Gone are the days when social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook were hangouts for teens only. Now a lot of adults are using these sites.


All social media help in promoting your brand irrespective of what it is. Let me elaborate why social networking sites are beneficial for your online advertising.

Reason 1: Social networking sites offer free Online Advertising

Most of the social networking sites are free. There is no fee of any kind. Some of the free networking sites are Facebook.com, Twitter.com, Orkut.com etc. Unlike search advertising based on pay per click that not only consumes time and money, social networking sites consume time only. You also know your audience more closely in networking sites than PPC marketing.

Reason 2: Reach Globally with Social networking sites, expand your online advertising

Social networking sites are not limited to geographical locations. There are 50 - 60 millions of active members on Facebook alone. Similar figures are there for other sites as well. People living in India are selling their products in US and vice versa. You need not limit your customers inside 1 country only. Live tweets are possible in Twitter. Groups together and now your audience, know their nationality, promote your brand. Online advertising has reached beyond the dimensions of single country.

Reason 3: Make your online advertising effective by targeting specific group of people.

You can target specific audience for advertising your product. Join groups in Facebook and other such networking sites. These groups consists of like minded audience which may be very to audience you are targeting for your brand promotion. Unlike in PPC or search marketing where it is difficult to tell much about your audience, socially advertising your brand is very cheaper. For example if your are selling books for engineering students, you can join any community that consists of engineering students. In social media such as Facebook it is very easy to know the members of community.

Reason 4: Make a community to increase your audience

Once you become member of Facebook, LinkedIn, Orkut, Twitter etc. You can create your own groups and community and send invitations to fairly a large group of members. Once you make the community, people joining your community who are really interested in your community or product becomes obvious. There is no limit no of members that join your community or group. You can spread your message with just few key strokes. The best thing is that you need not any well planned hi-fi strategy to promote your product.

Reason 5: Establish your expertise and relationship with your audience.

Share your knowledge with people you are targeting. By sharing your knowledge and expertise on any particular subject, you will not only establish your expertise about subject but will also develop a sort of relationship with your audience/clients. Once you win trust of people your chance of doing online business will increase tremendously. People like to do business with experts they know. You can establish your brand by mixing with people in social networking sites. Online advertising on social media can get you name more quickly than any other form of online marketing. People visit sites related to person they know more often than any other site. That is why traffic of social networking sites is doubling each year.

Reason 6: Use social media to partner with your Competitors.

Inspite of throat cut competition, in social networking sites you can team up with your competitors to reach interested audience. This spirit of co-operation develops because advertising on social media is free and you do not lose anything as in PPC marketing. People are ready and even your competitors are ready to share their experience to promote their brand. There is more emotional touch in social media than any other platform of online marketing. The number of customers/audience on these social networking sites is fairly large, so there is room for almost everyone.

Reason 7: Updating your activities and sharing new message is very easy and fast.

Updating information on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Orkut take only seconds. Addressing friends, followers, community members and other connections is much easier in social media. There are several free online applications that allow you to update your status across several of your social media accounts simultaneously.

There are many more reasons why you should use social networking sites for online marketing. You will develop your strategies once you are into it. Doing business, promoting your brand and attracting and reaching to potential audience/clients are much easier on social media than any other form of online advertising. Now big boys such as DELL, HP and other such industrial giants are taking help of social media to promote their brand and reach to people who spend most of their times on these sites.

In conclusion, if you are not advertising on social media, you are a whole lot of potential customers and also losing money on expensive search marketing or other online advertising.