Just reading Socialnomics (by Erik Qualman, 2013) and about halfway through, there are some very interesting facts trends coming through I wanted to discuss in the context of Kavia Moulded Products and how we use social media channels. What is Socialnomics; it is where consumers and the societies they create online have a profound influence on our economy and the businesses that operate within it. Social media is the new word of mouth. Now that individuals look online to find out information about products from their peers, marketing has taken a new turn. Companies must create a social networking presence in order to survive. Interesting facts
- Google has crawled less than 1% of the data on the internet
- Google founded in September 1998
- LinkedIn founded in December 2002, >175 million users
- Facebook founded February 2004, > 1 billion users
- YouTube launched in April 2005, 800 million users a month
- 60 million status updates per day on Facebook, data retrieved April 2010
- Average number of Facebook friends is 130 Trends
- Google is no longer a primary search engine, Facebook and YouTube are now more popular
- Spending time on social media makes you more productive and information from our peers is more trusted source than general advertising
- We no longer look for the news, products or services, they finds us
- Consumers turn to social media channels for information, brand endorsements, complaints and peer recommendation rather than the company website
- Social media messaging is the new inbox and email is antiquated and passé
The social media channels for Kavia Moulded Products are;
https://www.facebook.com/kaviamouldedproducts
https://twitter.com/kaviamp https://www.linkedin.com/company/kavia-moulded-products
http://kavia.wpengine.com/plastic-injection-moulding-news/
So lets go through the trend points and how we are reacting; Search engines such as Google took over from trade directories but have lost their top spot for searching information on the Internet because you get extensive results you have to filter manually to get to the trusted information you want rather than SEO (search engine optimised) results and adverts. It links with the second point that you can be more productive if you search information from your peers that you trust. A typical direct peer group is over 100 people and it is more than likely they have experience of a consumer product or business service you are seeking advice on.
For this Kavia has a Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn pages to extend our social network. Content is a lot more dynamic in these platforms versus the traditional website. Our Facebook page utilises the timeline feature for events and business milestones and connects with our own product customers. You will find all kinds of photos on there (currently 103) and besides creating conversations also enables us to listen. The Twitter account is updated daily where possible with 140 characters tweets or retweets from industry news on manufacturing and the rail sector.
The company LinkedIn pages are updated with links to the news blog which brings to the next trend of we no longer look for the news, products or services they are delivered to us in our social media. The Kavia news blog is pushed out through our social channels or you can subscribe to a monthly summary newsletter. The product and service conversations are no longer happening in online bulletin boards, telephone helpdesks or company websites. They have moved into users social channels where with increased popularity of mobile devices response times can sometimes be instant because email is now too slow and instant messaging is faster and more efficient even out of hours. Customers are once again starting to feel connected with companies rather than distanced by those terrible switchboards.
What is the future, companies have to focus on manufacturing great products and services. Listening to their customers through social media will accelerate their product development and give them an advantage over those companies that advertise they have great products.
