Social networking communities are another opportunity to connect with the current social media channels. Every attempt you make your brand and web presence to stand out from your competitors can be increased tenfold when you join a consumer-driven and user-generated community such as MySpace , LinkedIn and other social networking sites. These sites encourage frequent interaction in a conversational and informal approach. You will be increasing your brand awareness with your users although you won’t be submitting detailed articles or content. You should also use the Search features on any of these sites to narrow down your targeted market.
Today’s social networking sites are incorporating many social bookmarking elements into the platform. This allows users to learn even more about each other, and is engaging people online by building communities, opening up new networking channels, and giving marketers and business owners a chance to track behavior. Each social networking site is designed differently, but ultimately allows users to create a profile, update their preferences, and share this information with friends and family. Since they are creating this growing network of information, a pattern of tastes and preferences is established — and made publicly available.
Definition of Social Networking from Wikipedia
“A social network service focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most social network services are web based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact, such as e-mail and instant messaging services. Social networking has encouraged new ways to communicate and share information. Social networking websites are being used regularly by millions of people, and it now seems that social networking will be an enduring part of everyday life.”
How to choose the right social networking site?
Choose a few social networking sites, not more than 6, that suits your company, products or services and start putting in information about yourself or your company which is relevant to your targeted audience. This will help to improve the awareness of your company, products or services tremendously. There are many social networking sites available online. But which should you use? Mostly people choose the wrong the wrong networking site as they assume that all works the same. That is wrong. Not all social networking sites suits your company image, products or services. For instance, it does not make sense if you advertise business consultancy services or MySpace as it is meant for connections with friends. You should use LinkedIn instead to have a better efficient way to introduce the services you are providing to the readers. If you do this right, it will the crucial factor that will set you apart from all the competitors.
Define the group of people you are targeting at based on their:
- Age
- Occupation
- Gender
- Location
- Interests
Crucially, the growth in the use of social networks by young people in recent years has come at the expense of their consumption of traditional media such as TV and magazines. This switch in behaviour was one of the drivers behind the biggest deal in social media to date.