Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Networks in Business

This paper explores the advantages and disadvantages of social networks for businesses. It examines how social media can be used to connect with existing and potential customers, market products with low investment, and build relationships. The paper also discusses the risks associated with social media, such as negative feedback, legal compliance issues, and the potential for competitors to gain insights into business strategies.

Advantages and
Disadvantages of Social
Networks in Business

Table of Contents
1. Introduction.......................................................................................................................................3
2. Project Objective...............................................................................................................................4
3. Project Scope.....................................................................................................................................4
4. Literature Review..............................................................................................................................4
5. Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................10
6. References.......................................................................................................................................11
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1. Introduction
Social Network is one of the best network platform for connecting with friends, family, office
collogues, customers and audience with sharing images, audios, videos and personal
information.
We have many Social networks on the web but few are most popular and user-friendly. Most
popular Social networks are like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Myspace and Instagram. By
these friends and family keep connecting around the worlds and creating new connections.
Social Networks are free for users to connect and sharing information on this. (Affilorama,
2018)
Some Facts about Social Networking-
 Nearly 50% of all Twitter users have never sent a tweet.
 In 2013, a study showed that 79% of all adults in the United States had at least one
social network profile.
 2.1 billion People in the world have social network accounts.
 Mobile phones now make up 72% of internet traffic on social sites. (Hampton, 2011)
 70 million images and videos are uploaded on Instagram every single day, and it is
steadily rising.
Most Popular social networks in the social media are as per following –
I. Facebook – This is biggest and fastest growing social network and this has grown by college
age group. It has grown from college age to global network and as of now millions of peoples
are connected on Facebook. It has a user-friendly function by which we can find any person
(if he/she already connected on this social network) by searching, Name, location, age,
college, school, working company and place. Facebook also having additional functionality
by this we can target a specific audience and promote our product accordingly to get the best
result for growing the business (Computerhope, 2018).
II. LinkedIn – This social network designed especially for professionals and business network.
Basically, professionals and business colleagues are corrected and make new connections. It
is also providing the place to connect with potential customers, clients and business. Also,
helpful to get the job to provide resume and recommendations on this network. A business
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can hire an employee through this social site as target specify criteria like age, qualifications,
experience etc.
III. Twitter -online news and social networking services provided by Twitter. This is quick
information providing network and a person can share a short message on this and ask the
question openly, follower or anyone who has an account on this can revert on that openly. All
big leaders and political parties, companies have accounts and they have a number of
followers and with that, they relate to peoples. Twitter basically use leader and they connect
with audience day to day life and give directions for growing. Politician are making more
benefits by this (Copp, 2016).
IV. Myspace – This is one of the big social networks firstly but when Facebook came in this
social networking rapidly it is declining. It has more than 200 million users available on this
platform. In past, it was very useful for businesses to make brand and promoting the business.
In other term, we can say about a social network that “it is a media share site on that a person
can share Images, Audios, Video and personal information to other person and can connect
with that”.
V. Instagram- this is one of the most popular social sites basically for photos and videos share.
On this, a person can be popular in a day. It is fast growing and basically, it is used by college
age group and stars. They share real time images on this site and interact with fans and
customers.
2. Project Objective
The objective of this project is to understand of social networks for business purpose, how a
business gets the advantage of social networking, what are this disadvantage of this for the
business. Also, we will focus on how a business target to customers for promoting the
products. It is the best platform for introducing product and business to make awareness to
the customer and grow the business (Futureofworking.com, 2018).
3. Project Scope
Social media has a wide scope for the business, in terms of promotion of a product, introduce
a new product in the market, and connect with the existing customer and potential customers.
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Easy to get feedback from customers and modify the product as per requirement. It is very
good in perspective of cost for marketing with target specify audience.
4. Literature Review
As we discussed earlier social network is the platform where business can connect with the
potential customer directly without spending too much cost. It is also providing the facility to
target the customers and make good relationship with existing and potential customers.
Useful for getting ideas from the consumer and according company make a product for fulfil
the requirement of consumers.
4.1 Advantage of social network in Business -
There are many advantages of social networks which are described below
 Connect with existing customers –
We can connect with friends by the social network, to whom we already provide our services
or in other term they customer who already connected with us by using our services. A
business can convince to existing customers for joining our network by posting an
advertisement about business. Even to getting more connections on the social network on the
business page, we can print the web address on business cards. If we run a store or any
customer visit our store we can recommend to them to join us on the social network by given
web address. This can help to business to promote a new product online and the same
customer also can get the idea and know more about new arrivals in the markets.
