How Important are Social Media Sites?
Posted by Gavin Smith on Monday, June 1st, 2009 in Blogging, Digital Marketing, Social Media, Social Media Optimisation
Today I am answering the above question, to which my answer is a very resounding “extremely important”.
To explain why social media is so important I feel that I should explain my very mundane morning. It is currently 10.23am on Monday 1st June 2009 and already today I have:
- visited Twitter through Twitroid and Tweet Deck;
- caught up on blogs released overnight through an RSS aggregator whilst on the train, I am also kept up to date on new blog posts throughout the day via Outlook on my laptop;
- browsed forums to catch up on the latest Liverpool FC news;
- visited Youtube for coverage on Britain’s Got Talent;
- logged on to Facebook to see if any friends have any up-coming birthdays;
- monitored Yammer for internal communication;
- used MSN Messenger and Google talk to keep in touch with friends and colleagues;
- started thinking about this blog post;
- searched Wikipedia to see what it has to say on social media.
My day is only 3 hours and 53 minutes old but the combination of sociology and modern technology that is social media has dictated the majority of my morning already.
What are Social Media Sites?
Social media sites at the core are platforms and tools that facilitate the discovery, participation and sharing of information between select groups and the masses.
They have revolutionised the way in which individuals, such as myself, can reach large groups of people and have led to the democratisation of information by allowing people to give opinions and express what they deem important.
Examples
Sites like Digg and Delicious are employed as a source of news by many, whereas networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are more commonly used for interacting. Social gaming communities that surround Eve online are becoming increasingly popular on the web, in the same way as World of War Craft or the one that Microsoft has created with the Xbox 360.
Social media exists in many different forms such as forums, blogs, microblogs, podcasts, video logs, wikis, email, networking, instant messengers, gaming, photos and video sharing.
If social media sites continue to grow at the current rate they will become an integral part of our lives as we move further into the 21st century.
Social Media Marketing
The mass appeal of these social media sites has resulted in businesses following consumers into the Web 2.0 era. Social Media allows companies to reach more customers, meaning that businesses can answer questions and receive feedback on their products and service.
It is another channel through which businesses can communicate with the consumer, adding another dimension to the traditional marketing mix.
So how important are Social Media sites?
Sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Youtube, Sphinn, Digg, Amazon and Wiki have revolutionised the way in which we build relationships, meet new people, share content and find information.
Social media sites are infinitely important to me and my work, and this is increasingly becoming the case for corporations and the individual. Watch this space.
