Challenges And Opportunities That Social Media Networks Offer Media Essay

Ch exclusivelyenges And Opportunities That Social Media Networks Offer Media EssayTraditional media v/s sassy jump on mediaThe availability of digital media such as satellite and mobile phones, the digital television and most importantly the net income, as a means for dialogue makes Internet Marketing (IM) very different from the Conventional Marketing. McDonald and Wilson (1999) elaborately highlighted the key difference between handed-down media and new media. With particular emphasises on IM the authors proposed what they call The 6 Is of e- food selling mix. The authors posit that the relevance of the 6 Is argon twofold (i) they draw emphasis on the practical aspects of IM such as direct response and personalization and (ii) provide an perceptiveness of strategic issues such as restructuring of the industry and the changes in the integrated channel communications.The 6 Is of e-marketing mixInteractivityIn the case of traditional media the marketing message is predominate ly broadcasted from a company to its target audience, thereby implying the existence of a push factor. This surgical process of communication provides little scope for interaction with the customers. However, on the Internet, contact is initiated by the customer who, in most cases, is seeking information, implying the existence of a pull factor (Deighton, 1996).IntelligenceThe internet renders itself as a cost effective means of conducting market research. The internet is an especially useful tool in gathering information about customer perceptions about the product/ service.Individualism (Fig 1.14) pg 30As illustrated in the diagram above, new media forms allow marketing communications to be tailored to the individual that the message is meant for, un give care in the case of traditional media wherein communication is crowd together media and the same message is disseminated to its audiences. (Lasswell 1984, Katz and Lazarsfeld 1955)Further, the inherent feature of personalisati on that new media forms offer to marketers is an important building block in managing relationships with customers.Integration (diagram A New Marketing icon for Electronic Commerce)The conventional marketing communication model witnesses a fundamental alteration in the presence of a hypermedia Computer-Mediated Environment (CME) like the internet (Hoffman and Novak 1996). The internet enables an increased scope for an integrated marketing communication.The CME communication model provides a platform for consumers to interact with each other, the medium and the company itself. The most drastic departure from the traditional media is the opportunity for the consumers to generate content onto the medium. Hence, in the CME model the primary relationship is with the receiver and the CME, and not between the mailer and the receiver, which is the case in traditional media.( Hoffman, 1996)The active social occasion of the consumers makes it imperative for marketers to integrate their com munication messages.Industry restructuring.Concepts such as disintermediation and reintermediation (Chaffey et al, 2003) are important considerations for companies that operate in a CME.Disintermediation refers to the process of eliminating conventional intermediaries such as agents and brokers, who previously linked the company to its customers.Reintermediation is the process of creating new age intermediaries between the company and its customer, given the presence of the internet. These new age intermediaries are often referred to as cybermediaries (Shankar et al, 1996) and include virtual(prenominal)(prenominal) communities like forums, fan clubs and user groups, search engines like Google and Bing , virtual resellers like Amazon and eBay.Independence of emplacementThe internet provides the possibility of an increased reach of a companys marketing communications to the global audience. This stinkpot often translate into reaching international markets and audiences.Social media networks AN unveilingSocial media networks, though a relatively new terrain for most companies and brand managers had its humble beginnings when Open Diary was founded in 1950s with the intent to create a community of diary writers. A few years later, Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis introduced Usenet, letting its users post articles to its groups. (Kaplan et al, 2010). Dating sites that enabled its users to create profiles and even update pictures and online forums, which were the more user amicable and sophisticated versions of BBSs (Bulletin Board Systems), are all building blocks of the social media networks as we know it today.With the passage of time and the technological developments that.SOCIAL MEDIA NETWORKS OPPOTUNTIES AND CHALLENGESSocial networking sitesSocial networking sites like face book, my space, twitter and orkut are platforms for Internet users to create individual profiles with personal information, make new friends and connect with old ones and even for business n etworking, in virtually cases.Users cease use certain applications which help them connect to each other through instant messaging and sending emails between each other, creating personalised profiles for themselves which can be admissioned by colleagues and friends etc. Such applications are known as Social networking sites. Personal profiles are highly specialised as they are suitable to the users needs. He/she can upload audio files, videos, blogs as well photos into the profile which can be shared to other friends. Facebook is considered to be the largest social networking site and it is provoke to note that it was originally founded by US based Mark Zuckerberg who wanted to stay in touch with his friends in Harvard Unviersity. Myspace is also another example of a social networking site which has over 250 million users worldwide.SNS are being used for market research with regard to netnography as well as creating brand communities by different companies. SNS have also been used especially well for promoting movies for example when film makers create a fan page of their movie which allows user to access information such as trailers, photos and download games for free. Similarly companies sponsoring football clubs have used SNS such as Myspace to allow fans to feel closer to the teams they support. Apart from marketing their products through SNS other companies go to the extent of using SNS as a distribution channel for their products for example 1-800- flowers a US based florist has allowed facebook users to send virtual flowers to whomsoever they desire or send the real ones by directing users to their company website.VIRTUAL WORLDSPlatforms which exhibit a 3 Dimensional environment through which personalised avatar forms of users can interact with each other similar to how they would in real life are known as virtual worlds. These virtual worlds could possibly be the best form of Social Media since they involve the maximum social presence of individu als rather than only some aspects of social life. There are two forms of Virtual Worlds.VIRTUAL GAME WORLDFirstly there are the virtual game worlds which involve users following strict rules through online role playing games (MMORPG). This has gained popularity and now even standard game consoles such as the Sony Playstation and the Microsoft X box allow multiplayer options to connect with users all over the world. A storied example of a widespread virtual gaming world is the World of Warcraft which has more than 8.5 million users as well as Sonys EverQuest. These games have become such an important part of lives for some people that they start replicating their online role playing character in real life. It is also possible to leverage the popularity of virtual games into traditional communication campaigns. A good example is when Toyota used figures from the World of Warcraft into one of its car advertisements.VIRTUAL SOCIAL WORLDSThe second form of virtual words is the virtual s ocial world which allows users to live a virtual life online. Similar to the virtual game worlds, virtual social worlds have users in the form of avatars all set in a 3D environment though there is one major difference which is the absence of strict rules to which users have to abide and develop by. This allows more room for freedom and self presentation and thus it has been slowly seen that users or residents of the realm bring several aspects of their real life into the online world. (Haenlein Kaplan, 2009 Kaplan Haenlein, 2009a, 2009b). A absolute example for virtual social worlds is the Second Life application which was created by Linden Research Inc. This virtual world allows day to day activities such as talking to other users, walking and even enjoying virtual sunshine. Attention to detail goes a step further due to the possibility of designing own garment and furniture as well as buying and selling goods for virtual money. These virtual social worlds allow a large range o f opportunities for marketers especially because they can get good market research virtually as well launch a product into the virtual market to see how it fairs.