How Can Marketers Use Social Media for Their Business - Coursework Example

Use of social media in marketing Introduction Marketing is a management function manned with the identification, anticipation andsatisfaction of customer demands. The market on the other hand refers to both the demand for goods and services and the physical location in which the transfer of goods and services take place. Marketing therefore requires effective understanding of both the demand patters for a particular product or service and the geographical location in which the transfer takes place. Social network is a social concept that refers to a number of online aided communication and networking platform in the contemporary society. The media rely on internet connectivity to reach a large group of people. The use of social media has become a contemporary issue as every member of the society strives to log into such platforms. The social networks have succeeded in connecting and pooling people together thereby, providing marketers with an effective marketing tool as the essay below portrays. The numerous social media have different functionality with some such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Bebo.com among others working as websites while others such as twitter and Instagram is functioning as blogs. Regardless of their functionalities, the numerous social media have succeeded in connecting people from all over the world thereby creating a global village. This creates a large platform for marketers, the interconnectivity among countries have widened the boundaries thereby providing marketers with a large market. However, marketers must have effective understanding of the different social media in order to use them appropriately in the different marketing functions (Elizabeth & Michelle, 2008). Facebook and Twitter are among the most common social media. Facebook allows users to create accounts through which they maintain and manage a list of friends from all over the world. The posts an individual places on Facebook goes public depending on the security settings of an individual. Twitter on the other hand permits users to create account and follow friends. Posts of an individual on twitter are known as tweets and reflect on friends account depending on the settings and relationship among different users. The social networks provide users with intimacy as they place personal information on such platforms and share their information depending on the relationship among them. Depending on the functionalities, the different social media provide marketers with different ways of marketing their products and services. Facebook for example permit marketers to create pages and groups, which they use to advertise their products among the users of similar media. Groups are people of particular interests that a marketer creates thereby pooling the market within their reach. This way, interacting with the target market becomes easy since everyone in the group identifies with both the company and the products. Twitter also permits marketers with an opportunity to create accounts and manage the followers depending on the marketers’ ability to identify potential market and aggressiveness at growing the accounts. Among the essential marketing functions, that every marketer must undertake is market research and market analysis. Market research is a scientific study of the market with the view of determining the factors that influence the demand for a particular product or service. During market research, marketers investigate the features of both a product and the market that are likely to influence the demand for the product. Market analysis on the other hand refers to the investigation of the market response on the product. Both market research and market analysis rely on the interactivity between the marketers and the market. Social media provide marketers with effective platform to interact and share ideas. Through Facebook and Twitter for example, a marketer easily maintains a list of friends through such features as trends, pages and groups thereby interacting with them constantly with the view of determining their response to the product or service. Marketing mix is a marketing tool that helps marketers sustain interaction with their followers and friends on the different social media. The tool analyses he important features of the product that helps increase its appropriateness thus preference by a target market. The marketing mix elements include the price, promotion, the product itself and place. The place refers to the actual region targeted by a product. With an effective understanding of this, the marketer will therefore invite friends and follow particular users on the different social media who come from the region that constitutes the target market region. This improves the relevance of the products and the marketing endeavors. Promotion on the other hand refers to the marketing endeavors that seek to increase the product awareness in a particular target market. Different social media provide marketers with effective platform to increase the awareness of a product or a service through sharing images and videos among other similar file formats on their Facebook and twitter accounts thereby improving the product awareness within a particular target market. The use of social media in advertising is more effective than the use of the mainstream media. Social media for example are cheaper than the traditional media. Secondly, a marketer easily maintains interactivity with the target market through sustained exchange of texts and mails. The marketer can chat with the people in the market thereby obtaining their opinions about the product. Through dedicated pages and groups, a marketer enjoys free and unlimited access to his or her target market. The two parties easily exchange information about the product. This way, the marketer obtains relevant and appropriate information about a product and the market response, which the company uses to increase the longevity of its profitability in a particular region. Price is such an essential feature of the product that the market has more interest in and the social media provides the marketers with an appropriate opportunity to obtain the response of the target market on such features in comparison to the quality of the product. Segmentation, targeting and positioning is yet another marketing principle that influences the marketers operations in the market. The three are essential features that helps improve the position of the product thus the profitability of either a product or a service. As discussed earlier, the social media provides marketers with an opportunity to carry out extensive market research thereby obtaining fundamental information that will influence the positioning of the product. Segmentation refers to the isolation of the target market based on the usability of the product. Different segments of the market have different purchasing powers thereby targeting specific products in the market. The social media provides marketers with a large pool of the potential market. A marketer must therefore determine the appropriateness of every individual in order to sell a product. Segmentation is the process of determining the specific niche among the millions of users of a social media. After isolating a potential target market, the marketer can easily carry out the transactions. Segmentation of the market occurs easily on the social media depending on the relationship that the market creates with the target market. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn provide users with effective communication channels including chat rooms and electronic mailing services that help marketers interact with others users thereby segmenting the market based on the interest that each user portrays. With effective segmentation of the market, a marketer can easily introduce and position the market specifically to target the different segments of the market thereby standing a greater chance of gaining profits. Furthermore, the social media rely on the internet and therefore are reliable platforms for the exchange of products depending on the nature and uniqueness of such. The marketers must have adequate information and understanding of the target market. In order to do so, the marketer must understand buying behaviors exhibited by the customers. This information and adequate understanding of the market helps the marketers carry out effective segmentation, targeting and positioning of the market. The purchasing power of an individual relies on the use of the product and the individual’s income. A product must seek to provide particular quantity of value to the target market since such will increase the probability of one purchasing the products. Marketers must understand the features of the product that increase its preference among potential buyers. With such knowledge, the marketer carries such features on the numerous adverts they run on the social media and in the discussion, they hold with their friends and followers on the social media thereby increasing the relevance of the entire marketing process. Another equally important marketing feature is understanding competition in the market. Competition arises from different companies trading in the sale of similar products or substitutes. The marketer must understand the activities of other companies targeting the same market in order to position his or her products strategically alongside them and retain a competitive advantage against them. Understanding competition requires the marketer to study the competition effectively and understand the features of their products and marketing endeavors. Such features as quality and the price of the product are essential in positioning a product alongside its competition in the market. However, a marketer must understand the buyers’ purchasing power and behavior in order to understand the effective ways of positioning a product within the market (Homburg, Sabine & Harley, 2009). In retrospect, effective marketing increases the productivity of a product thereby increasing its market share. However, such requires strategic operations and effective understanding of both the market and the product. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, socialmention.com and Google+ among many other social media operate in similar framework with their key objective being pooling people together thereby facilitating communication among them. Such platforms provide marketers with pooled resources that facilitate the placement of the products strategically within the target market thereby increasing its visibility and chances of purchase. While the social media creates a platform for marketing, it provides marketers with a large virtual market that therefore requires their ability to narrow the market thereby increasing the awareness of the product among a particular appropriate group of users. Such require the understanding of the different marketing principles such as the marketing mx and competitive advantage among others. References Elizabeth, B & Michelle, C. (2008). Definition of Social environment. New York, McGrawHill. Homburg, C. Sabine, K. & Harley, K. (2009). Marketing Management - A Contemporary Perspective (1st edition). New Jersey, U.S: John Wiley & Sons. Read More