The article titled “The Challenges and Opportunities of Social Media” (Newton, 2014) states that social media is a critical concept to all businesses. The author discusses the different challenges and opportunities of using social media for businesses (as cited in Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). He claims that social media is crucial for improving sales and it is advisable to allow employees’ participation in the platform. However, businesses have to know ways in attracting their target market and engaging them through the right social media platform.
In this article, the author mentions that “social media is a concept that most organizations are realizing they have to embrace”. This is indeed true based on my personal experience. As a frequent user of social media, I usually browse through different platforms for new updates on products such as clothing, accessories and shoes. If I come across a product I like on Instagram, I would visit the online store and purchase it. Hence, social media serves as a good advertising platform for businesses as they can make use of it to increase the brand exposure and their web traffic. Moreover, there is a growing trend in the users of social media, according to the statistics provided by Statista; the number of social network users worldwide has climbed from 0.97 billion in 2010 to 1.79 billion in 2014. This suggests that businesses would be able to achieve higher market penetration through social media due to the rising number of users.
The author also point out another important point, which is choosing their active sites. This would be largely dependent on the business’s targeted market. For instance, if the target group is the youth, Instagram, Twitter and online blogs would be a better choice of platform as most users are from the younger age group. However, just being active is not enough to attract new customers; businesses have to engage customers by using humor and interesting posts. Being a consumer myself, I would be more attracted to sites which use humor to promote their products and also this would certainly leave a deep impression in me. This is supported by the article “2014 Statistics and Trends for Businesses on Social Media” whereby one of the five reasons why people follow brands on social media is for its entertaining content (Karr,2014).
In addition, the two other reasons to why people follow brands on social media are for its customer service and ability to offer feedback (Karr,2014). A customer would like to have product support after purchase from the seller as this would improve his or her buying experience and trust in the brand. Furthermore, before buying a product, most of the people would read the buyers’ reviews of the product and the feedback provided by the seller as these would have an influence on his or her purchase decision. In order to provide feedback more efficiently, the author suggested that an organization should set up a social media team to handle any matters regarding the platform and allow other employees in the organization to participate instead of blocking social media applications. This is a useful concept that businesses should adopt, as by proving prompt feedback to the consumers can improve customer satisfaction. Eventually it can translate into higher sales for the company.
In conclusion, social media is a useful tool for businesses as it can help to boost their sales level. Nonetheless, it is only useful if businesses choose the suitable platform where the targeted customers are present and they must also have the ability to retain them.
References
Number of social network users worldwide from 2010 to 2018 (in billions). (2015). Retrieved Feb 5, http://www.statista.com/statistics/278414/number-of-worldwide-social-network-users/
Puala Newton. (2014). The Challenges and Opportunities of Social Media. Retrieved Feb 9, http://www.intelligenthq.com/social-media-posts/the-challenges-and-opportunities-of-social-media/
Douglas Karr.(2014). 2014 Statistics and Trends for Businesses on Social Media. Retrieved Feb 8, https://www.marketingtechblog.com/2014-statistics-trends-businesses-social-media/
Andreas M. Kaplan & Michael Haenlein. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media. Retrieved Feb 9 http://michaelhaenlein.com/Publications/Kaplan,%20Andreas%20-%20Users%20of%20the%20world,%20unite.pdf
Andreas M. Kaplan & Michael Haenlein. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media. Retrieved Feb 9 http://michaelhaenlein.com/Publications/Kaplan,%20Andreas%20-%20Users%20of%20the%20world,%20unite.pdf
Hi Valerie!
ReplyDeleteCan see the improvements made in the 2nd draft in terms of presenting the reader response in a more academic way, and you have clearly differentiated your stand from the authors’ stands. Great follow-up on the explanations especially in the first paragraph. Overall, the content is good. Good job! :)
Some points to take note still.
Language
- Be careful of the tenses: The author also points out.
- Punctuation error: business’s (when the word ends with an s, just business’ will do.)
- Preposition: certainly leave a deep impression on me.
- “choosing their active sites” in paragraph 2, I think you may want to define who is the ‘their’ in this case.
- Paraphrasing:
> “For instance, if the target group is the youth, Instagram, Twitter and online blogs would be a better choice of platform as most users are from the younger age group.” (maybe you can consider rephrasing to “For instance, if the target group is youths, Instagram, Twitter and online blogs would be a better choice of platform as the users of these platforms are mostly from the younger age group.)
> “A customer would like to have product support after purchase from the seller as this would improve his or her buying experience and trust in the brand.” (this sentence is again confusing. If we have interpreted correctly, perhaps you can say a customer would prefer to have product support after purchasing from the seller, so as to improve …)
- Paragraph 3: “In order to provide feedback more efficiently, the author” (Have to reiterate who the author is since this is another author (Newton) & not the author (Karr) mentioned earlier in the same paragraph)
- targeted customers are present (further elaboration? Present where?)
Citation
Reference should be arranged in alphabetical order.
Review Team Members: Li Xin, Li Jun & Ryan
This is a richly detailed, interesting response, Valerie. You do a good job of reacting to the article with your own view of the value of commercial use of social media. You have also gotten useful feedback. Let me add to that by suggesting that you:
ReplyDelete1) revisit that in-text citation in the summary that quotes Kaplan & Haenlein. What that taken directly from their article? If it was, then you don't need "cited in."
2) look at all your various uses of "would." Why do you need these? Check out the explanation of the use of this word at Purdue's online writing lab (or elsewhere not the net). In fact, your paper doesn't ever need it.
3) Check out your end-of-text citations and the authors' names.
4) There are some recurring subject-verb disagreements.
5) the two other reasons to why > the two other reasons why
I look forward to the next draft.