Why is it not good to hide your brand’s social presence?
There are many organizations (even websites and people) that don’t want to go active on social media in order to
boost the presence of their brand. A few days ago, I asked my uncle if he wants to promote his brand online. His reply was negative, as according to him using social media to promote a brand would do more bad than good for it. “People will not take it seriously and our brand will become a laughing stock”.
This clearly shows the perception of certain class of people towards social media marketing. Statistics produced by various online agencies clearly shows that many companies are still reluctant to use social media marketing to gain users for their organization.
Different people have different fears of not using social media marketing extensively for the purpose of promoting their brand, which can be:
- The fear to use a different way of promoting their brand.
- The fear to share extensive information with the users.
- The fear to interact with the users directly.
- The fear to be attacked by social groups.
- They might be thinking that this way of promoting their brand may look childish would hurt the reputation of their brand.
The people who consider the above fears as true are actually WRONG at all.
Below are the points which tell you about the disadvantages of not using social media marketing for promotion of your brand:
1.
Not coming on social media won’t save you from criticism: When you are visible on any social media, people would talk about you and your services. Of course it makes more people notice about your brand, about what you are doing and can even bring criticism and suggestions from them about the services you provide.
If you are afraid of this, then you should actually quit the market and stop producing your products or services. Hiding from social media would not serve your purpose. It would rather make things worse for long term.
You must try to listen to your users suggestions and criticisms, and should try to improve yourself in order to secure better future of your organization and your brand.
Social media provides you a place to start a conversation about your brand and let people know you better. So, it’s time, to stop hiding away and, face the world.
2.
Social Media doesn’t cause Brand Disasters; it’s the other way round: Many people are of a view that a brand’s interaction with the social media often results in its disaster. And that’s completely false. When we talk of social media, we aren’t talking about twitter and facebook users; we are talking about the brand’s target users who are using facebook and twitter.
Interaction with them should be viewed as an opportunity to grow your brand presence, rather than getting scared about what they might say against your brand. Whoever thinks that social media interactions destroy brands, has a narrow frame of mind.
3.
Losing out on a perfect opportunity: Not making the use of social media marketing is such a waste of opportunity for any organization who wants to promote its brand/brands. With millions of users accessing social networking sites, from every corner of the world, social media marketing is a must to create personal relationships with your target customers and attract more people around the world.
4.
Creating a bridge between your brand and the users: If you have personal relationships with your users online, or you talk about your brand regularly with them, then it can take your brand out of any disaster instead of destroying it. For eg. If someone spreads a wrong rumor about your brand or organization then your customers know where they should go for trusted information about your brand. This would happen only if you are active on Twitter or facebook and have told your users to follow you on these social networking websites.
5.
Saving a lot of time: Social media marketing is the best source of providing information and regular updates about your brand to your users instantly. Instead of creating an advertisement and waiting for it to get published, you can simple write about it on your facebook wall or through your twitter messages. This saves a lot of time as providing updates through these social networking sites takes less than a minute.
For eg. Vodafone provides regular updates about its mobile tariff plans and new scheme from time to time on its facebook wall.
6.
You can pay the price of not following the latest trend: Gone are the days when companies used to find this medium to interact with their users as childish and unprofessional. With the tremendous growth rate in the number of users of these social networking sites and the association of some big names with it, the trend has completely changed. Plus with the power of youth behind it, it is a must to your brand noticed among them.
The youth of today is so addicted to facebook, twitter and his laptop, that he hardly finds any time to watch television or to read newspapers.So, if you are not following this trend of social media marketing, you are creating a grave for your own brand.
7.
Customer is the king: More than ever, customer has the power to choose the way through which he wants to interact with your brand. So instead of creating your own dancing steps, you have to learn to dance on your customers tunes. They can’t read the newspaper on a specific day or watch television on a specific time, to see your advertisement. They want automatic updates, which they can read in their leisure time. This is the way customers want to be treated, and social media marketing is the only way you can interact with your target customers.
8.
Avoid being targeted by your users: There have been cases when initiatives taken by the social groups have destroyed many brands. And this has been the biggest fear for many companies. But in order to avoid such a situation, you have to interact with your target users and customers, and have to become their friend by knowing what they want and providing them the same through your brand and updating them regularly with latest news about your brand. Don’t do it just for formality, create real relationships with your target customers and these relationships would prove vital in case of need.
9.
Closing your eyes in front of social media won’t make them disappear: Whether or not you want to jump in the world of social media, you
are already there. People will talk about your brand through social media and would discuss about its good and bad points, irrespective of whether your brand is socially active or not. So you can either take control of your brand’s reputation by being present there or you can just watch its fate helplessly.
10.
Creating a relationship of trust and faith with your target audience would remain a dream: If you
keep on hiding under your bed instead of being social with your customers and target users, you would lose a tremendous opportunity to build relationship of trust and faith with them.
By sharing with your target audience:
- vital news and updates;
- new offers and plans;
about your organization,listening to their:
- suggestions, complaints;&
- comments
and by removing their:
you can win the trust and confidence of your customer and can also
attract your target users. And your brand will not earn all this, if you were hiding under your desk. And trust me; this relationship is very vital for the success of your organization.
11.
Losing the chance of getting positive word of mouth publicity: If you are interacting with your customers through social media, listening to their complaints and suggestions and are working on them, then there is a strong probability of your customer spreading positive words about your brand. And such publicity (positive or negative) spread faster than forest fire in this concrete jungle.
12.
Losing the chance of earning promoting your brand free of cost: You can put the
advertisement of your brand at the highest paid slot on television media, but keep one thing in mind that you cannot purchase relationships. Social media marketing helps brands to ensure positive relationships with its users, which not just helps you to promote your brand, but is also the best way to accumulate your brand’s supporters and users.
And if you still have any doubt about whether you should
promote your brand using social media marketing, then watch any advertisement of your favorite product or brand on television or Newspaper and you will notice links to connect with the organization on Facebook, Twitter,
Traffup and their own website (through their blogs).
Remember, the best way to
gain the acceptance of social media is by being a part of it.
