Explore and discuss the extent to which new media has impacted upon and influenced UK consumers within a broader global context. (Define new media in a broad media context, determine the degree to which it has impacted upon behaviour and how it might influence consumer behaviour in a manner different to traditional media) ‘We no longer search for the news, the news finds us’ Erik Qualman - Socialnomics According to Wikipedia new media is defined as the means of mass communication though the use of digital technologies, such as online newspapers, blogs, video games and social media. Users are enabled to share content around the world by transmitting through connection and conversation, whilst being grounded on an interactive community. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_media Over the recent years, new media has impacted on consumers more than ever. With almost half of the global population being active online and 30% of these owning a social media account, new media plays an extremely large role in society. These figures rise drastically each day. Social Media Today states that social media users have risen by a whopping 176 million in the past year (2014) with six new Facebook profiles being created every second. This is undoubtedly a market worth being a part of from a business perspective. Many companies are benefitting from this as they have seen this as an easy way to influence consumer behaviour and pick up on their habits.
Moving forward, social media has been a major convenience and reward to virtually everyone. On an individual basis, social media allows friends and family both near and far to communicate with one another. Also, businesses are flourishing through the use of social media. Advertising has never been easier. Horn (2013) states, “Our profession, unlike any time before, is demanding we become social media (…) experts” (1). Horn (2013) also states, “More than half of reporters (55 percent) use Twitter and Facebook to source stories” (1). Social media has greatly benefited business life and personal life.
The use of social media marketing has become a standard way in which organizations advertise their products or services. Social media marketing allows consumers to have immediate access to other consumers reviews or to post a review about a product or service. There is engagement between the company and the consumer (Evans, Dave 2010). Social Media emerged in the late 1980’s when websites such as Prodigy, Compuserve and America Online. Prodigy was first of it’s kind and was known as a ”consumer online service”. Half of the page is devoted to advertising. Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Hi5, Bebo and Orkut are all social media platforms that are utilized as platforms today.
The marketing industry is an elaborate network that links companies to their consumers, primarily through written communication. The main objective of marketing is to identify trends and patterns in consumer behavior, and utilize the data to influence consumers to purchase more goods. From a macroenviroment standpoint, the general conditions of a market are heavily dependent on global environmental factors. The most significant factor that influences the markets today is technological advancements. Since the release of Facebook, Linked-in, Twitter, and Myspace in the early 2000s, the number of people using social media has increased to over sixty-five percent. The ever-growing dependency on social media platforms, has given marketers the tremendous opportunity to further market potential consumers. Social media marketing is a specific form of marketing that focuses on producing ad content that social media users will post on their own networks. This particular marketing technique is effective because ads and content are created, based on what personal information users post on social media. Firms and organizations that advertise their brands on social media are more likely to increase their customer base and annual revenue. By doing so, companies are able to increase exposure of their brand and widen previous hidden, customer bases. As a marketer, the fine line between right and wrong is often blurred. The amount and
Social media is not new. Facebook has been around since 2004, YouTube since 2005, and Twitter in 2006. What is new is how social media sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are affecting the way businesses market their products and services. Never before in our history have consumers been able to communicate so effortlessly with each other and with the businesses they frequent. Never before have businesses been able to interact and react to customer feedback so quickly and efficiently. However, just because businesses have the ability to use social media for their marketing and advertising efforts, does not necessarily mean they should. This paper intends to
Social media has taken off like a rocket throughout the years. The annoying sound of a modem connecting has turned into a soundless transaction. The wait time to connect is instant, opening a global world of interactions for people. You can now connect with anyone, anywhere at anytime at least once a day. Social media defined by Goyal is “Any platform,which provides the facility of sharing ideas, exchanging information and sending messages over an electronic medium, is considered as social media.” (Goyal,222). This is to include online magazines, Facebook, Twitter, Newspapers,Email, Blogs, YouTube and many more. Advertisers have taken notice to these platforms, utilizing social media to promote their brands, develop trust with the consumer,save money and target audiences faster than ever before.
