This Economy Can't Hold-Up Social Media for Long: The Impending Domino Effect
People have this strange belief that social media will prop up their business, and among an economic disaster, will sustain generous revenue flows for years to come. They could not be further from the truth. To just set up a blog in hopes of implementing a social media plan that works is like moving to Los Angeles and setting up shop to become the next James Dean or Marilyn Monroe. Why do I choose these two particular actors for comparison?
The main reason why is that, if you make it in social media then you can just as easily see yourself in a social media "Boulevard of Broken Dreams" poster. Below, I put forth four different variables as to why this is true.
1. As traffic increases to your social media platform, so do the costs. If you think your lonely, sole web server is going to support millions upon millions of visitors per day, think again. It would be like going to war with one tank.
Therefore, as things progress, you're going to need more tech personnel including battalions of programmers in all different languages. You're going to require marketing employees to ensure that your empire does not fall. You're going to need user support (regardless of what country it is in, it's very expensive). You're going to need to managers to set up shop and keep things running. You're going to need a crew to clean up after the aforementioned crew.
2. Additionally, you're going to have to figure out a textbook way to compete with the big-boys like Facebook. This is not to mention that Facebook is currently having economic trouble; you'll need good luck on that end. You're going to have to keep your users inundated with fresh content that is more cutting edge, interesting and pertinent to the end-user than the last idea. Success in social media is like being a goldfish in a pond surrounded by sharks. Make one wrong move and you can end up like MySpace.
3. You're going to have to swing advertising over from the current giants via a better marketing plan. This is where your marketing department comes into battle. However, this marketing department, if competent is going to break your piggybank. Also, with this economy, nobody is loving nor are they putting much weight in compensation via the form of stock options. 1999 is a now just another year in our past.
Another reason why corporate equity is not too sought after is that too many saw the stocks that they actually owned go down the drains when many sold at the bottom in 2008 - 2009. So, get ready to pay them in cash. You still must remember that to remain competitive, become accustomed to the fact that your internal accountants are going to complain about two things.
The first thing they are going to complain about is how much more money the marketing department is going to make compared to them. The second is how much the payment of your cool, hip and fresh marketing department is going to hurt the bottom line. However, until Quicken comes up with a replacement for a marketing department, you're in knee deep.
4. You're going to have a harder or the hardest time getting people with guess what to your social media platform? The answer is money. While all the hits are coming to your website and you're cool with the Justin Beiber crowd, the actual money is out working for a living. They don't have time to learn nor be Tweeted all day regarding how good or how bad the latest Leonardo DiCaprio movie was. With a 9.5% unemployment rate, Sally who wants a new designer Poodle is probably going to have to wait. The same goes for deriving profit from your new social media platform. Trust me, it is more of a curse than a blessing.
