View of A STUDY OF IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON INDIAN ECONOMY SYSTEM

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ACCENT JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS ECOLOGY & ENGINEERING

Peer Reviewed and Refereed Journal, ISSN NO. 2456-1037

Available Online: www.ajeee.co.in/index.php/AJEEE

Vol. 06, Special Issue 01, (IC-RCOVID19) April 2021 IMPACT FACTOR: 7.98 (INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL) 275 A STUDY OF IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON INDIAN ECONOMY SYSTEM

Prof. (Dr.) Pramod Sharma

Registrar, Renaissance University-Indore

Abstract:- Social networking/Media-a place where people can use networks of online friends and group memberships to keep in touch with current friends, reconnect with old friends or create real–life friendships through similar interests or groups and share their social experiences. Social Media advertising is a term that is used to describe a form of Online Advertising that focuses on social networking sites. Social Media Marketing Services are the services which helps the organization in enhancing the usability of the company’s website using integration with social tools and application; improve site likability; allow easy sharing of site content on popular social sites; increase visibility on custom and niche search engines (Technorati etc.); easy tracking of updates on your website; encouraging discussions on the site and a whole lot more. Hence, the need arise to study the state of social media use in marketing activities by Indian companies. By scouting the secondary data this study presents the state of social media marketing in India. This study answers one major research question – What is the state of social media marketing in India? The study has used secondary sources of information. And so to unravel this question, the study provides all major facts, figures, major research findings and some popular examples.

Keywords: Social Media, Blog, Twitter, Facebook, Social Advertising.

1. INTRODUCTION

Social media marketing refers to the process of gaining website traffic or attention through social media sites. Social media marketing programs usually centre on efforts to create content that attracts attention and encourages readers to share it with their social networks. A corporate message spreads from user to user and presumably resonates because it appears to come from a trusted, third-party source, as opposed to the brand or company itself. The base for any media to succeed is to make Conversation impactful.

Social media marketing (SMM) is the new method of marketing, which is based on the common principle of Word of Mouth (WOM). SMM is the latest innovation in the marketing world. It is been found that India is the world‘s 7th largest internet market growing at 11.2% (Comscore). The research also found some other interesting facts. There are 21 million people in India who are estimated to visit social media sites regularly, which is 60.3% of the total active Indian internet audience. More than 90% of Indian online users belong to 18 -45 age group, which has high purchase power and high disposable income. A typical social media site visitor in India spends 110.4 minutes on the site and makes 10.4 visits per month to a social network. In a nutshell, the social media websites in India are growing by almost 150% year after year. Besides the growth, opportunities lie within the high profile target audience with the age group majorly consisting 18-45 age groups. Also on social networking sites, it is all about a conversation. Everything is an experience on this platform and it is the job of marketers to make the experience wonderful. There is an excellent example to prove the above statement. India is called the country of three C‘s:

Cricket, Cinema, and Congress. India loves Cricket and its cricket stars. India is among the few countries where its own film industry, better known as Bollywood beats Hollywood. It goes without saying, that India follows what the three C’s follow. It came as no surprise when India‘s top movie stars like Shahrukh Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Abhishek Bachchan etc. joined Twitter to market their movies.

2. THE RISE OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

The rise of social media marketing can be attributed to the growing popularity of social media among the urban, tech-savvy population. As the number of people frequenting blogs, wikis, online communities, social-networking sites continues to increase, businesses a read opting social media to reach out to their consumers and promote their products and services. Social media is redefining the way businesses are implementing marketing campaigns.

Fastrack, the bold and definitive youth brand that emphasises on ‗moving on‘ in life, came up with an exciting campaign to target its young consumer segment. The

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ACCENT JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS ECOLOGY & ENGINEERING

Vol. 06, Special Issue 01, (IC-RCOVID19) April 2021 IMPACT FACTOR: 7.98 (INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL) 276 campaign called-Make Hell Cool‖ is based on the end of the world prophecy by the Mayans where the world would be ending on the 21^st of December. Beginning a week prior to doomsday, the campaign urged youth to sin as much as they want so they could be a winner in hell! Make Hell Cool had a dedicated website that served as a one-stop location for the campaign, along with an integrated presence on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

2.1 The Straight Hair Experiment

Unilever owned Sunsilk launched a one-of-its-kind campaign called‗The Straight Hair Experiment‘ during the season of winter chills and dry frizzy hair. Sunsilk involved bloggers and its Facebook community with the idea of sourcing crazy hair straightening ideas with a blogging contest and had integrated the campaign with Facebook and Twitter as well.

