What’s a better way to start off the New Year than making your brand active in the social world? If you are a business owner or work in marketing and your company still isn’t on Facebook or Twitter, now is the time to get on! If your brand is already on Facebook and Twitter, it’s time to expand your horizons to blogs and YouTube. Here are the top 5 reasons you need social media marketing in 2012:

5. Twitter’s redesign. At the end of 2011, Twitter revamped its features to become more user-friendly. Not only can users navigate anywhere from their home screen, the new tabs and the reply and mention separation makes Twitter usage a walk in the park. Brands can now enjoy larger header images and promoted tweets, where they select one of their most important messages to stay at the top of their page. For more information, check out our article, Twitter Redesign Includes Brand Pages or learn about PMC’s Twitter services now.

4. Consumers are always on Facebook. A new report just released fascinating statistics on the amount of time people are spending on social networks. Social networking overall accounts for every 1 in 5 minutes spent online. Facebook, having 55% of the world’s global audience, accounts for every 3 in 4 minutes spent on social networking sites. Facebook also accounts for every 1 in 7 minutes spent online worldwide. Why wouldn’t you want your business on a Facebook?

3. YouTube views skyrocketed. YouTube videos received over one trillion views over the course of 2011. That’s equivalent to every single person on earth watching 140 videos online. YouTube’s traffic and mobile usage have greatly increased since last year. The site gets 3 billion views a day and video uploads have more than doubled since 2010. It might be time to expand your social media marketing campaign into the world of YouTube.

2. Google+ continues to grow. Google+ rolled out its brand pages back in early November, and since then, it has been receiving more traffic. Every day, Google+ sees another 625,000 new users. It is expected to have about 400 million accounts by the end of 2012. Google+ offers a new way to establish your consumers’ trust through face-to-face interaction with the Google Hangout feature. Think of this platform as an additional way to build and strengthen your online community.

1.  Marketers are looking beyond social media experimentation. Just because your company has a Twitter or Facebook account set up, does not mean you are ahead of the game. A recent survey revealed that 37.1% of marketers will move beyond the experimentation phase in 2012. The biggest factors influencing these businesses are increased understanding of the benefits of social media, development and clear social strategy for the brand, and clearly defined outcomes. (See chart on right.) In order to stay in line or get ahead of your competitors, posting on Facebook once a week will not suffice.

The amount of growth social media networks and marketing has seen in 2011 may be overwhelming for many businesses, but that’s what Progressive Media Concepts is here for. If you are looking to begin a strategic social media marketing campaign in 2012, do not hesitate to contact us today!