Business Owners Need To Understand The Purpose Of Social Networking

Vehicles for social networking – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs, etc. – are still misunderstood by many small business owners. These are NOT more media tools for advertising; this is the grand misconception.

The most effective use of social networking, through the above internet tools, is all about creating community. Responding to customer issues (good or not so good), creating context, vision, mission and giving this to the community and creating a public interactive conversation is the goal.

This works. This supports deep loyalty between the business and the community – also known as the customers. This creates word of mouth buzz. This creates a community whose participants identify with each other. If done effectively this creates a secondary result – loyal customers who purchase the company’s products or services as a true believer would, with commitment to the community, and therefore, to the product.

Social networking using Internet media tools and creating community, if done successfully, results in passion for your business. Passion is unlikely to be created by advertising but it can be created by social networking and community building.

This is the job we must be doing. This creates a competitive advantage, an unbreakable bond between the consumer and the business and its products or services. This works.