Marketing in Social Networking - Essay Example

? MARKETING IN SOCIAL NETWORKING Given the financial difficulty faced by many non-profit organizations today discuss the opportunity of using social media. How can non-profit organizations use Facebook and other social media? Social networking is one of the greatest innovations technology has created. Through this method of connecting, individuals and organizations can communicate to the world, advertize, and introduce new and old products and services at a very low cost or for free. Small and big organizations can build websites and, like print media, promote what they want to promote and sell. This is known as the global village where we can connect or communicate to anyone anywhere in the world with internet connection. We can imagine how technology and this new innovation can benefit everyone who has a computer and an internet connection. The internet itself creates a community or a group of people with shared relationships and common beliefs and aspirations (MacLaughlin 2007, 3). Through this created community, we can share experiences and interact with people. Non-profit organizations are into this new stream. In fact, it is these organizations that can benefit the most because there are many individuals and entities that use social networking as a tool to communicate or propagate. Social networking sites are popular to the young and old and to almost every class of society that introducing one’s name or brand comes in handy. We have Facebook and Twitter, LinkedIn, Myspace, Myheritage, and many more. These sites are categorized according to the target audience the founders or makers wished to link or network with. There are sites that are purposely for non-profit organizations, for charity such as SocialVibe, or for business such as Talkbiznow. All these have their target audience and people or users who log in to the sites and have goals which are precisely for networking, interaction and communication. If we want paid advertisement, we can log in to popular websites, ask administrators for information and post your advertisements. But social networking is free. Non-profit organizations can post and register their organizations’ names and in a few minutes, they can have a free website. Facebook provides website features where we can link to friends and various organizations with different motives and goals. Through these free websites, an organization can promote and spread its name and objectives to a wide audience which is the virtual world. There are also websites where we can blog or post articles, photos and videos. A website can have greater visibility if its search engine optimization (SEO) is rightly or adequately managed. This can be done through articles and videos with popular search words. The more a site appears in search engines, the more it is visited by web users and its popularity can spread like wildfire. A website can be searched through links and it is through links that determine the ranking behavior. (Enge et al. 2012, 342) SEO is an internet marketing strategy. It works through search words, for example, if you use Google as a search engine, you type the word of a topic or subject or site you want to search. The typed words can produce a list of websites or links. How an individual or organization manages search words in their website will determine how visible the website is to the virtual world. An effective SEO will make a website viral and a viral state will produce thousands and millions of visitors to your website. But the process of SEO is not easy and requires skill and competence. (Jones 2010, 2) 2. You are the Marketing Manager of a not for profit organization and have just hired a Curtin graduate. You want to brief him/her before he/she starts. What in your opinion are some of the most important things that he/she needs to know about working in a not for profit organization. The first thing that a new member should know is the mission of the organization. The mission of a non-profit organization is very much different from the mission of organizations for profits. The goals are primarily humanitarian or to bring about change in people and society. (Drucker 2000, 2) The mission is to be carried out by the members and their leaders. How successful is the mission will depend upon the leaders. The new member should know the qualities of a good leader. Missions were successfully carried out by transformational and charismatic leaders. Examples are Jesus Christ and Mahatma Gandhi. Although these two are not equal in the sense that Jesus is God and Gandhi is an ordinary leader. But Gandhi is a Hindu who practiced the teachings of Jesus. Gandhi had no property or wealth and his wealth was his people. He carried out his mission to free India from the clutches of foreign rule and he was successful by using transformational leadership. Jesus – we know him as the Son of God but he came down from heaven to become an ordinary human being. He too is an example of a transformational leader. The mission of a non-profit organization must be carried out by leaders and transform the act into performance. There has to be results and winning strategies. (Drucker 2000, 37) A non-profit organization is not founded only for delivering service but to make the recipient of the service become a doer. This is the goal – to change the individual to be himself a doer and a giver of service. In other words, to be a part of a non-profit organization is to be a real Christian like Jesus or to be a real Hindu like Mahatma Gandhi. For what good is an organization if it is only for delivering service, or to give food to the needy, and then it leaves behind