2.2 Secret Diaries

Unilever owned FMCG brand, Dove launched its new hair fall treatment product via real women sharing their experiences with the product through videos and blog posts, in the Dove Hair Fall Rescue Diary. The campaign used YouTube as a major social media channel along with its global Facebook page to run an exciting quiz around the stories. Surely a cool campaign for a product launch via social media. It managed to build ample curiosity and more over offered the product as the prize to quiz winners, thus completing the cycle.

2.3 Drive with MTV

MTV and Tata Nano created history by organizing India‘s first 21 day social road trip called- Drive With MTV‘ where 4 teams formed out of 16 participants, had to undertake a road trip of 2500 kms in 21 days, armed with a Tata Nano and Rs. 50K each. Each team had asocial media engagement score based on the likes, comments, video views, etc. accumulated by posting content on social media sites and driving engagement through their social network.

Winners were decided not only on the tasks performed but also on the social media engagement score.

3. PRACTICAL ISSUES IN SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Digital Signage Federation has laid down strong privacy and transparency standards to protect consumers from aggressive online marketing and unethical collection of personal information through mobile marketing, social media etc. It is important for online marketing companies in India to adopt these best practices to ensure optimal level of advertising through online space. The community of Online Marketing Enthusiasts is involved in creating awareness about these best practices to ensure that online marketing remains consumer-friendly.

As of now there are no laws in India to protect companies from online defamation and commercial disparagement. However, many Indian companies a returning to Online Reputation Management (ORM) to build a positive image on internet and wards off reputation threats. ORM helps companies filter and edit the online information related to their brand on a regular basis. It identifies the threat of online reputation attack and helps them take corrective action.

4. THE FUTURE OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Social media is today not an option but a necessity for every industry. For entrepreneurial start-ups, social media offers a competitive advantage because of its low cost and low barrier to entry. Moreover, start-ups have flexible policies that help them to adopt social media easily. With social media and a little creativity, start-ups can easily reach out to their customers and build a successful brand. Health-care and travel industries will witness proliferation of social media marketing initiatives in the future. There is huge opportunity for the education sector also in this new media. The mobile penetration in India, including the rural areas, is quite high. So I see social media marketing go mobile. Social media is all about building relationships. For any social media marketing to be rewarding in the long run, companies need to continuously find creative ways to engage with the customers.

5. IMPLICATIONS ON THE TRADITIONAL MARKETING CHANNELS IN THE LONGRUN Due to the low internet penetration in the country, particularly in the rural areas, I don't

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ACCENT JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS ECOLOGY & ENGINEERING

Vol. 06, Special Issue 01, (IC-RCOVID19) April 2021 IMPACT FACTOR: 7.98 (INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL) 277 see social media marketing replace traditional marketing channels in the next few years. At best, social media marketing will be integrated with the traditional channels in the long run. Group buying and social commerce are the recent trends. Many e-commerce sites offer attractive discounts for a group of shoppers on their combined purchases. Group buying brings together customers who would like to buy a product. The increase in volume lets these websites offer attractive discounts. Some of the websites that offer group buying are taggle.com, snapdeal.com. In a social commerce model, invitation-only shopping sites give discounts to consumers if they add their friends to the site.

6. CONCLUSION

Although social media marketing is a relatively recent concept in India, it has redefined the way businesses are implementing marketing campaigns. With the online medium providing mass reach and low cost benefits, social media marketing is a powerful tool not just for big companies but also for small entrepreneurial start-ups. Businesses must creatively use social media marketing and come up with innovative campaigns to reach out to customers and build a successful brand. Everybody is a winner in the Social Media space, no doubt about it. But one thing that is to be remembered by the Brand Managers that average consumer is far more vocal today. He does not need a Letter to the Editor to voice his opinion. His voice is far stronger than what it is today. All he needs todoissneeze which will create a viral effect. One blog on any platform can make or mar your image. So just don‘t sit there and bombard him with marketing initiatives. Listen to him and talk to him. That show he likes it.

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