What Is Social Networking?

Social networking uses internet-based social media sites ♌to stay connected with friends, family, colleagues, or customers. Social networking can have a social purpose, a business purpose, or both through sites like Facebook, X, Instagram, and Pinterest.

Social networking is also a significant opportunity for marketers seeking to engage customers. In 2024, Facebook ranks as the most popular social network, with over 3 billion people using the platform monthly.

Popular Platforms

• Facebook: Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg and owned by Meta Platforms, Facebook connects individuals, businesses, and organizations. Users can post updates, respond to others, and share photographs and links to online content. Users can chat live and upload and share videos. Users can communicate directly via Facebook Messenger. They can join groups with similar interests and be notified of friends' activities and pages they elect to follow.
• YouTube: This site follows Facebook for most users. In 2024, YouTube had over 2.5 billion users. YouTube is a platform for creators to display their produced content. "Creators" can monetize their YouTube channels through advertising, merchandise sales, and subscriptions.
  
• Instagram: Focuses on sharing visual media like photos and videos. It's similar to Facebook in that users create a profile with a news feed. Posts can be shared publicly or with followers. Instagram has features such as Instagram Stories and Instagram Reels. Instagram was founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger and acquired by Meta in 2012. In 2024, Instagram had 2 billion users.
• X: A social network that allows individuals to communicate with short messages called tweets. The social platform limits tweets to 280 characters for basic and 25,000 characters for premium. Posting (or "tweeting") is sometimes referred to as microblogging. X was founded as Twitter in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone, and Evan Williams, and was bought by Elon Musk in Oct. 2022. Musk changed the name to "X" in July 2023 and the site is owned by X Corp., one of Elon Musk's holding companies.
• Pinterest: This site was created by Ben Silbermann, Paul Sciarra, and Evan Sharp in 2009. Pinterest promotes image saving and sharing using a virtual pinboard. It's an innovative platform that facilitates cataloging and organizing creative information for individuals. Account holders find images by browsing the web or Pinterest. They then pin those images to an online pinboard.

Marketing Strategies

Family members and friends can connect through personal social networking sites like Facebook, but marketers commonly use social networking to increase 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:brand recognition and encourage brand loyalty. 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Social media marketing helps promote a brand’s voice and content. It can help ma♔ke a company more accessible and prominent to new 💖and existing customers.

Marketers use social networking to improve conversion rates. Building a following provides access to and interaction with new, recent, and longtime customers. Sharing blog posts, images, videos, or comments on social media allows followers to react and engage, visit a company’s website, and become customers. There isn't a one-size-fits-all approach to social networking 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:marketing strategies.

澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Social networking companies want businesses to pay for their advertising. That's why platforms often restrict a business's reach and the number of responses it may receive through unpaid postꦿs. For example, if a company has 500 followers, followers may not all receive the same post.

Advantages

• Social networking allows individuals to make and stay in contact with family and friends.
• People can also connect with unknown individuals and develop new relationships.
• Social networking also allows companies to connect with new and existing clients.
• Companies can create, promote, and increase brand awareness through social media.
• Social networking can help establish a brand as legitimate, credible, and trustworthy.

Disadvantages

• Social networking can facilitate the spread of misinformation about individuals and companies.
• The anonymous aspect of newfound personal relationships requires vigilance.
  
• Building and maintaining a company profile can be costly.
• Businesses need many followers before a social media marketing campaign generates a positive return on investment (ROI).

Influencers

Tapping into social media can be 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:a good business practice. Influencers are those individuals who impact social media sites, build a la๊rge following, and influence product placement and purchases. These content creators can impact industries with their presence on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok.

• Kylie Jenner: With more than 397 million followers on Instagram, 36 million on Snapchat, and 40 million on X, this influencer and reality television star uses social media platforms to boost her image and brand name. She is also an entrepreneur who uses social networking to promote her business, Kylie Cosmetics. The beauty brand earned her a spot on Forbes' list of self-made women, 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:young billionaires, and the Celebrity 100 of 2020.
• MrBeast: James Stephen "Jimmy" Donaldson is MrBeast, an American YouTuber, known for his fast-paced and high-production videos featuring elaborate challenges and lucrative giveaways. In 2023, Donaldson partnered with Samsung, making the Samsung Galaxy smartphone the official vlogging camera of MrBeast.
• Tasty: Tasty is a division of BuzzFeed that produces and shares content on its Facebook page. The YouTube channel is the 114th most subscribed YouTube channel in the United States.

The Bottom Line

Social networking involves 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:online social media platforms to connect with new a🃏nd existing friends, family, colleagues, and businesses. Businesses use social networking to build a brand, sell products, grow a customer ba𓂃se, and strengthen customer relationships and service.