the same people whom the organization met when it was delivering service. The ultimate aim should be to change the individuals and society and make them a part of the mission of the organization. The organization looks for results, i.e. transforming intentions into positive results (Drucker 2000, 39). Non-profit organizations need marketing but a different kind of marketing. Market research is part of its strategy. The strategist in this type of organization has to know the market segment. However, a non-profit organization is selling an intangible product which is value to the customer or recipient. For example, a non-profit organization helps the sick patient in the hospital. Sickness is not a product but how to help the patient is the main aim of marketing. The non-profit also helps the physician so he/she can help the patient. Drucker (2000) says that this is a concept which is different from selling a product. Good and effective management is also needed in a non-profit. Marketing has to be incorporated into the design of the service. For example, in obtaining funds for the organization, management has to be able to produce data from census or from reliable survey organizations to help in convincing the market segment about its programs and mission. The organization has to respond to the needs of the market. (Drucker 2000, 40) 3. You are the CEO of a not for profit organization. An acquaintance of yours would like to join the board. You suspect that he/she just wants the prestige of the position. He/she donates a small amount of money each year to the organization and only has limited skills to bring to the board. You want the board to be small and efficient. How would you respond? I would respond candidly but speak with respect to my friend. I may start with describing leaders and how should the board work for the organization. Members of the board must be leaders with exemplary qualities and unselfish motives. I have to explain the qualities of a leader. There is a common thinking that successful leaders are those who respond most appropriately to the demands of the specific situation. When there are no problems, when it seems there is no conflict, leaders can relax and seek opinions from members at a leisurely pace. But when a problem comes up, the leader must know how to act and deal with the situation immediately. The leader has to be well prepared to changes which may come in any time. Leaders must be first to act and members will only follow. This is how the board should function. There was one leader who asked, “How can I lead my people if I do not know where they are going?” A leader should know where the road will lead to. He must know how to motivate his people, and members should be able to know how to follow and cooperate for the success of the leadership. It goes to any kind of leadership, whether political, organizational, or even leadership in a family. Transformational leadership transforms people into the kind of followers an organization must have. There are other kinds of leaders which may lead to disastrous circumstances for the organization, some of which maybe the egocentric leaders. Egos and selfish principles on the part of the leader can lead to failure of leadership even in a non-profit organization. In our organization, we aim for improvement and change in people and not prestige for the members. We aim for the welfare of our market segment. Every member of the board, no matter how small, should work for the organization and stand as a model. He must possess some extraordinary qualities but should be able to inspire and motivate people who then are inspired to work and see for the future. Transformational leaders stimulate the followers’ imagination to be creative and provide more ideas and innovations for the betterment of their company or organization. This type of leaders has made our world a better place to live in. (Bass and Riggio 2006, 16) There are rules in management we need to follow in our organization, some of which are: to get the members emotionally involved; to know what a team is and how it works; to set realistic targets; to hold effective meetings; to make meetings fun; to make the team better than you; to set boundaries; to let the members make mistakes; and to accept mistakes. (Templar 2005, 29) I want each and every member of the board to be this type. And I want this acquaintance of mine to be first a transformational leader before becoming a member of the board. How should I explain this to him without hurting him? As I’ve said, I have to be candid and I may be able to hurt him but I have to sacrifice our relationship before I sacrifice the organization which I have dedicated my time, talent and resources. References Bass, Bernard and Riggio, Ronald. 2006. Transformational leadership, 2nd edition. London: Routledge. Drucker, Peter. 2000. Managing the non-profit organization. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. Enge, Eric, Spencer, Stephan, Fishkin, Rand, and Stricchiola, Jessie. 2012. The art of SEO: mastering search engine optimization. California: O’Reilly Media Inc. Jones, Kristopher. 2010. Search engine optimization: your visual blueprint for effective internet marketing. Indiana: Wiley Publishing Inc. MacLaughlin, Steven. 2007. “The changing nature of community: leveraging the internet to build relationships and expand the reach of your organization.” In People to people fundraising: social networking and web 2.0 for charities, eds. Ted Hart, James Greenfield, and Sheeraz Haji, 3-17. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Templar, Richard. 2005. The rules of management. Great Britain: Pearson Education Limited. Read More