Whether you are an SME, large corporate brand, blogger or an everyday user of the internet trying to get digitally noticed, social media provides a variety of various platforms that can aid enhancing your digital presence. This blog will give a brief introduction to a selection of social media platforms accompanied with a suggested method to enhance your digital presence within them.
Twitter:
With over 500 million tweets per day, twitter is undoubtedly one of the most popular forms of micro blogging (Java et al., 2007 cited in Dunlap & Lowenthal; Striker, 2014). Whilst members can only use 140 characters per tweet, this social media platform can provide the user with a significant amount of digital presence.
A tweet’s content can range from pictures to links to websites; this therefore allows a user to include any content along with 140 characters to ‘sell’ themselves or their brand.
Method to increase presence:
Include a Hash-tag!
The concept of using a hash-tag to group relevant tweets together was first trialled by twitter in 2007 (The Independent, 2013). Through including a hash-tag in a tweet, users can directly advertise their message to the other users of twitter whom search or click on the related hash-tag (Redsicker, 2013). A user’s brand message, blog or picture can be viewed by the world through the searching of a desired hash-tag.
The concept of grouping related hash-tags can be viewed below. For example, a fashion blogger could advertise their blog to the world through including a link and a hash-tag in their tweet.
Have a look at my blog on “The Power of the Hash-tag” for more information on its capabilities.
Facebook:
With 1.4 billion active members, Facebook clearly provides its users with an opportunity to enhance their digital presence. Facebook allows its users to create a digital profile of themselves or their brand, post statuses, and upload digital content and pictures. Therefore it would be in the user’s best interest to portray themselves in the best light possible!
The range of content that can be uploaded is endless, users can upload pictures, videos, links to websites, links to blogs and this is just to name a few.
Method to increase presence:
Make content appealing and shareable
Demers (2014) highlights that making content shareable is essential if a user wants to enhance their digital presence within Facebook. If a user or brand uploads certain content that is in some form compelling, users will be more inclined to share it. Facebook makes life easier for its users; the content uploaded onto a users profile is made shareable through the click of a single button. Through continuous sharing of the content, the users digital presence is increased as their brand message, picture or infographic is viewed by more and more of the public.
Instagram:
Instagram allows its users to upload and share photos and short videos. There are over 300 million active users on Instagram (Smith, 2014) so it is vital that you stand out from the crowd. Pictures can be uploaded, accompanied with a hash-tag, this allows related images to be collected into an almost ‘virtual gallery’.
Titled “the king of social engagement” by Elliot (2014), studies have proved that Instagram has 58 more times engagement per follower than Facebook and 120 times more per follower than twitter (Elliot, 2014).
Click image to enlarge.
Source: Elliot, 2014
Instagram would therefore be a perfect platform for fashion bloggers or brands that want to showcase their products.
To read more on Elliot’s (2014) Blog “Instagram is the king of social engagement” click here
Method to increase presence:
Upload, upload and upload!
Instagram revolves around users/brands visual appearance; therefore the most straightforward method for a user to enhance their digital presence would be to upload as many engaging images as possible. Istvanova (2014) highlights that as Instagram is free to use, it is essentially ‘free advertising’ so users should take advantage of this factor.
For a blogger or an everyday internet user trying to enhance their digital presence, social media can be utilized as an effective tool to achieve this. However, corporate brands and SME’s must be aware that they cannot prevent users posting negative opinions about their brand (Cheung, Lee, & Thadani 2009). Solely focusing on sales without considering consumer engagement, and not responding to negative feedback could in fact cause your digital presence to be damaged (Hennig- Thurau et al. 2004).
References:
- Cheung, C. M. K., M. K. O. Lee, & D. R. Thadani. (2009). “The impact of positive electronic word-of- mouth on consumer online purchasing decision”. Visioning and Engineering the Knowledge Society. A Web Science Perspective, ed. M. D. Lytras et al. Lecture Notes in Computer Science 5736: pp501–510.
- DeMers, J. (2014). What Makes Content Shareable & Why It Matters for SEO. [online] Available at: http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/how-to/2358558/what-makes-content-shareable-why-it-matters-for-seo [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015].
- Dunlap, J. C. & Lowenthal, P. R. (2009). Tweeting the night away: Using Twitter to enhance social presence. JournalofInformationSystemsEducation,20(2).
- Elliot, N. (2014). Instagram Is The King Of Social Engagement. [online] Available at: http://blogs.forrester.com/nate_elliott/14-04-29-instagram_is_the_king_of_social_engagement [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015].
- Hennig-thurau, T., K. P. Gwinner, G. Walsh, and D. D. Gremler. (2004). “Electronic word-of-mouth via consumer-opinion platforms: what motivates consumers to articulate themselves on the Internet?” Journal of Interactive Marketing 18 (1) pp38–52.
- Istvanova, L. (2014). 6 Business Benefits Of Using Instagram. [online] Available at: http://www.koozai.com/blog/social-media/6-key-benefits-using-instagram-business/ [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015].
- Java, A., Song, X., Finin, T., and Tseng, B. (2007) “Why we Twitter: Understanding Microblogging Usage and Communities.” Available at: <http://ebiquity.umbc.edu/get/a/publication/369.pdf> [Accessed 28th Apr 2015]
- Redsicker, P. (2013) ‘6 Marketing Trends To Watch In 2013: New Research’, Social media examiner. [Online] < http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/marketing-trends-2013/> [accessed 15th February 2015]
- Smith, C. (2014). 130+ Amazing Instagram Statistics (April 2015). [online] Available at: http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/important-instagram-stats/ [Accessed 28 Apr. 2015].
- Striker, Gabriel. (2014) ‘The 2014 #Yearontwitter | Twitter Blogs’, twitter.com. [Online] <https://blog.twitter.com/2014/the-2014-yearontwitter> [accessed 15th February 2015]
- The Independent (2013) ‘How Did The Hashtag Become The Most Popular Button On The Keyboard?’ [Online] <http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/how-did-the-hashtag-become-the-most-popular-button-on-the-keyboard-8659606.html> [accessed 12th February 2015]