Combining Social Media With Traditional Media

As important as social media is to the success of your business, using it, even to its fullest potential, should never be at the expense of traditional media. They must work together to allow your business to flourish properly.

If you are a business person who understands the importance of integrating the two types of media to get maximum results, you are doing all of the correct things for your business. On the other hand, if you are not so sure of that importance, you might ask how you can integrate all of the social media with your traditional marketing and public relations strategy.

The fact is that social media has become an extremely important part of how businesses market their brand and their products. Technology offers so much at this point that marketers are no longer satisfied with only understanding how to use Facebook and Twitter. They now want to understand how to integrate social media with traditional media into their advertising, public relations and direct marketing campaigns. Of course, traditional media carries with it a great deal of credibility and although it may not create the same kind of buzz that social media creates, it is a very important contributor to the success of business. There are subtle ways in which social media and traditional media meet without your having put them together consciously. For example, anytime you have your business’s logo on an online advertisement for your business, you are seeing that coupling.

In order to succeed with this approach, your mind needs to wrap itself around coming up with ways of thinking about integrating social media, traditional media, and digital media. It is more about the framework than it is about the process. If someone builds you the framework for using social and traditional media for the full advantage of your business, you can apply that over and over again. Once you have the established structure, you will be able to do it on your own as many times as you need to.

• Truth: It is a known fact that consumers trust the opinions and recommendations of other consumers much more than they trust the business owners. That is the main reason why social media produces such successful results for businesses. People speak to each other. The trust that consumers have for business owners takes time but it will happen eventually.
   
• Yin and yang: If you were to imagine any symbol when it comes to the integration of social and traditional media, the symbol that expresses the relationship most clearly is yin and yang. The two parts (or types of media in this case) can exist separately. However, in order to truly work as a complete concept, the need to work together. Together, they complete the picture.
   
• Mutual benefit: When you use social and traditional media together, they feed off of each other and are mutually beneficial. Together, they create a much stronger and much more effective and successful marketing campaign. They complement each other so well and each makes up for whatever is lacking. They complete each other.

There are several points that you need to ponder before you, as a business owner, build your social and traditional integration framework and start to work with the two forms of media. The questions are:

• Your goals: What is your business goal and what is your communications goal?
   
• Who is your target market? Before you start, you need to be very sure who your target market is. It is recommended that you don’t only concentrate on demographics. If possible, try to identify with your target market on a more personal level. Try to find out what they look like, how they sound, who their friends are and why they are interested in your product.
   
• Where is your target market? This does not just mean where they are physically. It also refers to what point they are at in their lives. If you can come up with that answer, you will have the ability to connect with your audience on a much more personal and meaningful level.
   
• Connecting with your target market: You need to figure out how to touch them in a way that makes them want to stay connected to you.
   
• Interacting with your target market: Once you have established contact, you need to figure out how to make them stay connected to you. The more you interact with them, the stronger your relationship will become.
   
• Getting your target market to share you with their friends: Once you have established a strong relationship with the members of your target market, they will start to trust you. Once they trust you, they will want to share you and your offerings with people whom they care about. You will see that the success will really start to boom after this has happened.

Conclusion

When you integrate social and traditional media, you are giving a great deal more strength to your campaign than if you had a single-layer marketing campaign. Integrating adds another dimension and you will see that the success of your business critically depends on that integration.

We are pleased to provide you with the insightful comments contained herein. Please contact us at CompuKol Communications for further discussion on how we might be able to assist you and your team and don’t forget to “like” our Facebook page.