Social Media in Business

We all know how social media works. We've been in enough lectures over the past couple of weeks to practically memorise its definition, and we've also been using it for long enough to have a rough idea of its limits and capabilities, if not be fully conversant in its usage. Yet, a topic which is fairly new and not often discussed (this is changing, though) is the effects social media has on an organisation, particularly a small one. This is something I can relate with, because I once spent a year working for a small company, dealing in software consultancy and computer systems integration services, among other things. 
Before we begin, let me try to define social media. To many people, social media refers to the ways in which people can interact online. They can take on many forms: magazines, Internet forums, weblogs,social blogs, microblogging, wikis, social networks, podcasts, photographs or pictures, video, rating and social bookmarking. In all its forms, social media has become a large part of our everyday lives, proving itself to be extremely versatile and useful. This idea has been extended recently to businesses, who have been quick to see some of its uses. Let me name a few:

1. Social Networking Site (SNS) Pages Rather than Websites. 

Ask any web developer, and he'll tell you that his services are in high demand. To begin with, there are many costs associated with setting up a web page. First, one has to purchase a domain name. This is already an expensive option. Many blogs like this one offer bloggers the opportunity to use their own domain name (e.g. ABC.com rather than ABC.blogspot.com) and offer much greater server space for a fee. Wordpress, for example, offers this service for $99 annually. In addition to the cost, one has to spend time building an entire website from scratch, as well as maintaining it. It is possible to learn how to do it (I'm able to do some basics of web maintenance, myself), but it takes a lot of effort. Hiring professionals to do the same thing is also cost-prohibitive. Why? This website explains why.
A lot of time, a lot of effort. One single mistake with HTML and CSS can bring the whole site down, and finding and correcting the error can take ages. This is where social networking sites like Facebook come in. 

Ramen Monster. A family-run eatery in Velocity specialising in Japanese noodle dishes. You can see the full page here

This is all it takes: Creating a Facebook page for the business. No need to know HTML, no need to spend huge amounts of money on web maintenance. Facebook has taken care to make this available and extremely user-friendly, so it's essentially creating a Facebook profile for your business. Facebook's easy photo-sharing and tagging options, coupled with its "Wall" function, also allow for far greater interactivity between customer and proprietor than with a conventional website. More importantly, it saves the cost of creating and maintaining a website, which can literally cost tens of thousands. 

2. Saving Costs in Advertising through SEO

SEO, short for Search Engine Optimisation. On Wikipedia, it is defined as "the process of affecting the visibility of a website or aweb page in a search engine's "natural" or un-paid ("organic") search results." Generally, the higher on a list of search results a site is, the higher its SEO ranking. 

A search for a steak restaurant.  

 That, again, is a whole new ball game. SEO works primarily through the number of times a website is mentioned. It is also extremely competitive in the way it is structured, as well as being somewhat tedious. Optimising a website may involve editing its content, HTML and associated coding to both increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines. Promoting a site to increase the number of backlinks, or inbound links is another SEO tactic. Yet, as seen here, the cost of doing SEO is significantly lesser than advertising. It's also kind of like getting your business via word-of-mouth, albeit in cyberspace. 

Can you think of any other ways in which social media can help a business? Let me know!

Social Media

I'm not one to beat around the bush. Seriously. There has been a lot of hype about what social media is, and what we can do with it, most of which is actually beneficial. There are some, however, who sit on the opposite extreme, claiming that social media is detrimental to society. Even better, they feel that social media is a kind of "Big Brother", an instrument through which the government keeps its eye on the general populace, always on the lookout for dissension and making life difficult for the minority that dares to make a stand. 
Yet, what exactly is social media? To understand this, perhaps this infographic would help:

http://netdna.copyblogger.com/images/history_of_social_media.jpg

As the infographic so boldly states, the Internet has always been social. This can be seen by the simple fact that the first e-mail was sent a mere two years after the invention of the Internet (1969). Online bulletin boards such as Usenet_ were basically forums of the time. I generally agree with this. The Internet was created for people to get in touch with one another as quickly as possible. It would therefore be safe to say that a large part of it is for social purposes. There are, however, several problems with social media:

1. The Cost to Real Social Life

The first thing that can happen to us is that we forget how to interact with real people in real life. This is a problem because of the difference in communicating in the low-context realm of cyberspace, with real life being high-context. What this means is that because there is no way to transmit non-verbal cues on cyberspace, such as tone or more complex facial expressions (for example, a lot of things can be implied simply by raising one's eyebrows), and misinterpretations can occur if we are not careful with our body language and tone. Similarly, it is also possible for us to misread another person, because we are no longer able to read body language, having spent so long online.

2. Addiction

With being unable to interact in real life, there is always the danger that we might retreat further into our shell and become even more reclusive. There is the temptation to try to conduct everything on social media platforms such as Facebook, and completely shut out the real world. This is known as addiction when someone in that state finds himself unable to function without being on social media, and begins to feel extremely uncomfortable when he is deprived of such platforms. 

At the end of the day, how do we solve these? I wouldn't presume to solve what psychologists and doctors have been trying to do worldwide; nonetheless, here are some things that helped me when I was trying to kick this habit:

• Remind yourself that there is more to life than being online. Very often, there is still this need for people to associate in real life with others. Relationships with people are often built online nowadays, that's true, but they are strengthened offline, where face-to-face contact is necessary. How else can honesty be determined anyway?
• Gradually limit the amount of time spent online. Keep records. Log in the time you start accessing social media platforms and the time you finish. You might actually be surprised at the amount of time spent online. From there, try to deduct an hour from that time. 

How did I go from social media to addiction? Gaaahh...