Part 1
"Why Is Social Media Marketing Different? Please respond to the following:
- Go to the Daily Mail website, located here, or use other business related websites of your choice to search an article concerning a company's social media marketing campaign and its traditional media marketing. Next, determine the goal of the chosen company's social media campaign, and examine whether or not the company's social media campaign has the same effect as that of its traditional media marketing. Justify your response. Note: Include the source of your chosen article in your discussion post.
- Using the same company from the first part of the discussion, suggest the next step for this company in order to achieve the goal of its social media campaign. Provide a rationale for your suggestion.
Part 2
For this week's discussion, the company I chose is Panera bread from an article I discovered on "Sweet IQ by ." It definitely appears that Panera Bread takes their social media content as seriously as they do their in-store customer service and menu. Panera Bread's goal through their social media campaign is hands-down engagement with current and potential consumers. Posts can be re-posted, re-tweeted, sent and shared alike but after reading this particular article, it's clear that they want to be actively engaged with their customers. What I also enjoyed reading about their social media campaign is that the company's awareness of unhappy/upset consumers. An example that the article provided was a Facebook post by an unhappy consumer asking why their favorite salad (Steak and Blue Cheese) was discontinued. Through this social media outlet, consumers can bypass the company website to form, which requires name, phone number, store location, and simply connect to them via their social media page to make a complaint or request. There is an actual SOMEBODY that will respond and explain. In this case, the social media customer representative responded and explained that in this case, the salads are rotated out and it varies by the season. They also told the consumer that the company will keep him informed when it returns back to the store. With traditional media marketing (TV, radio, print) I believe the effects where it would be similar with social media would include imaging (think of general advertising, specials/, store locations), deals and discounts such as coupons (which can be either in print, radio and T.V. ads). This advertising is more external. The social media marketing takes a more internal and personal approach with active engagement.
The next step possibly would be social media marketing where staff and consumers can come together and engage in real-time or possibly have an "interactive" social/get together for specific store events such as grand openings, return of menu items, sales, give-aways, etc. And again, keeping customers engaged, especially those "loyalty" brand consumers would be the number one rationale for the effort.