Social Media – Redefining Small Businesses

Change, irrespective of context, is a wonderful thing in that it never occurs in a linear fashion.

As change embarks upon its trajectory through the system, nothing it touches remains static; themselves being swept up by the change and having an effect on those around it.

This can be applied to everything we see and interact with, with the landscape of social media bearing no exception.

Changes in social media behaviours are what propel the industry forward, resulting in more alterations that provoke new innovations in an infinite fashion. Just take the following cutting-edge technologies – they themselves being by-products of the so-called ‘social revolution’.

New social dynamics call for new developments to meet the end-user needs, no doubt fuelling the next wave of changes and advancements that will continue to benefit those particularly in small and medium-sized businesses.

So, what can we expect to propel businesses forward and open up new possibilities? Let’s take Apple’s financial results from the third quarter of 2011, which saw the technology giant make a net profit of over 7 billion dollars and 28 billion dollars in revenue.

This can be fairly attributed to the worldwide sale of 9 million iPads, and a whopping 20 million iPhones in just one quarter of a year. Now take into account the volume of mobile device sales from BlackBerry, Samsung, HTC and other brands, and it’s plain to see that such devices are having a greater impact on our lives – both personal and business:

1. The relatively small screens of mobile devices can be a significant factor to how businesses communicate and coordinate transactions.
2. There are apps that cover 99% of business needs.
3. Instant messaging is becoming a stronger asset for mobile devices.
4. Mobile devices allow for location-based marketing.

YouTube

Unsurprisingly, YouTube’s audience exceeded the ‘big three’ networks some time ago, becoming not only a way of uploading and watching videos, but a social media platform as well.

The site has evolved to feature feeds, channels and analytics, which has cemented them a unique position in which to serve as a promotion tool for businesses regardless of size.

E-Commerce

E-commerce and social seem to have integrated together perfectly. Whilst the consumer audience used to influence the e-commerce through means such as review and comparison sites, recent developments mean more and more apps are being introduced that can be integrated into websites to solidify and improve the customer’s experience.

New Advertising Directions

More and more companies are beginning to experiment with more cutting edge advertising strategies that embrace social media. Shortly after the dawning of the digital age, businesses continued to base their attempts on older advertising models that did not sit well in such a new and alien marketing environment. Now, such models have started to flourish and are built on the ebb and flow of digital, with a lot of emphasis on social media.

Communities

The overwhelming success of social networks such as Facebook and Twitter can be attributed to the need that we feel as humans to communicate, share and interact with one another. Our desire to gather around and champion causes and ideas can also be beneficial to businesses. If the same can be done for a company’s products and/or services, then the potential for a community within a business context can be very exciting.

Forming a social media campaign can be hard work, but thankfully there is plenty of help out there for businesses who need it.