Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Is Social Media the Next Great Product?




How can companies use social media? How can companies sell social media? These are some questions many businesses are asking. Now that more and more corporations are finding out that social media helps create a profitable business, the next step is selling this strategy. But is social media the next great product or will it fade in a short time?


Social Media Will Sell And Sell BIG


With IBM, Best Buy and even The New York Times as some of those who are using social media, the social media product is already well on its way to reaching the early adopters. What's that? Well there are five groups that consider buying a new product when it enters the market: Innovators, Early Adopters, Early Majority, Late Majority and Laggards. Right now, the social media product is in the Early Adopters group. The important thing here is the sudden potential for this product to take off quickly. As most marketers know, a new product makes the most profit when the early and late majority purchase the product. These are the next two stages for social media to reach. So who will take advantage of this prime situation?

Strategies Wanted

No major company is leading the way just yet. This means two things. First is that the leader is close to breaking through any moment. Second is that this leader could be you! I have developed a "Five Phase Strategy Template for Social Media" and have implemented it with success. Others have created templates as well and some have failed while others have done better. The fact is that one of these strategies is just around the corner waiting to break through from the others. Will you be the one to find it?