Social Marketing: Why it matters.

We do believe that social media and social marketing have radically altered advertising. We believe social media can level the playing field between Madison Avenue and local business owners. It’s not a fad; the landscape of social media has changed dramatically over the past three years, and what we see today will dramatically change three years from now. We feel we are at the ground level of a new marketing age and that social media will play a big part in the local business sub-businesses moving forward. There are numerous reasons to use social media, and some of the same lists will tell you how to get started. This blog by Brian Solis does a great job of describing how a business plays in social marketing and addressing why it works. However, he fails to address whether there are enough hours for the average business owner to dedicate to social marketing. I saw a quote today from Mitch Kapor: “Getting information off the internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.” The information is there for everybody in abundance, but is the time there for the local business owner? Over the past 18 months, the economy has made many difficult decisions for local business owners, as they have drastically cut their overhead and personnel. The mantra “more for less” began with large corporations to raise stock prices and has now spilled over to local small businesses as a way to survive. All the information is available, but is the time? After all, you do have a business to run, and for most small business owners, being a marketing expert, let alone a social media expert, is not what you signed up for. If you’ve been in business for any time, you’ve had to adjust products or services. Consumer demand can make you add goods and services and discontinue others. We are a small full-service agency that has worked with locally owned businesses. Over the past 12 to 18 months, we have seen more and more opportunities for our clients in social media. Due to the efficiency of being able to communicate consistently with their customers and add new friends, we decided to create a department dedicated to helping our current clients succeed in social media. Our goal is to assist other small businesses in competing in the social media marketplace.

Why We Chose to Add Social Marketing to Our Suite of Services

With efficiency and cost-cutting being huge topics in advertising budgets, social media just made sense for our clients. Today, most businesses are not getting the ROI in traditional media that they got 2 to 3 years ago. Even if they spent the same dollars, the return would not be the same. First and most importantly, the economy won’t allow it. Second, the time consumers spend on social media today versus two years ago has cut into time spent with traditional media. So, with budgets being cut, we knew we had to find other ways to talk and communicate with their clients. Social media was the logical conclusion. We began to implement cost-effective social media campaigns for our customers. While social media today cannot replace or replicate what can be done with traditional media, it does act as a very affordable compliment to anyone’s campaign. For those clients who couldn’t afford traditional media campaigns, social media has given them the voice they’ve needed for many years. It takes time and dedication to do it correctly. Social marketing is more than just marketing and more than just being social; it’s walking the fine line between the two. For us, it’s fun and exciting. It’s a way for us to do what we like and do best: help the local small businesses compete and succeed.