Engineering With A Social Twist

Social media is fast becoming an important way to engage with clients, consultants and the community and we are starting to notice that more and more of our clients and competitors are all using social media to stay in touch and as a way of promoting their businesses.

 

Modern marketing now allows businesses to market their products and services faster and allowing them to hit wider audiences within seconds. With the growth of the internet and e-commerce trade, online marketing is laying the groundwork for modern marketing and what we’ve noticed is that online marketing seems to be taking over from more traditional methods of print marketing and distribution.

 

As there is such a wide offering of available social media marketing platforms, we can see why more and more companies are choosing to adopt social media as an alternative and more cost efficient way of marketing. And with the popularity of sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, which attract millions of users every year, any business would be unwise to fail to tap into these free marketing platforms.

 

Companies across the world can now hit worldwide markets and millions of users within seconds, allowing everyone to distribute and market their services at the click of a button. All that is required is a little time to set up a profile and to decide what you’ll be communicating. Think of it as the IKEA of marketing...all the components are there, just a little assembling required.

 

But is modern marketing the lazy way to promote businesses today and are we becoming less and less interested in face to face interaction and communication?

 

It’s a tricky one because on one hand you can’t be seen to be lagging behind in modern technology and outdated, but on the other hand you don’t want to neglect the traditional methods of face to face communication and maintaining professional working relationships.

 

We need to find a happy medium where you employ the best attributes of more traditional marketing methods and the best attributes from modern social media. Too much of one and you’ll look out of touch, but too much of the other and you’ll start to lose important established relationships.

 

At Millward we’re moving with the times and have introduced a company Facebook page, a Twitter profile and a company LinkedIn profile. Yet we still think that social media cannot replace completely the good tried and tested methods of going out and meeting clients and connecting face to face. Every month we host a Curry Club evening, where we invite around 10-11 clients and take them out for a curry as a chance for us to talk and reconnect. It is a strategy that has served us well and has allowed us to meet a variety of people with the result of building strong professional relationships.

 

As with everything it is important to have a balance to maintain a healthy state. We can see advantages to both and the most effective marketing campaigns will use a combination of all of these different strategies.

 

The marketing team at Millward split their time between social media and more traditional methods, so as to target everyone with maximum impact, without neglecting any marketing platform. So far we’re adapting well to change, and with a thoroughly thought out marketing strategy that includes all different marketing types, we hope that we’ll continue to maintain and exceed our previous marketing successes.

 

We'd like to know what you think! Tell us your thoughts about modern marketing methods...