| Is Social Media Marketing relevant for the Nigerian Business Environment? |
 |
 |
View Comments
| Conversion Report |
| Written by Oluwaseun Pelemo |
| Saturday, 13 September 2008 13:23 |
 With the increasing use of the world wide web in the Nigeria, social media has also seen a big boost in audience from Nigerian sources. Social Media is the use of electronic and internet tools for the purpose of sharing and discussing information and experiences with other people. Social media takes different forms including forums, blogs, wikis, podcasts, pictures, videos and e-magazines. Social media encompasses all the services that define the much touted 'web 2.0'. The idea behind it is to get the audience involved in the process of browsing the world wide web. The internet for a long time was known to be a source of information and a tool to pass information across which made it work like a library. In recent years, the internet has evolved to become more of a community where information can be researched, shared and contributed to. This does not strip the internet of its library-like model but adds user interaction and collaboration to it. That is what 'web 2.0' or social media is all about. It is not news that Nigerians are making use of web 2.0 services available on the internet. Nigerians blog, are active on social networks, write articles on wikis, participate in discussion forums and comment on various forms of media that the internet has provided. However, Nigerian establishments to a large extent have not maximized these new available channels to engage their present and prospective customers. Being socially active on the internet is much more than a corporate internet presence i.e. a website. Every establishment should make an extra effort to ensure they are available to their customers through every possible channel in order to empower their brand and have a personal relationship with their customers. The interesting thing about social media marketing is the fact that most of it is free and can be done with little or no budget at all. Services like Digg, Technorati, BlogPulse and Google Blogs crawl the internet daily looking for relevant information to serve other people who need the information. An establishment having a blog that frequently gives updates relating to the products or services that define them can give customers a personal attachment to that product or service. Blogs give people the opportunity to write about various things and also give readers the opportunity to drop comments and discuss the posted article. It is a good method for corporate individuals to get feedback about a particular product or service which they offer. It is also a good method of viral marketing on the internet as search engines pick up content from such blogs and serve them in search engine results. It has been said that social media marketing not only helps to manage customer relationships but also helps to attract valuable employees and investors to the business involved. Also, some social networks give businesses the ability to create their own business, service or product page. This empowers brands or businesses to provide a sense of omnipresence to their customers; going out to meet them at every possible location on the internet where they have created a personal presence. Social Media Marketing also helps to maintain online reputation. On the internet, the images of a lot of Nigerian companies are already being destroyed. Various threads on Nigerian forums such as Nairaland talk about Nigerian companies and the way they do business. There is no doubt that a lot of companies have lost valuable customers as a result of reviews and opinions on the internet. While a lot of these reviews and opinions may not necessarily be correct, the absence of the company involved on that social network results in damage to their corporate reputation and loss of prospective customers. For now, we can say that the effect of online reputation is not significant because the internet is not as readily available in Nigeria as it is in more developed countries where consumers base their purchase decisions on reviews and opinions of other consumers on the 'social' web. However, the exponential growth of internet use in Nigeria will trigger such consumer behavior sooner than we expect. A company that is not managing its online reputation will discover in future that they are losing a large number of customers due to bad reputation they are presently accumulating on the internet while it is not considered significant. Social Media Marketing puts companies on the forefront of information being communicated about them on various social networks. It also gives companies the ability to address certain loopholes in their business structure and processes that may have caused customers to be dissatisfied with their products or services. The earlier companies begin to make use of this channel, the more prepared they are for the next generation of consumers in Nigeria. |
My InC Account
Opinion Poll
Last InC Poll Results
In last week's poll, our poll takers were equally split between taking a vacation in Dubai, UAE and Paris, France.
Weekly Reflections
You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great. Zig Ziglar
