The evolution of social media marketing in business

With the rapid evolution of technology, the early 1970s saw the conceptualization of social media. With evolution of tools and availability of data, it was only a matter of time before social media transformed into the powerful tool in the world of business and marketing we know today.

Social Marketing Today

Social media began to be used as a marketing tool shortly after it amassed a large audience and the world of marketing saw the opportunity. Since then, its transformed the places for virtual community gathering, to a retail platform of sorts, allowing businesses the opportunity to build credible brand awareness and connect with consumers on a much broader scale.

Coca-Cola was one of the first high-profile examples of social media marketing, creating the famous ‘Share a Coke’ campaign that encouraged users to share virtual cans of Coke with their friends. This campaign saw an 870% increase in traffic to the Facebook website and a 39% increase in Coca-Cola Facebook fans.

Agencies Rise to Fruition

 As social media evolved, measurement tools gave marketers the ability to understand consumers’ buying habits, demographics, and gain access to other valuable and actionable information. Marketing and PR firms added ‘social media’ to their list of services, and no longer confined to the constraints of traditional forms of media, they began leveraging existing audiences, and subsequently creating the age of influencer marketing.

While most marketing agencies are equipped with the knowledge of how to pay social media influencers, or build brand awareness, there are little that have dedicated resources to a holistic social media marketing program. Typically, it falls under another offered service, but to have an agency dedicated to social media marketing is lesser known, but widely beneficial.

An Agency for an Agency

Agencies are at the cusp of beginning to recognize the broad appeal of having more social media marketing expertise than just a strategic social media marketing outlook for their clients.

Rather, agencies themselves, are turning to specific, strategically-focused, holistic social engagement powerhouses that can research, monitor and leverage social media for high business-related gains. It’s become evident to owners, shareholders and their marketing teams that they must pay attention to more than just selling and promoting. It heavily involves researching, listening, monitoring, interacting and being able to connect uniquely with their intended audiences – no easy feat for an agency tasked with other marketing and PR initiatives. Enter, an agency for an agency that offers a wide range of digital marketing which includes many other benefits:

• Content development
• Social media reputation management
• Social customer support
• Performance marketing

While the future of social media marketing will continue to be redefined by evolving business models, as well as advancements in storytelling technology, it’ll certainly be interesting to see when agencies will more rapidly tap into the new social media marketing environment – one that scales the businesses of their clients, while scaling their own as well.

Talk with our social media and digital experts to see how we can help elevate your brand.