A recent report by the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP found that Internet advertising is down 5.3% as compared to last year. If your company has cut back on internet advertising but wants to boost brand buzz, promote sales, or improve customer service, joining a social media site for your online marketing efforts may be a perfect cost saving alternative.

Twitter and Facebook are the most popular social media platforms. If we were to compare the membership on these social networking sites to a boxing match, Facebook would be the repeat heavy weight champion, while Twitter is the up and coming underdog crowd pleaser. Even with this grand difference in membership, it seems like “everyone” is on one of the two social media giants.

So which social media platform best fits your business marketing needs? Although on the surface these two appear similar, the way they are used is ragingly different. Understanding these differences is vital to successfully promoting your company through social media channels.

First things first, what is your goal? What do you want to accomplish?

If you want to… gauge client reviews, have immediate interactions with your customers, personalize your company: Twitter is for your company.

If you want to…provide information but not necessarily directly communicate with customers, host contests, and reach a larger pool of people: Facebook is the way to go.

Twitter:

Twitter is considered a running conversation. People love Twitter because they can talk directly with companies and people they do not know. By joining Twitter you are expected to add valuable content in 140 characters or less. Adding valuable content is critical to establishing your follower base and brand buzz. Tweets should not be verbatim copies of press releases or announcements of new products already published but rather a post directed to your Twitter followers.

Twitter provides a lot of freedom. A large company, could have multiple employees on tweeting while with Facebook, your company can only have a fan page. Tweeting links to interesting articles unrelated to your company, providing insight into events or office life is a great way to make your tweets less like a sales pitch and more like a conversation. Remember that tweets are a way to show the human side of your company and a way to talk with your customers directly.

Twitter is a forum or mini-blog that enables and promotes conversation. Regularly commenting on other people’s tweets and responding to comments or “retweets” made on your postings is necessary to continuing the conversation. Aside from continuing the conversation, retweets or hashtags (#) allow you to see what the rumor mill is saying about your brand, search for people to follow, and keep track of trends.

Twitter allows your company to engage your customers in real-time conversations thereby improving overall customer relations. A classic example of how Twitter can help improve customer service is what happened on a Virgin Atlantic WiFi equipped flight. A passenger was not served his meal so he used his phone to tweet about the flight attendants oversight. This tweet was seen by a Virgin Atlantic employee who contacted the flight crew and the passenger was immediately served his meal.

Facebook:

If Twitter is talking to random people on the streets of Manhattan, then Facebook is your 20-year high school reunion. Facebook has “friends” while Twitter has “followers.” Facebook has “fan pages” to promote your company and each fan page is used differently.  Two examples of organizations that use Facebook differently are:

• Sanuk. This shoe company focuses on a hilarious photo caption contest to create buzz.
• The NFL’s New England Patriots. The Patriot’s use this page to include any and all fan information and updates. The page was created to share specific information that is not on their website.

Facebook fan pages have less “rules” on what is expected of you compared to Twitter. That being said, to get the most out of your site, it needs to be interactive and updated frequently. Your clients need a reason to come back to it—if a fan page never changes, why would one revisit?

Facebook offers chat, email, video chat, and both video and photo posting capabilities that Twitter does not offer directly. Companies with fan pages on Facebook are not aiming to show the inner workings of their companies but still intend on interacting with their “friends.”

As far as legwork and time invested to both, Twitter sucks more time than Facebook as it requires more updates and real-time conversations. Facebook does not make your company more personal, but still promotes customer interactions. Before opening accounts on both social networks, determine why you want to be on a social networking site and what you hope to accomplish from it. Word to the wise - if you are not ready to give Twitter or Facebook the attention it deserves, then wait until you are. Both of these sites take time to develop a following, require frequent updates and valuable content.

It’s official- Facebook has become the most popular social networking site in America, edging out MySpace by a slim margin: 7.278 million U.S. users are now on Facebook, compared to 7.255 million using MySpace. To many, Facebook’s surge was inevitable, especially now that it offers one of the key features that differentiated the two sites: personalized URLS.

Over the weekend, over 5 million current users scrambled to get their hands on a vanity username- a feature already provided by MySpace.  Businesses with fewer than 1000 fans or users who created pages after May 31st, when the announcement was made, must wait until June 28th- next week- to register a username of their choice.

As it turns out, many popular companies have been using Facebook for a while. According to a 2008 study by Rosetta, 59% of the top 100 retailers maintain branded Facebook pages. Here are five companies you’ve probably already heard of that are harnessing the power of social media to build an online reputation:

1. Starbucks

The coffee giant uses Facebook as part of a successful online/offline marketing strategy.  Starbucks’ love for Facebook is mutual- Facebook recently announced Starbucks as one of three “Blue Ribbon Award” winners: companies with the “top most creative and innovative campaigns and most engaging pages each month.” (See #2 and #3 below for the other award recipients)

2. H&M

Also a Facebook award winner, the trendy discount clothing retailer has taken advantage of several different advertising tools on Facebook, helping boost it’s international and U.S. popularity.

3. Vitamin Water

The recent “Great Debate: Kobe vs. LeBron” campaign tied in television ads with a Facebook page asking fans to “state the case” for their choice in an online video.

4. Nutella

The fan-created page for the chocolate hazlenut spread ranked #3 on Facebook earlier this year- even though the company spent only $300,000 on advertising and didn’t even create the page itself.

5. Microsoft

Users with a Microsoft corporate e-mail address were among the first to be offered accounts when the service was extended beyond the student user base in 2006.  Microsoft also owns a small stake in Facebook, the purchase of which included the right to place ads on the site.

Facebook- and social networking in general- is becoming a very valuable tool for businesses of all sizes.  From corporate giants like Microsoft and Coca-Cola to smaller, local businesses, companies of all sizes are discovering the value of online marketing and social media.

If you need to improve your interactive marketing efforts, visit our quote center for online marketing services.

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