Page 98 - 100 Great Marketing Ideas (100 Great Ideas)

45 PUT YOURSELF ON A
NETWORKING SITE

One of the major growth areas of the internet has been social
networking sites such as Facebook and Friends Reunited. Facebook
in particular has shown dramatic growth over the past few years,
and has literally millions of members. These sites are visited by
millions of people, but because they are essentially sites for people
to meet their friends, the atmosphere is unthreatening and people’s
resistance is low.

The idea

There is, of course, a system for advertising on Facebook, and
the advertising can be targeted to specific groups of people—
your market can be segmented by age, by gender, by interests, by
hobbies, by marital status, and so forth. This means that people
see advertisements that are relevant to their own needs and
circumstances, rather than having to accept a “scattergun” approach
and therefore spending effort on filtering out advertising that is of
no relevance or interest.

However, some small businesses simply say what they are doing at
present (flying, sailing, serving meals, etc.) and thus communicate
with friends. Provided the person running the business has
enough friends on the system, word quickly spreads. Some small
businesses, especially those in inherently exciting areas such as
aviation, mountaineering, bungee jumping, or travel, have made
great use of the social networking sites to promote their services
and maintain relationships with existing customers.

100 GREAT MARKETING IDEAS • 89