Changing technology has had a significant impact on marketing in the last few years, in terms of its capabilities, but also in the way that people use it.  For example, according to the B2B Content Marketing: 2012 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends study, marketers? use of social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and LinkedIn grew by up to 20 % between 2010 and 2011.  These changes have, and still are, giving marketers huge opportunities and also challenges, in the way it is used for maximum effectiveness.

Social media is a platform we use often for our clients to deliver ongoing marketing programmes, and this is a phenomenon which has been borne as a direct result of the changing face of technology.  Whilst the majority of people use varying forms of social media in their everyday lives, how many of us use it effectively for business across the marketing plan.

With all the social media currently available, you could spend your entire day on it – time spent not running your business!  That?s why it?s so important to develop a strategy that integrates all the activity relevant to your business.

Think of it in terms of Business Goals:

If you approach the use of social media as a marketing tool as you would the rest of your marketing planning, it becomes clearer to see why and how you should be using it (and which forms you shouldn?t be using, they are not all relevant to every business).

In my next blog we?ll look at some of the social media tools and how you integrate them to make them work easily and effectively for you.