach/Low involvement
Cost effective. Focused presence in key and relevant genres
Awareness
Magazine
Drive Imagery
Reaching out to the Core TG
Low spill over
Awareness
Radio
Reminder medium
Available just prior to point of purchase Awareness/
Engagement
Cinema - Multiplex
Reach out to high networth individuals. Captive audience
Awareness
Internet
Build relevance to the TG
Highly interactive.
Bridges the consideration gap
Awareness/
Engagement
Dailies
High Reach. Creates News Value - Launch/Promos
Awareness
Recommendations
Experiment with Social Media * Experiment personally before professionally * Try a variety of social media tools * Be yourself, make some friends, and share
Make Social Media central * Spend time upfront planning how you will use social media
Think POST: * People * Objectives * Strategy * Technology
Listen before participating * Find where your audience is participating and indentify the influencers * Read industry blogs (including comments) * Google your company name & your competition * Find tools that can you listen
Be Transparent & Honest * Avoid puffery (people will ignore it) * Avoid evasion and lying (people won’t ignore it) * Companies have watched their biggest screw-up 's rise to the top 10 of a Google search * Admit your mistakes right away
Commonly used social media tools
By a long shot, Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn and Facebook were the top four social media tools used by marketers, with Twitter leading the pack. All the other social media tools paled in comparison to these top four. Owners of small businesses were more likely to use LinkedIn than employees working for a corporation. Another interesting finding was that men were significantly more likely to use YouTube or other video marketing than women (52.4% of all men compared to only 31.7% of women). A close examination of which tools experienced social media marketers are using compared to those just getting underway provides further insight.
Conclusion The evolving media landscape and changing consumer behavior presents new challenges for marketing practitioners. The growth of social media properties forces marketers to consider new tools in approaching the postmodern consumers. As summarized in the findings, these tools vary depending from the consumers’ group media channel and SMP itself. It is clear that this media/marketing is here to stay, but as it is still developing and changing therefore the constant monitoring of SMP tools is required by marketing professionals and academics.
The research achieved its main goals and showed that the consumers welcome company’s initiatives to communicate through social media and that the web 2.0 applications can be used successfully as the new tools in marketing communication mix. Even though, as this research just tested the theory that social media is effective marketing tool and channel, the further possibly qualitative, research is needed in order to understand the effectiveness of every tool on the consumers’ behavior.
Thus we can now clearly understand the various benefits as well as utilities of Social Media and therefore we can conclude that it is the most beneficial form of media in terms of advertising and marketing.
Bibliography
Websites – http://www.omnipresentad.wordpress.com http://www.stateofthemedia.org http://www.business-inteligence.com/advertising-and-something-else-newspaper-vs-ads-online.html www.google.com www.wikipedia.com
Magazine and journals -
Medium Matters: Newsreaders’ Recall and Engagement with Online and Print Newspapers - Arthur D. Santana, Randall Livingstone and Yoon Cho
Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project - The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Reports on Digital Media and Learning | November 2008
Media Marketing – Magazine.
Bibliography: Websites – http://www.omnipresentad.wordpress.com http://www.stateofthemedia.org http://www.business-inteligence.com/advertising-and-something-else-newspaper-vs-ads-online.html www.google.com www.wikipedia.com Magazine and journals - Medium Matters: Newsreaders’ Recall and Engagement with Online and Print Newspapers - Arthur D. Santana, Randall Livingstone and Yoon Cho Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project - The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Reports on Digital Media and Learning | November 2008 Media Marketing – Magazine.
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