Economy of Social - Social Media Tips, Marketing and Business

Instagram started as a iOS only application and quickly became a huge social networking website with a presence on Android and the web. An active and rapidly growing user base has made marketing on Instagram important for brands, small businesses and startups. Instagram has more than 75 million daily active users, with a total user base of over 400 million. Instagram users in 2015 were sharing over 70 million photos per day.  Given its growing importance we'll explore some easy tips that can help you with Instagram marketing.

On 12th April, a popular Indian newspaper published a story, " Who really runs AirAsia India? " It raised some interesting questions about the operations of Air Asia. It stated that " Documents, emails show that Malaysia’s AirAsia Bhd has final say in decision-making, in violation of the  Indian law." Today suddenly after approximately a week I saw #AirAsiaScam trending #1 on Twitter. This came barely hours after Air Asia announced Air fares starting at Rs 999 for flights across India.

"If the photo is legitimate, it seems to have worked like a charm."  Source: instagram.com/kimkardashian This was the final comment of a post on the daily beast on the subject of a naked selfie by Kim Kardashian on Instagram. For those living under a rock, on 7th March, Kim Kardashian barely a few weeks after giving birth to her second child posted an innocuous comment " When you're like I have nothing to wear LOL " with a picture that got the internet drooling.

Follow @Sushant_KM Choosing an appropriate hashtag for your social media campaign can prove to be a tricky exercise. At times it can also determine success or failure of your campaign. A bad choice can result in negative conversations about your. How can you differentiate and make your campaign stand out? How can you make sure that the message reaches your audience?

"Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future" by Peter Thiel has been one of the better books that I've read recently. It not just gives a perspective about startups and businesses, but there are some interesting things about life in general. Following are a few excerpts from the book. “The smartphones that distract us from our surroundings also distract us from the fact that our surroundings are strangely old:” “Creating value is not enough—you also need to capture some of the value you create.”

Rajnigandha Pan Masala, one of the sponsors at Jaipur Literature festival every year organizes a contest i.e #RajnigandhaSixWordStory. It's a interesting brand engagement consistent with the theme of the festival.  Users have to share a six word story and they can stand a chance to win. The event being one of the largest of its kind in the world attracts a lot of participation and so does the contest. This year however it did not go as planned and the contest backfired. The narrative on social media was not about the contest, literature or the Jaipur Literature festival. It became a narrative about Rajnigandha, chewing tobacco and oral cancer.

One of the most valued asset of an organization is the brand. Recent literature in branding points to the brand playing the role of a social actor capable of forming intimate relationships with its customers. One of the biggest challenges for a brand is in building loyalty (or reducing infidelity). Organizations globally spend billions of dollars annually in building a stronger brand. However most brands  do not take a stance, do not polarize.