Without any doubt, social media impact both businesses and consumers. Practically all possible industries have changed their strategies and ways of connecting with the audience.
Their potential clients are altering their buying behavior and decisions as well. The leap of internet technologies, and social networking, in particular, has influenced the relationship between businesses and buyers a lot.
In fact, social networks have become such a powerful instrument to wield, that a whole new industry appeared where you have the opportunity to purchase 100 youtube views or to buy 30 Instagram likes, e.g. socialsgrow.com. It is proof that the potential of socials is huge.
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Product Awareness
With the help of socials, consumers have an opportunity to discover new solutions to their needs. Browsing through brand pages, people are able to choose the most suitable product or service.
They can also try something new.
A wide choice of options can leave consumers in doubt, so the main task of every business is to give them an open and full description of the product’s benefits.
Social media at this point are helping to prove what your product is worth. One of the most important features of social networking sales is based on the fact that they sell not just a product, but the idea, lifestyle.
Thus your brand page is a dynamic illustration of your production, an exhibit that provokes the wish to have a similar lifestyle.
Social Approval. Influencers
Along with personal preferences, users often rely on the opinion of other people.
Social media here is a free space, where it is hard to censor user-generated content (or feedback, in other words) and impossible to impact the thoughts of your clients.
Online users can find proof that this particular product is just what they need or that they shouldn’t choose it.
And the huge instrument informing the social approval of your product is influencer marketing.
This is a relatively new strategy to wield. It is based on that you build up the image of your product with the help of the people who are popular online, also known as influencers.
The name speaks for itself. About half of users will look out for their favorite blogger’s buying decisions. Before applying the influencer marketing strategy, you need to do research:
- Look through the profile of chosen influencers and make sure he or she has an active and engaged audience.
- Check out other collaborations of a certain blogger, if possible. Sometimes their manner of promoting can be not complementary to your product.
- See how the audience is engaging with this influencer. For better results, you need someone who really puts effort into communication and getting a genuine reaction from users.
Social Approval. Reviews
Another aspect, similar to the previous one, is actual feedback from the client. On social media, it is easier for users to share their thoughts about the product, and for brands it is simpler to gross the reviews.
Along with social celebrities, people are checking out the experience of their family and friends. This has enormously effective results.
Thus, for any brand, it will be important to encourage their clients to share their thoughts about the product. For example, on Instagram, it is fine to ask users to post stories with their opinion about your production.
Then you can repost it and save it to your Highlights, so new potential buyers can check out the real feedback and make their decision.
Exclusiveness
One of the key aspects of the success of social media is the possibility to enter different communities without standing up from a chair.
Humans are highly social, which is why using different platforms is just an easier way to unite in certain groups. For brands and businesses, this feature is also a great marketing instrument.
The ultimate hit is to create an exclusive community on your social profiles. It can feature different things:
- Special offers and discounts
- Giveaways or lotteries
- Exclusive insights and behind-the-scenes, etc.
All these activities are targeted to influence the behavior of the buyers. Online browsing is great leverage that pulls the purchasing process fast forward.
People make decisions quickly as they see an instant deal that looks good to them.
Online Advertising
On the majority of social platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, or Pinterest, Ads are built-in quite smoothly, thus the advertising loses its irritating obtrusiveness.
For example, on Insta, promoted posts are not different from usual posts in the feed, except the notice that it is a promotion. They can include videos, or carousel photos in standard formats, that are not distinctive.
Thus the information about the product comes in a rather pleasant and subtle way.
The post material itself may be too aggressive or bright, but this appears to be the problem of your content solutions rather than the advertising system of the platform.
Another good example of promotion integration would be Pinterest. This network looks like a big search engine for illustrations and photographs. Many users are browsing it looking for ideas for their homes, fashion, etc.
So, generally speaking, Pinterest posts sell the idea, the product in a certain context, that is meaningful to the consumer.
The specific of promoted posts on this platform is that visually they are not different from usual posts at all, they only contain the direct link to the product on your site and a more concrete description.
Research And Advertising Accuracy
The great profit from social media businesses achieves in the form of statistics and demographics. For consumers, socials are the way to speak directly to companies and highlight their real interests and needs.
By collecting and reworking the data about users’ activity and preferences online, brands are able to produce better products and provide a more effective and accurate marketing strategy.
The development of social platforms has made the process of purchasing not only shorter, but clearer as well.
Targeted ads, that the algorithm is showing to you in the feed, is chosen by it after analyzing your behavior online.
Conclusion
Social media have an impact on the many spheres of human life, and of course, the relationship between sellers and buyers is one of the most influenced.
