Online Social Media and its Impact on Business

In this age of online social media, it has become imperative to be active on social networking sites and be the first mover in online advertising and promotion. The statistics show that there are over 100 million people on twitter and 750 million active users on facebook. Anything that is posted on these sites goes viral in a matter of minutes. Everyone gets to know about any thing, trivial or sensational that is happening in any corner of the world. Most organizations have learnt the power of this medium and are leaving no stone unturned in capitalizing it. Unlike the print media or electronic media, where the companies have to invest in advertising, online media comes for free. Anyone can post anything from anywhere and moreover the online promotion gets propagated among the global populace all by itself. Customer loyalty in the age of online social media is a big issue as the customer is well informed and he also makes sure that his neighbour/ online “friend” is well informed too. If a customer perceives that a product is good, he propagates the information in positive light and he does the same in negative light if he perceives that the product is bad. Online information flow is similar to a town hall gossip, only difference is that the reach has grown to exponential proportions. 

The paradox of online media is that, while you launch a blitzkrieg of promotions, any slip or any negative image has an equal potential to be propagated as widely as possible. A couple of days back, Anand Mahindra, Vice Chairman and Managing Director, Mahindra Group tweeted a video link on twitter which showed a Mahindra Scorpio pulling out a car stuck in mud somewhere in South America. The same video link had prompted few other links which showed Scorpio either getting overturned or getting involved in some accidents. This was just a small example of the paradox online media poses. Most seasoned users of social networking sites understand this paradox and are careful in the way they project themselves on these sites. Once Shah Rukh Khan stated that he doesn’t work for himself but works for the brand SRK. Similarly, the users who are cautious work for the brand they are projecting as themselves.

So maintaining an online profile is an art which needs to be mastered. Again taking the example of Anand Mahindra who has over 350,000 followers on twitter, he not only tweets regularly about Mahindra products but also voices his concern for social causes. Also, he tweets about contributions from his employees and in a way motivates them. So he is connected to people not only outside his organization but also from within on twitter. This is a novel way of bonding with the people who work for you and can be emulated across the industries.

If you follow Barack Obama on twitter, you may realise that tweets are drafted with utmost care as in case of press releases from the President’s office. Indian politicians have lot to learn before they could capitalize on the social media to connect with the people. The minimum effort they can put is to avoid creating controversies with their tweets and that doesn’t mean closing the account and stop tweeting altogether.

Film makers like Aamir Khan and Shah Rukh Khan use the social networking sites to interact with their fans and launch promotional events for their films. The online marketing which starts well before the release of a film ensures that enough hype is generated that the movie recovers its cost in the opening week itself. In case of soon to be released movie Ra.One, the producers have been releasing teasers, videos and posters in a phased manner over last six months and subsequently have been successful in creating the hype around the movie. They have also launched online merchandise for kids and hope to capitalize on the hype generated so far.

 
The online social media is a powerful tool if one understands and masters the art of using it. But at the same time it has the potential of an invisible weapon which is capable of brewing a revolution and bringing down governments.