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Social media has become the most popular digital tool in today’s world. However, there are multiple pros and cons of social media marketing. In this age of technology, we find social media at the fingertips of all age groups. From children to adults, everyone is well informed about what social media is and most probably how to use them.
Generally, people use social media for getting connected with their family, friends or sometimes strangers. People even express their opinions by posting different posts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Linkedin, etc. It is equally used by businesses and entrepreneurs to promote their products and services, reach out to their targeted customers, interact with them and increase their sales. This technique is known as social media marketing.
So, we cannot deny that social media marketing is one of the most interactive and efficient techniques for business development. But it doesn’t mean that social media marketing is totally beneficial and doesn’t have any flaws. From draining of time to security breaches, it has numerous disadvantages as well. Let’s discuss some advantages and disadvantages of social media marketing.
Large audience
Unlike traditional marketing, social media marketing helps you to reach out to a large audience. While promoting your brand through traditional marketing, you will be able to reach to very limited audiences.
Due to the availability of smartphones and easily accessible internet, the number of people using social media has also increased. The rise in the number of social media users means the rise in the number of audiences. Every time you post and promote your brand on social media, it has a high chance of getting connected with a large number of audiences.
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Cost-effective
Have you ever promoted your brand through any traditional method? If yes, you must have spent an attractive amount every time you promote. But in the case of social media marketing, you can promote your brand with very low cost or without cost as well.
You do not have to pay for creating an account for your brand or business. Moreover, you can post about your brand and products/services on different sales-related public groups for free. And the ones who are interested can contact you directly through messages or comments. Even if you choose paid promotions, it would not cost much. Just by spending a little amount on social media advertisements, you can gain a huge audience and customers.
Easy to interact with customers
Social media marketing makes it easy for you and your customers to interact with each other. A large audience can directly contact you at a time and you can respond to them by messaging them personally. Customers love receiving personal responses to their queries rather than automated messages. It makes them feel that you care for them and helps to build a better relationship.
Easy to check post insights and evaluate performance
When you promote your brand or product through social media, you have easy access to check post insights. Yes, you can check the total engagement of audiences in your post. Likewise, you can see how many people liked your post, how many audiences tried to reach you through messages or comments. All these insights are helpful for you to generate ideas for more effective promotion and customer satisfaction.
Drives more traffic to your website
If you have a business website, you can insert the link of your website on the posts. Whenever one sees your post and gets interested in your product/service, s/he will click on the link and get landed on your website. The more audiences your post reaches, the more traffic your website will have.
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The page that you create for your business is always open to the public. Whatever you post on it is visible to the public. Not only the posts but the reviews and feedback that anyone writes on your page are also visible to the audiences. If anyone is dissatisfied with your product/service, s/he can directly post negative feedback or reviews on your business page. The worst part is that you cannot even edit or delete those negative reviews even if they are not true.
Damages brand reputation
It takes only a few seconds or minutes to get viral on social media. So you need to be very careful while posting anything related to your brand, product or service. It’s better if you recheck the content multiple times before you post. Even a small mistake can damage the reputation of your business and brand.
Likewise, negative feedback or reviews by your audiences on social media pages are not limited to the page only but directly harms your business. Most people check out customer feedback on social media pages before they make any purchase from the company. Single negative feedback can divert audiences from your page.
Time-consuming
Though social media is a great place to make sales and gain a reputation easily, the most disappointing fact about it is that every social media campaign consumes more time. You need to manage time for everything; posting content, handling customers, solving different issues, etc. If you are unable to manage time for all these, social media marketing is completely a waste of time and a loss of money.
Security breaches
Anything in a digital platform has a common risk of security breaches. In case your business accounts in social media are not highly secure, you may be the victim of online hackers. Security breakdown of your account may lead to change in username and password, loss of monetary value, loss and misuse of data, exposure or sale of your business information etc.
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