Why Social Media Marketing is not the same.

Two years ago if you would have asked anyone how effective social media was in terms of return on investments people would have given a shout out saying that it’s the best thing that had happened since the invention of the television.

Fast forward and I think the scene has changed considerably. Fighting for Click through rates has become the norm. Engagement is perhaps at it’s lowest levels and people are trying to get off social and into the real world.

All said it’s an exciting time as Twitter and Instagram are playing around with advertisements for their respective platforms and that day isn’t far when Snapchat and Whatsapp will be integrating advertisements into their platforms as well.

The issue with all of this is that every single platform with it’s own share of ad spend creates a sort of bubble. Because a lot many users would choose to engage with a brand on one platform only. And unless brands are able to create content that is platform centric and without the slightest bit of overlap in terms of content I really don’t see why users will choose to interact with brands across various platforms.

The next issue is that the platforms in themselves are seeking to create a noise free environment whereby the user gets to be social with his/her friends , family and the things he/she loves. So effectively they are trying to curb organic advertising. A simple example of this would be that if fifty people from your friend list on facebook were to share a particular post. It would only show up once stating that X,Y,Z & 47 others shared this. So effectively as compared to earlier facebook versions the user is seeing the post only once whereas previously he/she would have ended seeing it fifty times.

That said the other issue is that Faceboook is inevitably forcing brands to increase ad spend. While that makes sense for Facebook as a business it is a bane to the brands already on facebook. Thus rising costs are one aspect of the deal.

Simply put, Facebook wants you to spend more on advertising. Other platforms are introducing ad spends so on the whole the social media budgets of brands are going to explode.

Campaigns are becoming repetitive and unengaging. Companies are trying to create the Oreo Moment but that is far from happening. Traditionally campaigns revolved around a stellar price and asked users to share and like the post or page.

Today user’s aren’t game for that anymore. They want to be as secretive as they can on social media platforms with recruiters and close friends always having the ability to know what you are upto. Moreover, as the WPP’s and Ogilvy’s of the world start to take over the digital media space it is not long before which we will end up seeing two products from bigger companies having similar campaigns.

The reason that social media was cool was because there were smaller companies, startups and even teenagers who were on it. And these people understand it better than high profile executives with their six figure paychecks. Similarly, these people make better campaigns and have an inherent understanding of the market.

But as these shops close primarily because they are either getting acquired or because they just don’t find it profitable enough the scene just gets worser off.

The final issue is that everyone is on it. There was a time that brands did not understand it so they steered clear and away from it. This in a way was a good thing. The argument is simple if you over saturate a market with demand (Social media) and have a limited supply (Platforms) you are going to be on the losing side of the bargain. More brands in turn is a repetitive cycle of what we have faced on the newspapers, televisions and on the radio. Advertisers vying for your eye and stooping to any level to get it. No big issue with that just the fact that that’s not what a social platform was meant to be in the first place.

We lost sight of the greater things when we start looking at those that are not so significant.

PS - I know the points are debatable and there are going to be arguments in favor and against my stand. This is my personal point of view.