Beware of social media price sting
Social media is becoming a business phenomenon and with the rise of its popularity has come a wave of so-called "experts" offering to help establish your online presence.
John Lai is the founder of Social Media News NZ and says advertisers and marketers have identified social media as an emerging market and they're making a quick buck or two.
The up-take of social media has been huge, in the United States for example, the number of small businesses using it doubled in 2009 from 12% to 24% according to the Small Business Index by the University of Maryland's Smith School of Business.
The popularity of it for businesses is evident when you see that approximately one-third (1,434,280) of New Zealanders are on Facebook.
After researching eight social media experts, NetProphet found an incredible price range from $300 three-hour workshops to $15,000 for a "well set-up" Facebook and Twitter site.
The most common price range for a customised business set-up of Facebook and Twitter was around $600.
Lai says people should be wary about the amount being charged.
Teenagers and many university students have been riding the social media wave from MySpace which started up in 2003, to Facebook in 2004, to Bebo in 2005 and Twitter since 2006, so while they are new to many businesses, social media is not new at all to the younger generation.
Lai says if you want a Facebook and Twitter site set-up get your kid or the nearest teenager to do it.
He says he cringes at the word expert with social media because no-one's an expert as new sites come up every day and there's no way you can keep up with the developments.
He believes workshops would be better than paying people to set up Facebook and Twitter sites as then clients can be taught how to do the set-up and can continue to develop their sites.
"The most important thing is having a strategy and knowing the market you want to target with social media," he says.
Deloitte talent acquisition manager Richard Long has set up a Facebook and Twitter page with a social media expert and he says it goes further than just setting up a page.
"What people should make sure they're paying for is someone who understands how to leverage social media to help them with their goals and strategies.
"It's more about setting up a presence that communicates your brand, has a target audience, that activates the culture of your business community, engages with people and measures results."
He says social media is two-pronged and you have to get the page set up and in front of people and then keep it updated and interesting to get people to participate.
"You want to make sure your brand is being handled and presented in a way you're happy with as there's a lot of capital tied up in a brand.
"I believe a well executed social media strategy can have a huge impact on brand positioning in the Generation-Y market."
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