Social Media Phenomenon

Sajal Gupta, General Manager and Head of Business Development, Regalix India
Is traditional media dead? In my opinion it’s not dead, but challenged, as there is this vast area of content being built today called Social Media. The key to the Social Media success is that the author is “You & Me” which fits perfectly with the Gen “Y”. Today social media encompasses the various activities that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio. Traditional media sits up and recognizes this, the Time Magazine person of the year is “You”. Do you need any other endorsement?

The Social Media trend is fueled by the sociological trends of Gen “Y” and the enhanced interactively on experiences with the technological development of Web 2.0 (the semantic web experience web 3.0 promises to give us will keep this flag high for some time). The perfect blend of technology touch the hearts of million of people and gels with the new breakaway freedom of Gen “Y”.

For all of us, it’s a journey from being a couch potato to a rising star, from being at the periphery to the center stage. For businesses it is a journey from a 30-second commercial to wooing for three minutes of the prospect’s time and that is what makes their life that much more complex now.

Active brand engagement has become the key; it is not about a catchy 30 second message any longer. It’s become more than that. It’s about engaging with your customers - living and sleeping with them, talking to them continuously and above all being a friend.

Let’s see what this gives us as a marketer, studying and making notes of the conversations your prospect group is making gives you immense insight about your product and more importantly about your competitors’. Now compare this to the traditional means of research, data gathering, trending and projecting that one undertakes. Unbiased, unaided feedback – we all know its value.

Now that one have observed, it is equally important for someone to participate in the discussions and in a very subtle manner influence the discussions. This will need a more thought through approach, jumping in putting across an advertising message is hara-kiri. It is important to gain trust and confidence of the community before influencing or moderating discussions. Important for one to be participative, build creditability and thus be accepted by the group.

Let’s relate this to our offline lives, don’t we become part of communities, societies, interest groups etc? We don’t jump in and spreading our message we befriend, find common talking / interesting areas etc. etc. before dropping the message. So are the case here and the Social aspect of Social Media.

Finally to the most difficult part for any brand marketers – the brick bats. All conversations will not be positive; there will be the share of brick bats. Brand marketers will need to stand up and own up to it, and more importantly respond and take remedial action. We all know as a consumer if our voice is heard and acted upon it goes the longest way to convert the negativity to a happy experience.

Finally, we do read about Pharmaceutical, Technology and Consumer marketers engaging with customers, on the other side we have the human resource division of the same companies actively using professional social networks for their recruitment. Social media touches lives of all organizations large and small and has become or is poised to become a critical part of their operations.