By Gaurav Pradhan
Social Media Advertising got its importance with increasing number of users in Social Media space. There are over 1.4 billion active internet users who have their presence on Social Media Platforms across the world. This audience is targeted by modern day marketers. Social Media platforms can give high scale of reach at relatively low cost compared to traditional advertising methods and Medias.
Which Social Networks to be advertised on ?
Answer to this question entirely depends on the type of business and offerings. This can define your target demographic segment. You can very communicate with the audience about your product/service, intricacies, benefits, and getting feedback.
Facebook opened towards advertising in 2012, with the introduction of Promoted Posts. Businesses pay to appear in the news feeds. Facebook went further, launching video ads, sponsored videos which get played automatically in news feeds, in December 2013. But the roll out is limited and controlled with specific count of users.
Twitter had avoided advertising for a long time since inception. This micro-blogging and social media networking platform felt that advertising is not in the best interests of the company. But they launched Promoted tweets, Promoted accounts and Trends in 2010. Twitter went on to adopting ‘tailored audiences’, which enhanced their advertising with better target ads for the users. This product uses the internet browsing data history of a user, showing ads which directly relate to the sites recently visited.
Foursquare’s growth has been slow compared to other growing social networks. But it tried some updates to improve its advertising strategy. During October 2013, Foursquare launched a self-service advertising program which allowed business to advertise stating their needs and budget as the inputs.
Instagram allows advertisers to buy space for their pictures and videos to be shown in newsfeeds. But it also allows the users to hide the ads if they don’t like it. Instagram has also indicated to the users that the features ad would be more creative and engaging.
Pinterest displays ads in the form of Promoted Pins, which started in September 2013. These ads appear in related searches and category news feeds. Promoted Pins are also accompanied by a button which allows learning more information about the promoter.
Social media advertising is being adopted by many big companies along with start-ups, which allows both types of companies to play on this level-playing field. But thing to watch out for – Will this be accepted by the users or will it be going below the radar ?
(Author is a Management student of IIM Bangalore having an experience in Manufacturing Industry, Follow On Twitter @GauravToYou)
Also Read
Shopping goes a Level Up: Purchase on Social Media – Social Media Trend – https://www.socialmediatrend.in/marketing/shopping-goes-a-level-up-purchase-on-social-media/
What is Social Media Marketing – Social Media Trend – https://www.socialmediatrend.in/marketing/what-is-social-media-marketing/
Don’t Waste Money – Make Your Social Media Advertising Smarter, More Original, More Creative – Forbes – http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviatemin/2013/12/03/dont-waste-money-make-your-social-media-advertising-smarter-more-original-more-effective/
Advertisers Use Social Media to Promote Brands in Real Time – The Wall Street Journal – http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303801304579407284034257414
