Social networking sites should not be disregarded in doing business in the digital age

With over 20 years of working as a lecturer and faculty adviser to student media programs at the University of Hawai’i and the literary journal Hawai’i Review, Mr. Jay Hartwell has gained extensive experience in studying and applying effective solutions to help businesses succeed in promoting and expanding the market of their products.

According to Mr. Jay Hartwell, it will be very effective for enterprises to use social networks as a major channel to promote their commercial activities. Particularly, Vietnam is a country with a rapid increase in the number of Internet users, and many of them have a tendency to search for information about the product they are going to buy.

Mr. Jay Hartwell, a lecturer as well as faculty adviser to student media programs at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa (USA)

* A cheap advertising channel

During the past 5 years, with the boom in social networking sites, many businesses have quickly made advantage of this channel to introduce and promote their products. Is it possible for those sites to become the most effective channel of information to companies?

- Social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. have rapidly developed in recent years with a huge number of users, and the figure is expected to continue to go up. For that reason, numerous businesses all over the world choose this channel to advertise their products and services to consumers. According to different sources of data, there are now over 28 million people involved in social networking sites in Vietnam, offering a great opportunity for companies to exploit this advantage. Through research, I contend that this is a low-cost advertising channel but the efficiency and publicity it brings are much higher than traditional advertising.

Based on several enterprises’ evaluation, advertising via social networks can save 30% of the expense compared to traditional advertising. However, in order to attract public attention, businesses need to post messages that are compelling and appropriate to each age group.

So is it enough to publish good advertisement for businesses’ products on social networks only?

- I would say that social networking sites are an effective advertising channel these days, but it’s not sufficient. In order to market their products for a large number of consumers, businesses should use different types of advertising. By doing so, their message will be repeated and leave deeper impressions on viewers. Posting information on various channels also helps their goods approach different age groups. To do that, enterprises have to hire a specialized company or form their own qualified staff with expertise in the field. They need to make the information concise and avoid using overstated adjectives. Apart from appealing headlines and pictures, the contents of the article about their products also need to be well-written and honest.

In what ways can advertising goods via social networks and other news media generate more publicity?

- In my opinion, before introducing their products to the public, businesses need to clearly identify their target customers to prepare appropriate contents, pictures and headlines, and then they should get to know what their favorite actors, politicians, soccer players, etc. are in order to invite them to endorse their products.

For example, actor A is the talk of the town among young people, and a company’s product is aimed at youngsters, so it should manage to invite that actor to endorse the product at all costs, which will help grab the attention of many young people. Headlines should be brief and enclosed with photos or videos. Attached photos should be in close-up and eye-catching so that they can capture readers’ attention among mountains of information on the Internet. In addition, businesses may request for famous companies’ support in promoting their products. If they find it interesting, they will be likely to have cooperation and make investments.

* Stay calm to solve problems

Many enterprises in Vietnam have been aware of the importance of social networking sites to their development. However, when facing problems that affect their famous brand, businesses still cannot come up with viable solutions. Could you give them some advice on this issue?

- Social networks are a cheap and effective channel for businesses’ advertisement, but they may also cause unfavorable situations if some people give their products poor reviews with photos to prove their opinions. Under such circumstances, my advice is that enterprises should remain calm, provide an explanation and show pictures or videos of their processes of manufacturing and product quality assurance and inspections, as well as publicizing certificates of their products issued by the authorities. By doing so, they can easily turn the tables.

It is advisable to change those criticizing you into your allies.

What do you think Vietnamese enterprises should do to exploit the advantages of the media?

- Vietnam has a population of about 90 million, and there are up to 40 million Internet users, which offers a great opportunity for businesses to engage in online commerce. This is considered a channel that requires little capital but brings big profits, helping to increase their revenues by 20-30%. Companies can make their own website to introduce their products, interact with customers and connect with other sites in order to post their articles. Research has shown that a high number of Vietnamese people go online to read newspapers via their computers or smart phones, so businesses can choose to publish information on reliable sites with numerous visits. Vietnam is now one of the four countries in the Asia-Pacific region witnessing a rapid growth in the number of people using smart phones. 

For that reason, companies should not overlook the benefits of advertising and selling goods via the Internet. Particularly, for Vietnamese small and medium-sized enterprises with limited capital or start-ups with labor shortages, if they succeed in spreading information about their goods online, they can save a lot of expenses and become well-known more easily. In addition to advertising, businesses should also need to invest in improving their products’ quality and designs accordingly. If what is advertised does not match their genuine products, customers will definitely turn their back on such businesses, causing considerable damage. 

How can businesses build up trust on social networking sites and is there any way to measure it?

- At present there is not any exact measurement of community trust on social networks. If the information is interesting, precise and reliable, the number of viewers will gradually rise, and trust will also be developed. Once achieving those things, enterprises have to continuously improve their services so as to maintain other people’s trust, otherwise they will be very likely to be “bashed”. 

Vietnamese and worldwide consumers have got in the habit of searching for information about the product they intend to purchase, and many of them believe in their friends’ reviews on social networks. So if an item receives loads of positive feedback from netizens, many people may pick it. Similarly, businesses also rely on other people’s reviews about a partner which they want to have cooperation with. In case a company draws a lot of public attention and obtains favorable feedback, it will stand a better chance of gaining cooperation from other enterprises.

Thank you!

Huong Giang (Dong Nai Newspaper)

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