As
much as some businesses are still trying to, the fact is that social media can
no longer be ignored from a B2C perspective. The range of networks available
can be daunting and choosing the ones where your audience can be reached is
essential to the success of social media for business, but there are also many
other strengths and weaknesses that need to be taken into account when
considering which channels to expose your brand on. The following list details four
key channels for B2C businesses to be considering, and what their pros and cons
are:
·
Facebook
– With 1 billion users, Facebook is not to be ignored. The advantages
include it offering the best form of direct contact with your customers, making
it useful for gaining feedback and using for product development purposes. The
disadvantage also stems from the advantage of direct contact, as customers may
get disgruntled if you aren’t always around to answer their comments/messages
in a timely manner.
·
Twitter –
Twitter is another favourite social channel among consumers, but a disadvantage
can come in the form of its fast paced nature and limited engagement (140
characters isn’t always enough!). This can mean you need to get extra creative
with campaigns, but an advantage of running campaigns on Twitter is that the
#hashtag feature promotes engagement and can be used to measure success.
·
Google+ -
It may not be as popular as Facebook or Twitter just yet, but its well on its
way. It isn’t used as much as other networks for social reasons, but that
doesn’t mean it can’t still be of use to businesses. The simple fact that posts
and pages that are regularly updated often appear in organic searches is enough
to at least give it a second glance.
·
Pinterest
– It drives more sales than any other social network, with product based
and visual based companies finding the most benefit from this image sharing
site. If your core audience is women, even better, as 72% - 97% of Pinterest’s
users are estimated to be female.
B2B business? We will be doing a similar run down of
channels and their strengths and weaknesses for B2B as well, so keep checking
back!
If you like
this story, do share and tweet me @annmariehanlon, and share with me your
own thoughts on these campaigns and others!
Labels: facebook, Google Plus, Pinterest, social media for b2c, social media marketing, twitter
