Social media marketing has evolved businesses in India

Social media marketing has evolved businesses in India

What is Social Media Marketing?

Social media marketing can be referred to the process of gaining attention through social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc. It utilizes the social aspect of web by creating attractive content which encourages readers to share it with their social networks and hence helping the firm increase brand exposure and broaden its customer reach.

Social Media Marketing strategy can be as simple as having a Facebook page, a Twitter handle, a blog or a YouTube channel but framing the right mix of strategies to leverage the wide-ranging benefits of Social media is very critical.


Why Social Media Marketing?

•  Provides relatively inexpensive platform for organizations to implement marketing campaigns.
• Enables to create buzz using word-of-mouth promotion.
• Enables you to manage your reputation by keeping an eye on what others are saying about your brand.
  
• Enables to reach out to a larger audience. 
• Provides a platform that gives power to reach and engage with your audience directly. 
• Provides permission based marketing tool rather than intrusive marketing.
  

Hence, Social media marketing is a great way to Listen, Engage and then serve your followers to drive business and to attract new followers.


Social Media Marketing in India

Social media marketing is evolving from a 'nice-to-have' to a necessary strategy in India with 83% of the firms agreeing that without social media activity, marketing strategies cannot prosper.

• According to a survey, in 2010, 52% of Indian firms acquired new customers through Social Media and it reached 61% in 2011.
• 64% of Indian firms use social websites to connect, inform and engage their customers. 
• According to a study in 2013, around 95.7% of Indian organizations use social media to build communities and advocates while 76.1% uses it to highlight information and brand news. 
• 83% of the Indian firms have used social media to promote a contest or increasing brand awareness.
  

Indian organizations use Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Blogs as key social media channels and use analytics to measure the success of social media spending.


Few examples where in Indian customers came across social media marketing:

• Secret Diaries: Dove launched its new hairfall treatment product via real women sharing their experiences with the product through videos and blog posts, in the Dove Hair Fall Rescue Diary.
• Thunderbird500: Royal Enfield used teaser videos on YouTube to create pre-launch buzz for its Thunderbird 500
• Save with Subbu: Kotak Mahindra Bank launched "Save with Subbu" campaign where users can co-author a "Smart Saving Book" by sharing their saving tips through Facebook or Twitter.
  

Future Ahead:

Indian organizations indulged in Social media marketing are very optimistic about its role in enabling them to Listen-Engage and Serve the customers. And, firms have realized that it has helped them to create their own communities of followers, customers, prospects and advocates. Hence, in near future Indian organizations can be seen indulging more and more in social media marketing.


As rightly said by Scott Cook, Co-founder, Intuit:

"A brand is no longer what we tell the consumer it is – it is what consumers tell each other it is."


Refrences:
http://en.wikipedia.org/
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/
http://www.ey.com
http://lighthouseinsights.in/