According to (Creeber and Martin, 2009; Bennett, 2003) the difference between producers and consumers will become increasingly difficult to draw. In looking at the difference between the mainstream media the new media, there are technical distinctions one can understand between the various media forms (Brydon 2011). New media have different characteristics, such as the Internet; can be used for mass to point message supply and points to mass communications. They are de-centralized and needs low investment, that gives interactivity and public engagement and it is also difficult to control (Banerjee,
We cannot deny how big of an impact social media has on our lives now, not only on people but businesses too. It has opened a whole new door to the business world and given them a big opportunity to interact and attract a larger amount of customers. It’s given us a new and faster way of communication by exchanging pictures, stories, news, blogs, online discussions, etc. In exchange businesses have benefited by a long shot just by the click of a button. With the help of the Internet a company no longer is dependent on a particular customer base to survive because now it can reach out to a worldwide audience within seconds. It’s imaginable the countless business attributes of all social media to this day and still is growing. Social media
Information and entertainment today are usually spread through the development of technology. Due to this, various medias enable us to give and receive information. Media can be divided into traditional media and new media (Christian, 2014). While it is easy to pinpoint the differences of the two medias, there are also some similarities that tie both medias together.
Old media is the idea of mechanical and analogue methods of conveying media while new media is the idea of digital and binary ways of conveying media. For example if you look at the old media newspaper it was a psychical object of the days before computer technology but has now been digitized into the new media format by being made available to read through digital devices like smartphones and tablets. New and old media are currently living in a mid way state due to its early days, by this I speak of the idea of a digital native and a digital immigrant, it is the idea that some people, the digital natives are born into this world of technology and adopt it as the way of life but to the older generations the digital immigrant technology is still to alien and new to them to adopt, so currently we have
In today’s business world, social media is being discussed on a daily basis. This phenomenon has taken over the marketing and advertising industries and has changed the way they handle their efforts to attract customers. There is a big misunderstanding that social media are only popular networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, but as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, social media are “forms of electronic communication (as Web sites for social networking and micro blogging) through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (as videos).” The rise of these online communities has given companies an opportunity to engage in conversations with their customers. This in
The new media announces a new period of media development in the world over, it is the one that preaches the significance of new communications technologies. The new media is not just a kind of information technology but also part and parcel of the social being of man in this modern society.
New New media is communication channels that have been created recently. These channels interact with the user and give the user the ability to talk and communicate between other users in real time. Social networking is a prime example of new new media, blogs, Twitter or even YouTube all fall into the category of new new media, were as emails would fall into new media due to their introduction times and limiting factors. New new media summed up is users interacting with other users on a massive scale. Let us single out YouTube as an example, YouTube gives users with massive interaction through: likes, dislikes, shares, favourites or even reports. The content creators can get feedback in many different forms on their creations, the biggest feedback tool being the comments section, were users can share their ideas,
Social media is capable of connecting a brand with its consumers and discover how they are being perceived, it also has the power to change perceptions and identify the key people within the business network. The unique feature of social media is that it can provide corporations and businesses solutions developed through operating with consumers and stakeholders. Basically, social media serves as a visible connection to one’s corporation and its stakeholders, consumers, suppliers, etc, who each have a defined role within the system to filter and regulate information. As mentioned earlier, the influence of social media is spreading in a proliferative pace that has resulted to an essential transformation in society, technology and business customs.
The way that individuals and businesses communicate and interact has radically changed. With the development of technology and the internet, people can connect almost instantaneously and with very little effort. Social media has come to play a huge part in the way that the world communicates with each other. In fact, a recent report shows that in a single month people spend over 25 hours on social networks (“The Digital Consumer”). With consumers committing that much time to social media sites, social networking has become an important aspect of everyday life for individuals—and businesses. Like most marketing activities, social media marketing poses some risk. However, it is advantageous for businesses to exploit this opportunity, and develop an effective and ethical marketing strategy that includes using social media as a marketing tool.
Social media is defined as a group of Internet-based applications which build on the platform of Web 2.0 and the contents of these applications can be modified by all users in a participatory and collaborative method (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Social media creates a platform for companies to talk to their customers as a hybrid element of promotion mix. With the emergence of social media, the tools and strategies for companies to connect with customers have also changed (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). To adapt with the emergence of social media in the marketing, companies should have unique insights about these significances (Quan-Haase and Young, 2010). The significances of social media embody three main aspects which are technology, decision-making and purchase behaviors of customers.