Blog 5- Social Media

As we know, the term social media refers to media created by users. It is also important to notice that social media differs considerably from mass media. For example, mass media is relatively cheaper than mass media. Usually it is more expensive to communicate something buy using newspapers, television or radio than using some sort of social media. Furthermore, the user interaction is really important in the social media while users can not participate actively in mass media. Despite these differences, I think that the most interesting common characteristic between these two types of media is that they can persuade a huge audience.

After establishing some differences between social media and mass media, we have to say that social media has increased its popularity over the past few years. Nowadays lots of companies are using social media as a way of gaining insights and create customer experiences. We could talk about different kinds of social media applications such as blogs, social networking applications, photo sharing applications, but I will focus on video sharing applications.

Companies usually use their own websites in order to promote their products or services. However, they know that if they use the Web 2.0 concept, they can persuade more people. Probably, the best example and the most successful video sharing application is Youtube. Everyone knows that this social media application is an incredible marketing tool. Firstly, we could say that its main advantage is that it totally free; it has no cost for the user. Another point worth mentioning is that the message can flow really quickly and crate buzz.

Talking about social media in general, it is important to notice that they are not only useful for companies. A particular person, an association and other kind of entities could use these applications. For example, I know and interesting case about the Lleida city council. Lleida is a small city from Spain which has just built an airport. The city council has published a video in Youtube in order to promote the airport. They believe that the airport will attract more visitors and professional talent to the city.

Finally, regarding http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist I have to say that it is a really interesting tool. I believe that the “Trend for Websites” is a very useful tool because you can see visitors by region and related sites visited. With this information you can learn customer’s preferences by region. “Google Trends” is also an incredible tool. If you are doing marketing research on a topic, you could know how relevant that topic is today.

In conclusion, Web 2.0 is playing a main role today. If companies know how to use these applications in a proper way, they could persuade more customers. Furthermore, not only companies can use these tools. Also people and other entities can use social media applications as promotional tools.