Analyzing Social Media Channels

Lately I have been studying the effective use of social media for businesses. I have come across a few people that believe it is the future of marketing a business. I have been learning about how different businesses and business owners use social media. In addition I have been looking at our customer's sites to see how social media has driven traffic to their sites, as well as the quality of that traffic.

My preliminary conclusion is that social media has a place for most any business, but that the difference in business models will determine how social media will play a role in the marketing. So many people are plugged in to social sites, that it makes sense for businesses to have a presence, there just needs to be some thought and planning in how social media fits into the overall marketing strategy.

For some businesses, it may primarily be a way to engage their current customers at a social level. In this case, there may not be much of a direct revenue benefit, such as new sales/customers. However, it could play a critical part in developing a relationship with the customers that will keep them from turning to other companies with whom they do business.

In other cases, social media may be a way to spread awareness of small businesses/websites. This may directly bring business from the social media space because people are able to recommend products or services to their friends. To have a presence on social media sites as a business allows people to see what businesses their friends like.

In the cases of our customers, we see some of each of these. Some generate quality traffic to their site and build awareness and credibility through social media. In other cases, the traffic from social media represents a very small portion of the overall traffic and the traffic is not high quality. It performs well below average. The participation on the company's social media pages by customers, however, completely justifies the investment of time and resources to keep up with the initiative. Then, there are those of our customers that haven't started taking advantage of social media.

Share with us how you use social media. Have you seen increased business or increased customer engagement from your efforts. While you are here, you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook.