Assignment task:
Social media marketing is about people connecting with other people through a variety of texts, images, videos, and ideas across the internet. Social media represents all the online interactions that allow people and businesses to communicate and share ideas, personal information, and information about products and services. Social media sites have exponentially increased in popularity in a short amount of time and user numbers increase daily while people log onto sites from a variety of devices to connect with family and friends and gain information.
Businesses use social media to provide information to customers and as a means of customer service. Businesses also use social media data to learn about customers' likes and dislikes and for feedback on products and services. Social media marketers use social media marketing plans to help strategize how to best communicate with social media followers and use the data they gain to inform new marketing plans and ideas for the future.
While marketers may use different sites to communicate with customers in a social media marketing plan, there are several specific types of social media content sites that businesses can use to share information about their products and services:
- Blogs allow the business to share detailed information about products and services and build trust. Stories and information are posted, and customers can provide feedback in the comments.
- Media-sharing sites allow users to upload photos, videos, and other types of media. Social media marketers must determine who will create and distribute this type of content and how much it will cost.
- Podcasts allow people to listen to or watch digital audio or video files online often in an interview format. They are not linked to a scheduled time and can be available for download or streaming at any time.
- Social media ratings, or sites for reviews and ratings of products and services, allow customers to leave reviews and share information about their experiences with products and services. These sites can help build a good reputation for a business.
- Social media communities allow groups of people who share common interests to connect with people with similar interests on the internet.
- Forums allow users to create posts and act as an interactive community bulletin board for discussions.
- Wikis allow people to work together in a collaborative online space that enables members to contribute content that can be shared with others.
Imagine you are meeting with your after-school basketball club at your campus recreation center. The club wants you to create a social media strategy to promote new member sign-ups so you can increase your roster. After a meeting with the club leadership, you decide that you would like to be part of the social media marketing team and you want to create some new content about your club, what you do, when you meet, and why new students should join.
You are now part of the social media marketing team with other students in your club and begin to build a social media marketing content plan. Laura wants to film some video content. Marcos is interested in scheduling an interview with a student podcasting group on campus. Sandra would like to create a hashtag campaign to encourage members to post content on their own social media pages at club events. They ask what you would like to do.
Explain what idea would you provide and how did you come up with that conclusion? Also, what do you want to share an experience online with others? Do you know how social media marketers plan to create and distribute content to online audiences with multiple devices? Is social media beneficial or disadvantageous?