 Connect with Potential customers –
The social network is growing so fast and the maximum customer has an account on social
networking site. As all relate to a social network so it is too easy to find out new customer
only by a business. To reach new customer business does many attractive activities to get a
customer.
For example, posting snapshots of new arrivals, offering a sessional discount, festival
discount, explaining about features of product etc. Also, business gets a customer through
referral scheme.
 Marketing with low Investment –
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In the current scenario, none of the social sites is chargeable. All sites are free to use by
customer or business. A business can directly contact the potential customer without paying
money. If a customer has any problem in terms of product, price or service he/she can
directly post to business wall and get resolution as per norms. Even there is chargeable
advertising option also, by this a business need to spend a minimum amount and can get
service from the social site for advertisement (Sandilands, 2018).
Sometimes also we have to pay that amount are not showing anywhere and that is called
hidden charges of this sites.
 Free communication –
As this is social network so there all friends, family members, office collogues are available
so anyone can share the officer, secret sales and other promotions. There is no issue of
communication to others. Even a friend can share benefits of any product with other group’s
timeline. If someone has an issue related to the quality of product, price, logistics service etc.
He/she can share the review on business site and resolve the issue. The business also connects
to direct customer and ask feedback about product and services. And according to that
business cam improvement if required.
As these sites are free so some company do survey by this just the make contacts and put on
Prize so people come online and fill all required information which we want.
 Get feedback from valuable customer –
Every day social media generate mass data about customers in real time. If we figure out that,
500 million Tweets, 4.5 million likes on Facebook and 95 million images and videos on
Instagram. So, this huge amount of data about customer business can make strategy
according to the customer and make judge customer sentiment.
 Promotions and loyalty –
Social sites also provide advertisement facility for the business or other activities so a
business can get help and promote the product and business on the social network on real
time.
 Target customer –
All social sites provide special setting through that a business can target customer for
advertisement, offers, prices etc. to target customer a business gets the help of ad campaign
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on social sites. For example – In LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, twitter we can target
audience as per age, sex, location, company, job title, as per interest, and get data for making
strategy.
To target the customer for promotion the product is very useful functions of these site. We
get good results from this functionality.
 Lead Generator –
As social media marketing increasing day by day. So regular connection with the customer is
helping in high lead generating.
As per the product, we can target specific customer so we can get more calls for that product
instead of general advertising.
 Relationship Building –
The social network is not only for sales and marketing purpose but also it is useful for
making a relationship with the existing customer and potential customer. A company
periodically post the information on social network’s wall to recall the customer for a specific
product and according to this companies make the bonding of customer with products.
 Connection with Business to Business –
Few social sites made as their business to make a relationship in terms of LinkedIn, Twitter
etc. so if a business have any achievement the can congratulate on this social platform.
 Share fast information –
Companies were facing challenges whether information delivered or not to the customer in
past. But now there is no issue, by the social media, we can ensure that information reached
or not in shortest time.
Sometimes we need to share important news in the market for a public purpose so it is the
best platform for that.
 Watch on competitor’s activities –
Social networking helps in providing key information’s about competitors, according to that
we can make a market strategy to target the customer and grow the business.
4.2 Disadvantage of social network in Business
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As we have many advantages of social networking in business, if we talk other side so there
is a disadvantage also for the business.
Following are the disadvantage of social network…
 Risk in Business –
Business handover the product and brand to employee and customer. So this is risky for the
business. If someone from the employee post lowlight about the business or product. The
customer can it negatively and business can lose the credibility. On same time the consumer
can put negative comments on social site and that also impact on company’s other products.
(Marilyn Price-Mitchell, 2014)
 Number of platform for social media –
Today we have multiple platforms for social networking so business cannot decide which
platform is suitable for the business. So sometimes if business select the wrong platform so
they cannot get a good result in promoting the business.
 Legal compliance –
The social network has one big disadvantage for a business that it opens one legal risk like
false advertising, political connections and leaking confidential information to others.
 Results measurement –
Many companies do not have correct measurement about the result so some time business
makes the wrong strategy due to wrong results.
