Internet Technology, Marketing and Security Research Paper - 1

Internet Technology, Marketing and Security - Research Paper Example Social media, though an emerging trend is becoming part of everyday life and most businesses ranging from SMEs to corporate companies are now using social media marketing strategies. With today’s dynamic world social media platforms is also increasing tremendously with the current trends in information and communication technology (ICT) making the world more or less a global village. Businesses that have been swift to move with the current trend have seen great success whereas those that are not dynamic enough to embrace technology have often collapsed. Social media marketing has gained tremendous popularity and use in the recent past by entrepreneurs at all levels of business. There are very many companies that have succeeded and benefited from using social media marketing including Pepsi Co. and Ford just to mention a few, and others like Kodak have faced great decline because of not being swift in embracing technology and dynamism. There are very many reasons why social med ia has become increasingly popular among entrepreneurs in the recent past as the state of the art marketing tool. Many people have switched from the traditional telecommunication tools to adopt the emerging technologies in the ICT sector. There has been a paradigm shift from the traditional media such as television, radio, newspapers and magazines, which are seen as one-way and static communication technologies, to the current trend of online sources and social media as communication tools (Zarrella, 2010). In a way, it can be said that the traditional media has lost a lot of its popularity to the new social media thus, companies can only reach many people through the social media. The paradigm shift in communication has also shifted consumer markets to a great extent changing the orientation of the business playing field (Evans, 2010) People are no longer seeking News as it was in the recent past but instead News is looking for them, all this courtesy of the recent developments in ICT (Zarrella, 2010). People are no longer buying information and knowledge but it has become free in the social networks. The information has also become free of constraints of place, free of control of content and free of restrictive access on consumption. The social media dramatically levels the playing field by making the information plentiful and available just like it levels the businesses and organisations that work on the principle that make information scarcer (Evans, 2010). Social media platforms somehow create virtual communities by bringing people together in creating, manipulating and sharing information. Companies that use social media marketing are able to reach out to these social communities and interact with them more closely in a way that they share information thus strengthening the communities (Qualman, 2012). The organisation using social media has a more interactive and deep relationship with their customers compared to companies using traditional media. In th is way, the company can get instant feedback from the customers regarding their products and thus learn more about the feelings and perception of the people/consumers concerning their product and services. In this way, they can improve their products to suit the needs of their customers in a more appropriate manner (Zarrella, 2010). On the other hand, those companies using traditional media cannot have a deep dialogue with the customers because the communication is one-way. For instance if you do not agree with an advertisement