Business Skills Report: Social Media Strategy for Croft Gleeson Ltd

This report evaluates the potential of social media for Croft Gleeson Ltd, a mobility scooter manufacturer. It explores various social media platforms, their profit-generating capabilities, and associated risks. The report advises Croft Gleeson Ltd to invest in social media to expand its customer base and increase profits, recommending platforms like Facebook, Google+, YouTube, and Twitter. It also highlights the importance of understanding customer demographics and balancing potential costs with expected revenues. Drawing a parallel with Jaguar's successful social media engagement, the report concludes that effective use of social media can significantly benefit Croft Gleeson Ltd by enhancing brand equity and achieving a competitive advantage. Access more solved assignments and past papers on Desklib.

BUSINESS
SKILLS

INTRODUCTION
 Croft Gleeson Ltd. is a firm that manufactures and sells
high-end mobility scooters.
 Victor Croft and Gladys Gleeson are running Croft
Gleeson Ltd. in a traditional way in the premises of
Woolwich.
 Organization is looking to expand their business by
assessing whether using advertising on Social media
Platforms will be beneficial for firm or not.
 Different social media platforms will be explained to
identify their appropriateness in Croft Gleeson Ltd.

SOCIAL MEDIA
 Social media are the computer mediated tools.
 Helps people and firms in creating, sharing and
exchanging information and ideas on networks.
 Dependent upon mobile and web-based technologies .
 Supports in creating highly interactive platforms to help
individuals and communities to share.
 Co-creates and modifies the user-generated content.
 Introduces substantial and pervasive changes for having
smooth communication in between businesses and
individuals.

TYPES OF SOCIAL MEDIA
PLATFORMS EXIST
 There are six major types of social media which includes:
 Social Networks – These are the services that make people
able to get connected with others having similar interests
and background. Examples: Facebook and LinkedIn
 Bookmarking Sites – It helps in making people able to
save, organize and manage the links to various websites
and resources that are available on the internet. Example:
Delicious and StumbleUpon.
 Social News – These are the services by which individuals
post various news items or links for the outside articles.
Thus, it allows users to do voting on those items.
Example: Digg and Reddit.

CONT…
 Media Sharing – People can upload and share various
media like pictures and videos, making profiles as well
as commenting through it. Example: YouTube and Flickr.
 Microblogging – These are the services that emphasizes
on short updates which are pushed out to the one who is
subscribed to get those updates. Example: Twitter.
 Blog Comments and Forums – They can be called as
online forums which helps the members to hold
conversations by posting messages. Numerous popular
blogs and forums are there.

WAY IN WHICH SOCIAL MEDIA GENERATE PROFITS FOR A
BUSINESS (MONEY MAKING OPPORTUNITIES)
 Setting the strategy
 Researching audience
 Joining conversations
 Finding right tools

CONT…
 Creating relevant content
 Listening to customers
 Building community
 Measuring results

THE POTENTIAL RISKS (COSTS
INVOLVED)
 Reputation management
 Lack of participation
 Sometimes topic gets sidetracked
 Two way dialogue and potential criticism

CONT…
 Chances of breach of security
 Trust as part of the culture
 Sometimes people feel ignorance
 Wasting company time

ADVICE ON INVESTMENT
 Croft Gleeson Ltd should use social media for increasing
the scope of their business.
 Firm should make investment for the purpose of gaining
higher profits and to sustain business in the long run.
 In order to beat the competition, use of social media is
necessary for Croft Gleeson Ltd in the present scenario.

CONT…
 Potential customer base - School and college going children.
 Customer demographics – On the basis of age and family
income, that is, 16 to 22 years and 400 to 600 pounds
respectively.
 Potential costs vs. Profits - Use of social media will require
huge amount of marketing cost, however, increased sales
through social media will generate higher profits that would
cover the costs.

REVENUE GENERATED BY
SOCIAL MEDIA

ROLE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN
CROFT GLEESON LTD

FINANCIAL INFORMATION ON
SOCIAL MEDIA

SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS THAT COMPANY
SHOULD USE AND THE REASON BEHIND THE
SAME
 Croft Gleeson Ltd should use social networking through
Facebook, Google plus, YouTube and Twitter as these are
the platforms that maximum people are using.

CONT…
 Will help the firm in grabbing the attention of maximum potential
customers and thus, increase the existing customer base of
organization.
 Would prove to be highly effective for the firm and lead to increased
profits and revenues with strengthened brand equity.

EFFECTIVENESS OF SOCIAL
MEDIA
 Benefits and effectualness of using social media for Croft Gleeson
Ltd can be understood by the case study of Jaguar on "Engaging the
Right Audience. Jaguar has been faced with a challenge of engaging
with a mixed audience without diluting the brand. During the past 12
months, it made use of social media through Facebook and Twitter to
engage with customers globally. Company constantly evaluate the
Jaguar’s channels for continued high level if engagement. Jaguar
launched F-TYPE and posted live updates across 11 global and local
market channels. It welcomed over 35,000 new fans to the Facebook
page. Firm delivered the real world experience socially and made the
social advocates to experience Jaguar. Also, it created an exclusive
video for song “burning desire” featuring the F-TYPE. As a result,
Jaguar gained 1.7 fans on YouTube and has become the third most
engaged UK brand on Facebook.

CONCLUSION
It has been assessed that social media platforms plays a
significant role in making a firm successful by grabbing
the attention of people. It increases the customer base and
thus, the profits of company. Croft Gleeson Ltd would get
highly benefitted if it will make an effective use of social
media platforms in business. This will lead to increased
sustainability and survival of business with gaining a
competitive advantage over others.

REFERENCES
 Grahl, T., 2016. THE 6 TYPES OF SOCIAL MEDIA. [Online].
Available through: <http://timgrahl.com/the-6-types-of-social-
media/>. [Accessed on 25th April 2016].
 10 Ways to Profit Through Social Media. 2016. [Online].
Available through:
<https://www.paypal.com/webapps/mpp/brc/10-ways-profit-
through-social-media >. [Accessed on 25th April 2016].
 Top 10 Risks of Social Media. 2016. [Online]. Available through:
<http://www.religioncommunicators.org/top-10-risks-of-social-
media >. [Accessed on 25th April 2016].
 Steve., 2014. Top five risks companies face when using social
media. [Online]. Available through: <http://techxb.com/top-five-
risks-companies-face-when-using-social-media >. [Accessed on
25th April 2016].