Social networking sites play an  ntegral part of individuals day to day life. Signing up to social networking sites is free therefore businesses and individuals can benefit from free advertising in a bid increase their brand awareness and consumer engagement.Lambert (2014) identifies years ago the idea of paid social media would seem pointless due the possibility of one viral campaign attracting thousands of followers/hits. However, know paid social media appears to be the only way to attract members due to the significant content within social networks. Vizu (2013) identifies advertisers have raised their budget towards paid social media  shifting this way from online advertising  due to effectiveness in increasing audiences,

Advantages of  Social Media Paid

Specification and customization–Kvaavik, O’brien, Nguyen (2014) highlight CastroMoto motorcycle enthusiast group aimed to build an online community within  North America. Castro received favourable results however only 20% of audience engagement with were living in North America. As a consequence, they decided to incorporate paid social which lead to new fans reached more than quadrupling. (see here for full report).

Promoted Posts– Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter all offer advanced posts that operate by business paying a higher fee to have their posts appear more frequently. At the top of individuals news feed providing companies with a better chance to engage with the greater audience. Each social networking sites provided different means of promotion

• Facebook- Audience & Budget Selection
• Twitter- Audience, Gender, Interest. Businesses changed corresponding to consumer engagement.
• LinkedIn- Company Size, job function, job title, etc.

Return on Investment-Paid social can add further development to growth especially successful initiatives are being implemented.

Disadvantages of Social Media Paid

Inconsistency of Services–Null (2013)  carried out an experiment between five services Google Adwords, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn discovering contrasting results between services highlight difference in generating product/brand exposure.

• Google Adwords: produced  13,970 impression and 65 click through for $80.74. ($1.24 per click)
• Facebook: 253,207 impressions and 25 click for $37.70.( $7.30per click)

These two examples reveal a contrasting generation of exposure and follow through with two different price sets for each service and as a result Google Adwords was the most efficient service in generating social activity. This is recognised through the price per click, as Google led to a higher level of engagement from consumer.

Conclusion

Paid social media offer individuals opportunity to add  greater detail  and  focus towards targeting audiences that lead to direct exposure of brand increasing individuals awareness. However, people should be aware of the variety of services that may use due to differences in functionality of services e.g. seeking increase exposure of company is likely to generate greater activity within LinkedIn in comparison to Twitter.

References

Black, L (2013) 3 Ways Paid Social Ads Can Make Your Content Explode.  [Online] https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/openforum/articles/3-ways-paid-social-ads-can-make-your-content-explode/ [Accessed 5th J Match 2015]

Lambert, J (2014) 3 Things Content Marketers Need to Know About Paid Social. [Online] http://contently.com/strategist/2014/08/07/3-things-content-marketers-need-to-know-about-paid-social/. [Accessed 6th May 2015]

Kiss, J (2014). Facebook’s 10th birthday: from College dorm to 1.23 billion users. [Online] http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/feb/04/facebook-10-years-mark-zuckerberg. Accessed 4th March 2015]

Kvaavik, O’brien, Nguyen (2014) Everything you need to know about Paid Social. Sprinklr.chrome-https://facebookmarketingpartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Whitepaper_Everything-You-Need-to-Know-About-Paid-Social.pdf

Null, C. (2013)  Do social media ads really work? We put them to the test! [Online] http://www.techhive.com/article/2030740/do-social-media-ads-really-work-we-put-them-to-the-test-.html. [Accessed 18 March 2015]

Vizu (2013) Paid Social Media Advertising [Online] http://www.nielsen.com/content/dam/corporate/us/en/reports-downloads/2013%20Reports/Nielsen-Paid-Social-Media-Adv-Report-2013.pdf [Accessed 22nd March 2015]