Strengths of Social Media

This blog entry is an elaboration of the Topic 03 ST1007 Social Media Marketing module slides for the section titled "Strengths of Social Media".

The information is taken largely from the section titled "Purpose" at the Wiki article here with some modifications on my part to keep it easier for you to understand.

The purpose of including this slide is to allow you to understand the reasons for the increasing popularity of  Social Media as a marketing tool, for big and small organisations alike.

So what are the strengths of Social Media, especially when compared to Traditional Media?

1. Accessible and affordable – Access to publish content via traditional media is not “free-and-easy” and the cost of using them is often very high. On the other hand, anybody is free to use social media to communicate and many social media applications are “free” e.g. Facebook 
2. Decentralized reach with multiple points of production – Traditional media typically use a centralized approach to organize, produce and disseminate information.  Social media is conversely decentralized, less hierarchical, and distinguished by multiple points of production and utility.
3. Easy to use – Traditional media typically require specialized skills and training.  Most social media production does not require specialized skills and training
4. Immediate - the time lag between communications produced by traditional media is much longer compared to social media which can be capable of virtually instantaneous responses
5. Dynamic - Traditional media, once created, cannot be altered (once a magazine article is printed and distributed changes cannot be made to that same article) whereas social media can be altered almost instantaneously by comments or editing.