Today, social media has become one of the most important means to connect people from around the world. This medium has promoted sharing of real-time self-generated, and authentic content on common topics of interest shared by users. As of today, there are about 4.9 billion active users creating, consuming and sharing content on social media platforms. The constant evolutions in the industry have now turned social media into the most impactful marketing tool.
Insights show that every piece of content on social media gets perceived in its own way and similar perceptions end up creating like-minded communities. Business professionals are now employing social media and content marketing to build brand awareness, visibility and engagement with their followers.
A good piece of content can evoke various emotions within people and holds a strong scope of getting ‘viral' or as many would call it ‘trending’. This is just the beginning of what social media as a marketing tool can do for your brand - the possibilities are endless.
Content as a whole has turned into a visual representation of a brand. This gives brands an opportunity to humanise themselves and position themselves as thought leaders. It all boils down to “keeping it real on the gram”. The real benefit brands gain on social media is the community they build based on their niche. Authenticity drives credibility which drives vested interests and trust. This is the cycle that often seems to make social media an irreplaceable tool. It’s a basic scale, the higher the relatability, the higher the chance of a user engaging with your brand, converting into a follower and eventually sales.
While content happens to be the core benefit of social media, any marketing effort has one strategic target which often happens to be positive business performance or in just one word sales. With the constant advances in tech, social media has now equipped itself to go beyond just a content sharing platform.
There are additions of features almost every other day that gives businesses an insight into valuable customer data, patterns and trends. This allows them to mold their strategies into suiting their target audience and driving sales. The best part is that social media opens doors to engaging with customers in real-time and staying on top of their minds at all times.
Along with this social media provides an invaluable amount of data to marketers. By tracking it all, social media insights help you learn about your customers and the sentiment they have around your brand. When this happens, it allows marketers to adapt and modify their marketing strategies to best suit their audience.
Social media also allows you to constantly keep evolving and tends to move away from being a medium just for personal brand communication. It now allows brands to collaborate with real-life ‘influencers’ who have their niche and help promote your brand to their audience. With this, you get the chance to connect with new bases to follow you.
While social media has its numerous advantages, sometimes getting lost in the space could be very easy. Brands need to make sure they stay true to themselves and don't jump on every bandwagon.
All in all, social media can be termed an irreplaceable marketing tool. While it might be the only valuable marketing tool, in the current times it is the only platform that allows brands to have a 360-degree strategy and immense control over it.
To stay relevant, the only way to go is through social media marketing.