Social media the tool to develop businesses
Social media is the tool to develop businesses both locally and globally.
This was the consensus view at a discussion at the Sunday Times Business Club (STBC) last week during the club's monthly meeting at the Kingsbury Colombo.
The two panellists who exhaustively dealt with social media issues under the theme "Worldwide trends in digital media and the impact of social media on branding "were Suresh Jayaweera and Naresh Abeyesekera.
Mr. Jayaweera, an alumni of the Postgraduate Institute of the Management and Chartered Institute of Marketing UK and Director Operations at Sarva Integrated, said the practice that prevails then and now was to advertise products and brand names during peak hours on TV so that consumers do not miss such advertisements.
However the products then did not have brand differentiation like today.
Whatever the manufacturers produced was sold to its customers. But as time went by advertisers put differentiation on their products to make it more eye catching for consumers prior to advertising their products. He said the TV was a gift to marketers to take across the brand message to the market place. When people sit in front of TVs and watch it from 6.30 pm to 9 pm, they did not miss such advertisements during peak hours. Later advertisers began to put values in ads so that people began to talk about it continuously for days and months.
Some of the larger brands that exist today have been built on this principle and it is the value that they talk about it. By doing so they have realized that their brands have more value than their assets put together. The most important aspect is even if all assts were destroyed, one has the possibility of raising a loan from a bank. Brand loyalty is the emotional love such as falling in love. The logo of Harley Davidson was one such brand for instance.
He said TV was the mode of entertainment for 50 years before 2000 but things began to change. From the TV it has now gone to the mobile phone where entertainment can be watched on the mobile phone anytime or at any place.
"Today you do not wait until you go home to watch the TV programme. You can watch it while in the bus or on your way home. We have about five million Internet users, i.e. about 20 per cent of the population. The mobile penetration in Sri Lanka is about 60 per cent which was high compared to countries in the region. This can be attributed to cheaper mobile phones arriving in the country from countries like China and India. About three million people use mobile phones to access social media like Facebook. When you go into rural areas such as Badulla you can see people accessing Facebook on their mobile phones. There are about one million people on Twitter and other social networks like Instagram and Linkedin. The beauty of using social media is that you can target the person that you want and get the message across. The investment is far better than what you get on conventional media because 25 per cent of our population is below 25 years and 25 per cent is over 60 years who belong to the income generating segment."
Referring to Facebook, he said the time limit for a commercial should not exceed for more than three seconds to grab the people's attention. Social Media also uses famous people to grab the attention of the public. Digital advertising is going to be in for a long period and its content has to be appealing for people to see it on their mobile phones.
Mr. Abeyesekera, a Chartered Management Accountant, Chartered Global Management Accountant and Founder of SECQ, a leading strategy, financial and technological transformation company, said a single Tweet had brought a million dollar business to a company at zero cost.
"One third of the global population is on social media and one can run a media campaign on social media platform that is going to be the future." He said social media is not Facebook alone but there are other social media platforms as well. "There is a local woman who earns Rs. 25,000 every day by selling her cakes using the social media platform. Twitter is another powerful tool to reach an international audience." Kingsbury is the club's host hotel.