The Benefits and Challenges of Social Media for Sales and Marketing - Essay Sample

1. What is the difference between sales using social media and marketing using social media? What are the benefits of social media to each and what are the challenges?

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Sales using social media refer to activities of engagement in the various social media platforms and the primary objective is the generation of revenue while marketing using social media manifest through any social media activities, in which there is no revenue generation in the end (Brodmerkel, 2018). The concept of revenue serves as the only basis for the difference between the two. On the same note, while sales on social media drive revenue, marketing on social if focused on driving awareness.

Social media has significant benefits on each o the activities in the course of focusing on the mission of each. For selling on social media, the platforms used guarantees the creation of affective bonds between the seller or producers and potential customers. This makes it easy for the service provider or the seller to secure an opportunity to connect with consumers. Besides, the engagement with customers is reliable now that social media has made easy to reach out to them without much struggle. Social media also makes it for a seller to determine the patterns of customers and focus on the predictions. The challenge is based on the competition that social offers to them now that every seller has the opportunity of reaching out to the same customer.

Social media also has potential benefits on the platforms; for instance, they promote goals established towards branding and marketing communication. Social media have effective tools that promote content sharing in different ways like mages and videos (Gupta & Bansal, 2016)..These are significant contributors to creating awareness for the targeted audience. The challenge is the difficulty in creating high-quality visuals and reaching out to the targeted audience;

2. What are the pitfalls of engaging difficult customers on social media platforms?

Customers present different forms of responses while organizations and individuals try to reach out to them on social media. This occurs due to the different mindsets that customers have before or develop in reaction to social media engagement. A significant pitfall is the offensive responses that customers make (Hajli, 2014). The responses are influential to other potential customers who may not see value in the marketing information presented through social media platforms. The negative reactions lead to prejudgment among some customers who are made to believe that the recommended products are worthy hence leading to failures concerning the mission of the engagements accomplished in such communications environments.

Competitors also take advantage of the impacts of the intervention of difficult customers. The competitors can utilize the opportunity to design communications and marketing information that could appear to meet the needs; bridging the gaps associated with the former engagements. Competitors can also fuel the process by using the offensive social media users and the negative comments may spread widely (Brodmerkel, 2018). This subsequently affects the customer base negatively. As a result, it makes it very difficult for an organization to restore damaged situations. For example, they have the obligation of ensuring that they respond o the comments of the customers in time before they influence the others to have the same forms of perception.

3. Visit www.guardian.co.uk. List how this print publication is embracing social media.

Live post and user engagement; the published in the print publication formation are updated in terms of the time in which they were made available. The most significant part of engagement is guaranteed by the live updates . This is achieved by forums established for engaging with the users of the platform. The management of the print publication is based on the recognition that user feedback is important is very important for the improvement of the content in the subsequent publications. Besides, user engagement is a strategic process through which the user-generated content can be resourceful communicated further on the same platform.

The publication also recognizes the need for user opinions without restricting them. This is a feature of social media in which users have the freedom of communicating whatever they feel, from which they should not be prevented. Even as much the opinions may be wrong or offensive, special media users should exercise their freedom in such platforms (Gupta & Bansal, 2016). This is one desirable feature that users experience that is different from the traditional media.

Link with social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, the electronic nature of the publication has made it relatively easier to connect with the other social media which will further promote the process of reaching out to the widest possible audience. There active links for Facebook and Twitter in which readers can link and access the pages and accounts of the publishing organization. By clinking links and navigating to the pages presents the readers with more information which could not be published. On the live publication, there are just highlights with links to other sites with more adequate pieces of information on the same.

4. Should all brands be active on public social media? Which brands have less to gain from trying to create an online following/community? Please use an example of a real brand.

All brands should be active on public social media. This is because the creator of the owner intends to reach out to the widest possible audience. It, therefore, follows that presenting in them n an online community will be effective because many will have the opportunity of following. However, there are some risks that one has to take and may experience in the course of trying to share such brands. This may include the undesirable response that they may get from the users of such public spaces which may have a negative influence on the overall exercise. Acordint to Gupta and Bansal (2016), it may be worthless at times to communicate the brand's information on social media platforms. Therefore, the effort of the advertising group or individual may not be fruitful. Nevertheless, now that the originator of the information had the intention of reaching out to the audience. Consequently, the possible outcome should discourage them from presenting the brand information to social media platforms.

A real brand example is a news story published online and could have also been presented in print. Other outlets may have the opportunity of promoting an engagement that may prevent the associated ads from going much viral. They may summarize the contents and may even end up not linking to the source. In the advertising context, such forms of engagement may not be beneficial in the end (Voorveld et al., 2018). This presents a great challenge that may influence individuals or organizations against presenting in such public environments facilitated by social media.

5. What skills do you think are important to be a great community manager?

An important skill for a great community manager is based on effective communication. This is a broad requirement and covers the need to be outgoing; to communicate a brand about a company an individual charged with the role at the position of community management should able to communicate effectively and reach out to the potential buyers. On the same note, they should be nice to them and willing to accommodate their opinions which can further b used to improve the services and products. Communication skills can also manifest through the ability to convince others efficiently without struggling (Gupta & Bansal, 2016). The choice of words should be sufficient to attract buyers into the brand which is being marketed or advertised. These constitute the people skills hat an individual representing an organization should have and demonstrate in any event or exercise meant towards ensuring that the information about a brand reaches the targeted audiences which would turn into potential customers.

The professional should also be aware of the current trends so that communications on brands are updated according to a given time and the communication demands in the context of the advertisement. For instance, adverts benefit from the advances in technology and this shows the incorporation of information technology tools in the media. The community manager must be informed about h current trends and how they can have a significant impact in representing the organization in question. Otherwise, the targeted audience may lose interest in the information being communicated therefore the organization may end up registering considerable losses. This confirms the importance of how people can be engaged apart from what is being communicated at times.

References

Brodmerkel, S. (2018). Should brands "nudge us for good"? Towards a critical assessment of neuroliberal corporate social responsibility. Journal Of Public Affairs, 19(1), e1898. doi: 10.1002/pa.1898

Gupta, S., & Bansal, E. (2016). Consumer Orientation Towards Online Buying Via Social Media Platforms. International Journal Of Scientific Research And Education. doi: 10.18535/ijsre/v4i01.15

Hajli, M. (2014). A study of the impact of social media on consumers. International Journal Of Market Research, 56(3), 387-404. doi: 10.2501/ijmr-2014-025

Voorveld, H., van Noort, G., Muntinga, D., & Bronner, F. (2018). Engagement with Social Media and Social Media Advertising: The Differentiating Role of Platform Type. Journal Of Advertising, 47(1), 38-54. doi: 10.1080/00913367.2017.1405754

WU, X. (2019). Strategic Thinking on Social Media Marketing in the Internet Era. Destech Transactions On Social Science, Education And Human Science, (icssd). doi: 10.12783/dtssehs/icssd2018/27412