 False information –
As we know, any information can be shared with millions of people within the hours or day
but sometimes unfortunately false information shared and it can cause panic.
 Competitor watching us –
As a businessman, I must know about competitors, and same thing competitors do. We keep
some key information on social site and other people get benefits of that for making
strategies.
 Demarketing –
By social sites, competitors can do demarketing with the false information of other business
without showing identity.
 Negative feedback –
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Social network user has free to any post, so they can post any negative feedback about any
product, company.
Sometimes we can get negative feedbag from own business employees and just because of
the consumer and customer can also put a negative comment
 Time severe –
It takes more time to make a reputation on the social network and it is more time taking to
maintain it.
People have to monitor every social media and respond to questions and give feedback, and
post valuable feedbacks. Even some people may view these feedbacks as negative feedback,
spending time on a social network can help a business to create the last relationship.
 Some other disadvantage of Social networking
- Problem creation in Major Relationships – on social site every day we interactions with the
peoples and make the relationship with the friends, customers etc. just share a picture and
make strong bonding with the peoples but sometimes if the wrong post happened it creation
misunderstanding and wrap the relationship.
- Cybercrime – We can access peoples online any time and it's not good thing always. It is
especially for kids. Sometimes kids can be publicly harassment, even then can-do others.
- Addictions – Young youth maximum time spend on social networking and this is not good
form them. Some Youngers are addicted then cannot leave social media.
- Loss of privacy and Identity – As we all time available online that is because we are losing
our privacy. Nowadays all social apps are showing actual locations through GPS. So anyone
can trash us, where we are right now.
- Theft – Day by day theft cases are increasing because we are available online anytime. And
we put such type post by that anyone can judge where we are.
- No Emotions – Social site is very good to connect anyone and share the things. But it
connects with others without emotions.
- Reducing family closeness – When we do not have a phone, we feel like nothing is going on
around us. We use the social site as we connect with each and every one in society. But we
do not spend time with family and our closest friends. So somewhere we are making the
distance from family and friends.
- Social networking is time-consuming activity so we don’t have time for other activity like we
do not give too much time to family.
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- Many peoples replace face to face contact by social networking. Like we wish birthday to
someone on Facebook or Twitter instead of phone calling or personal meeting.
- It makes a big barrier between who have internet or someone who does not the internet.
- It also promotes crime that is very panic.
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5. Conclusion
The social network is a most popular platform for promoting business, making fan following
and awareness in day to day life. It provides lots of benefits for business and person to
person. It connects a person or business with all over the world and makes it popular. If we
have an advantage on other side we also have the disadvantage of the same network. It all
things depend on how we use this network and how we treat with society. Social media is fast
growing so, it is having the power to make popular in a day but it is also having similar
power to lose the credibility within a few times.
.
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6. References
Affilorama. (2018). What is a social network? | Affilorama. [online] Affilorama.com. Available at:
https://www.affilorama.com/internet101/social-networks [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018]
Computerhope. (2018). What is a Social Network?. [online] Computerhope.com. Available at:
https://www.computerhope.com/jargon/s/socinetw.htm [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Copp, E. (2016). 10 Benefits of Social Media for Business. [online] Available at:
https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-for-business/ [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Futureofworking.com. (2018). 10 Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Networking |
FutureofWorking.com. [online] Available at: https://futureofworking.com/10-advantages-and-
disadvantages-of-social-networking/ [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Hampton, K., Goulet, L., Rainie, L. and Purcell, K. (2011). Part 5: Conclusion. [online] Pew Research
Center: Internet, Science & Tech. Available at: http://www.pewinternet.org/2011/06/16/part-5-
conclusion/ [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Harrell, B. (2018). Social Network Essay 4 1. [online] Academia.edu. Available at:
http://www.academia.edu/7797841/Social_Network_Essay_4_1 [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Marilyn Price-Mitchell, P. (2014). Disadvantages of Social Networking: Surprising Insights from Teens.
[online] Roots of Action. Available at: https://www.rootsofaction.com/disadvantages-of-social-
networking/ [Accessed 25 Apr. 2018].
Sandilands, T. (2018). Disadvantages of Advertising With Social Media. [online] Available at:
https://yourbusiness.azcentral.com/disadvantages-advertising-social-media-5467.html [Accessed 25
Apr. 2018].
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