BENGALURU: In this age of social and digital media, personal branding is an undeniable part of our lives. With nearly half of the world’s population using social media platforms, they are a natural place to reach new and highly targeted potential customers too.
Social media today also helps brands promote themselves in many significant ways. With many consumers using the social media every day, it has been a great opportunity for brands to reach out to online audiences in a very strategic manner through various new-age social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram etc.
Working on multiple channels of social media, brands have been able to tap audiences and go to them, rather than wait for them to come to the channels. Today, influencer marketing is also opening up a plethora of opportunities to reach and engage with the right audience as their opinions are valued.
Consumers now are more receptive to brand messages on social media because it allows brands to be more informal and conversational and show their different side. The content you publish on social media channels contribute to your brand personality and help you demonstrate your brand voice. It has also helped in building authentic connections with the audiences and not just deliver direct marketing messages, which has helped brands promote themselves intensely.
— Manas Mehrotra, chairman, 315Work Avenue
In today’s digital era, we are all connected. In a day, we can meet or interact with a limited number of people, physically. However, with social media, we can reach out to millions - digitally, showcasing our personal and professional value system.
One should always share the content that in a way is helpful, engaging, actionable, and of high-utility value to the audience, it is targeted to. One should always maintain two-way communication with the followers so that they know you are still there listening, replying, and engaging with them.
Most used platforms for self-promotion on social media includes LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Quora, etc. The content strategy for all these platforms is completely different from each other.
One content doesn’t fit all. If self-promotion is about showing your work and about adding value, one needs to ensure that the content for each of these platforms is customised to target different sets of followers. Consistency is one of the most important aspects of self-promotion and one needs to understand his/her niche for self-promotion.
– Kapil Jain,
founder and CEO, Graphitto Labs Private Limited
Self-promotion, while not having the greatest of reputation, given that it’s easily associated with marketing, advertising and social timelines, is an integral part to your success provided you can add value.
The art of self-promotion almost always equals to the high value of exceptional content and gives you the opportunity to set yourself apart provided your content is outstandingly useful and always adds value. Having said that, social media is certainly the undisputed public medium today, way ahead of other traditional media formats.
Today, social media has gone from a new idea to an absolute must for marketers. It has drastically improved and enabled visibility and enhanced brand recognition. The art of “telling the right story” with perfect timing via social media has enabled brands to foster close relationships with multiple and heterogeneous audiences through entirely new communication channels. After all, we are on social media to engage.
India comprises the largest millennial population in the world who essentially drive the digital media consumption in the country today. With nearly three billion active users, social media is the universal thread to manage self-promotion and in turn is key to acquiring new customers. A stellar social media presence takes a lot more than just setting up a few profiles and waiting for new customers to find them. The only rule for social media marketing to work well is that you have to get social. Tell good stories. Open up your cabinet of curiosities. Share something small, every day!
– Abhishek Jain,
founder and managing director at Terapact