$GFMD Social Media Market and Opportunities!!!

Social Media is a recent addition to organizations’ integrated marketing communications plans.  Integrated marketing communications is a practice organizations follow to connect with their target markets.  Integrated marketing communications coordinates promotional elements: advertising, personal selling, public relations, publicity, direct marketing, and sales promotion.  Increasingly, viral marketing campaigns are also grouped into integrated marketing communications.  In the traditional marketing communications model, the content, frequency, timing, and medium of communications by the organization is in collaboration with an external agent, i.e. advertising agencies, marketing research firms, and public relations firms.

However, the growth of social media has impacted the way organizations communicate.  With the emergence of Web 2.0 the internet provides a set of tools that allow people to build social and business connections, share information, and collaborate on projects online.

Social media marketing programs usually center on efforts to create content that attracts attention and encourages readers to share it with their social networks.  A corporate message spreads from user to user and presumably resonates because it is coming from a trusted, third-party source, as opposed to the brand or company itself.

Key factors that ensure its success are its relevance to the customer, the value it provides them with and the strength of the foundation on which it is built.  A strong foundation serves as a platform in which the organization can centralize its information and direct customers on its recent developments via other social media channels, such as article and press release publications.  Often times, corporate social media platforms are used to offer unique incentives to customers who are willing to engage.

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