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BRANDING: Should Businesses Join The Social Media Rush?

social media bandwagon

Social media has much to offer in terms of building web traffic and awareness. But is it a must for businesses to engage in it?

The answer is no. Perhaps it is pretty apparent since we don’t see some of our favorite brands engaging in social media!

Social media is fun and cool. But that could very well deter businesses from using them.

Catch what I think about social media below.

Social Media In An Association Map

SM word association map

That is what I perceive social media to be and I believe it shouldn’t deviate too much from anyone else.

So how do we determine if a social media is suitable for our business?

It all depends on your brand image. No matter what we embark on, we have to be consistent in our messages, style and image. Brands like Dell, Wholefoods and MailChimp are engaging social media because their overall image matches consumers’ associations of social media.

We don’t see luxury brands like Gucci and LV promoting their brands on Twitter or Facebook because this will probably sabotage their high fashion and exclusive status.

Takeaway

The deciding factors when choosing social media to market your business isn’t directly about cost, reach, effectiveness and ROI. To make your social media campaign successful, it requires you to interact and connect with people. That itself makes social media special.

Poster ads and TV commercials can’t talk with consumers. Social media can.

While employing other media to market your business is pretty straight forward, social media on the other hand must be dealt with delicately. You wouldn’t want to jump onto the bandwagon and face a branding mismatch or any other types of social media disasters.

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About Sarah Chong

Co-founder and editor of Penn Olson. A laid-back marketing student otherwise. Loves social media and twitters about everything! (yes even about the stranger who chants to himself) A huge Harry Potter movie fan who is extremely scared of geckos.

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  • http://twitter.com/dubuc64 Antoine Dubuquoy

    I'm not that certain brand shouldn't jump on the social media bandwaggon. Though using social media -even for luxury brands – doesn't prevent them from having a global communication strategy. Social media use and monitoring should be part of the global communication approach.

  • http://www.facebook.com/laurent.michel Laurent Michel

    I agree with you article except the fact that luxury brands do not use social media or should not use social media because it does not match with their brand image.
    One of the biggest event on facebook last month was organized by LV http://www.facebook.com/LouisVuitton. They broadcast their fashion show live on facebook with the live stream box widget. They have more than 750 000 fans and the feedback of the event was huge.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Courtney-Engle/38808427 Courtney Engle

    I often advise businesses to at least stake their claim in most of the social media spaces, then listen and develop a strategy of implementation before actually participating in the party.

    By the way – what plugin are you using for the related posts? Love it. I'm mostly running “yet another related posts”

  • http://www.rick.dk Torben Rick

    Yes – they already do:

    Southwest Airlines, Comcast Cares, Telstra, Washington Metro, BTCare all use Twitter for customer service. Who else? http://bit.ly/3fDI2q

  • http://twitter.com/williswee Willis Wee

    Hey thanks for the great comments. Agree with all and thanks for the heads on luxury brands guys! Using social media to track buzz and broadcast events are great idea. But i guess there is a limit to how much they can use social media.

    I don't see LV or Chanel having a twitter page.<— Any comments or critics are welcome :)

    To Torben:

    More here!
    Business on Facebook: http://bit.ly/S1DX0
    Business on Twitter: http://bit.ly/4rg9TT

  • http://twitter.com/williswee Willis Wee

    Hey Courtney. We're using YARPP :)

  • http://www.chiefingredient.com/ Lisa Thomas

    Social media is analogous to the telephone. When you buy a phone system, do you ask what your ROI is going to be on it? Of course not, it's viewed as a necessary communication tool, not an optional marketing strategy. Do you know what customers will talk or tweet about? No, and you don't know what the next phone call will be about either. Can you imagine how long your business would survive without a phone, but meanwhile all your competitors are using one? Same thing for social media — if you don't pay attention to that communication tool, your competitors are — and who's going to be the ones 'talking' to NEW customers? It's hard to measure performance on a phone system, but you can measure performance in social media — which helps you perfect your ongoing communication. “Communicating” correctly and efficiently through social media is the key. And if customers are out there talking about you and your brand anyway, wouldn't you like to be right in the middle of the conversation?

    -Lisa
    http://www.chiefingredient.com/

  • http://www.rick.dk Torben Rick

    Wow – great :-)

    Torben Rick

  • http://www.penn-olson.com/2009/11/10/burberry-the-facebook-trench-coat-campaign/ Burberry: The Facebook Trench Coat Campaign | Penn Olson

    [...] we mentioned that luxury brands might not consider social media as a marketing platform, Burberry has proven us [...]

  • http:cmtmarketing.net Jerry/CMT Creative Marketing

    Social media for the B2B markets is evolving but there are lots of practices that can be incorporated from the B2C platforms.

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