Social Media: Moving from isolation to all-inclusive integration for brands

June 30 has come to be observed as a day dedicated to social media, and this year marks the seventh annual official global celebration. Social Media Day was launched by Mashable in 2010 as a way to recognise and celebrate social media’s impact on global communication.

On this occasion, AdGully spoke to a few industry stalwarts to find out what path or direction they would want the social media sector to move towards.

Karthik Nagarajan, National Director – Content & Social Media, GroupM:
“For brands, the medium has metamorphosed continuously over the last few years. While it is still at the centre of customer centricity, social platforms are today more than just communities for brands. They are anchoring platforms for content marketing and probably the richest source of consumer insight.”

Sanjay Mehta, Co-CEO of Mirum India:
“As an agency, we have evolved from being a pure social media agency to being more of a 360-degree digital agency. Earlier, social used to be in isolation, where you go and do communication. But today, with all the changes that have happened in the platforms as well as the digital world, social media is one of the integral components of the digital mix that needs to be seen in the larger framework of a digital strategy that any company or any brand has. It is an important component, but it is not sitting in isolation anymore. So what one would expect brands and brands manager to look at in social media today or in digital is to think of it is as an integral part of their business and not just marketing. And think of areas like how does digital play a role in the overall business like in addition to marketing are there areas in customer service, in operations, in internal communication, interaction between employees, offices. Also, how is social and digital media been an integral part of the processing. How they can lead an organisation structure to support it and then how they can mend a strategy to make it work.”

Zafar Rais, CEO, MindShift Interactive:
“Social media is the most influential and high-impact marketing instrument currently. Owing to the smartphone revolution, the number of people using the Internet continues to grow exponentially even in developing economies like India, adding millions of new users annually. This year witnessed the rise of mobile shopping and conversational commerce building a strong hold in the social media space. We also saw drastic shifts in the form of Instagram’s new logo, Twitter’s extension of their character limit to Facebook creating more effective call to actions, launching Audience Network and introducing 360-degree experiences, and the huge LinkedIn and Microsoft association, which promise to bring about another significant change in the way social media is perceived. #SocialMediaDay is an excellent platform to recognise marketers who put in all there is to create new stories and engagements and customers who make social media what it is today. It marks the evolution of this space over the years and the increasing dependency of the world on social media to provide solutions as per personal preferences. Social media is only set to see further advancement, transforming into a business front line and become a powerhouse of data providing recognised return on investment measures to the users’ advantage.”

Nimesh Shah, Head Maven, Windchimes Communications:
“Social media has started becoming mainstream form of communication for various industries and sectors. In lieu of that, it is only befitting for brands and agencies to start showing tangible ROI for all the campaigns carried out. This medium should generate confidence in companies to prepare digital only strategies for their brands and create successful examples of it. As way forward, newer models of measuring success will have to worked out to drive the adage that ‘conversations leading to commerce’ holds relevance, and importantly, value. Social media could deliver that in isolation or in conjunction with other mediums as part of larger brand campaign.”

Shubho Sengupta, Brand Consultant:
“I’d like it to be more inclusive, more regional. Support more dialects, not just languages.”