IS SOCIAL MEDIA HERE TO STAY?
Some 15 years ago, the internet used to be a very, lets say, ‘less-happening’ place. Sure there was the whole thing about the world becoming more connected than ever, thanks to the influx of instant messaging and email.
But what the world didn’t know at that time was that they had no seen anything yet. The full potential of the internet was still waiting to be explored. The sharing and exchanging of ideas, though possible, was still in the ‘baby-steps’ phase.
Then came social media and the world (both the online and the real one) was never the same again. The information revolution that everybody had been boasting of being in the horizon, had finally arrived.
Social media – What is it?
In the good old days, we had TV, newspapers, magazine; all these media as static and uninvolved as they come. People had to make do with what the corporate advertisers were doing and that was it. There was… an element missing. Something that made it easier for the consumer to dictate what type of content they wanted, what products or services they wanted. They wanted a platform where they were king.
Sure they have been messaging boards in the internet way back then. But their niche-ness was holding them back.
And then came social media networks. And suddenly the people realized that they held the key. Suddenly advertising, communication, the whole order of doing business underwent a tectonic shift. If consumers had a bad experience with a brand, they could now have the means to take their grievances public. No longer were consumers going to sit back and let the corporate firms dictate their terms to them.
As a result, companies have had to invest in reputation management and social media marketing. The art of converting potential prospects into sales leads acquired a whole new dimension. It was no more business as usual for big and small firms alike. The customer now had to always come first. Product managers now had the means to gauge the public reaction for proposed changes before shipping off to manufacturing stage. The likelihood of shipping a unpopular product has now become abysmal at best, thanks to the always-connected nature of social media.
Social Media is not just about the commercial aspect though
Now people could share photos, videos and their daily going-on’s to thousands, even millions of people. The daily minutiae of your lives could now be beamed to so many people. This aspect of social media was exciting (and risky). No longer did far off relatives have trouble keeping up with each other. No longer did intellectuals have trouble with debating their ideas with instantaneous feedback. No longer did content producers have to wait and see how well their content was turning out with the audiences.
Writers, artists, celebrities, finally they could share their thoughts and creations with the world at a moment’s notice.
Social media has, for better or worse, lead to a democratization of the internet. It has become a catalyst for change. It can mobilize political movements and dissipate important information to millions of people.
And its here to stay.
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