Social media is often seen as simply a consumer technology that has limited value to businesses, but you might be surprised by how much proper use of social media can impact it. Here are four benefits your business could potentially see from using social media websites and applications.

Increase Your Business’ Reach

Social media is an effective way to increase the scope of your business’ sales funnel, and considering that most social media accounts can be made for free, all you need to do is upkeep the account and post content to tap a market that might not be possible otherwise. It also helps you stay in touch with your consumer base. Interacting with them on a regular basis can prove beneficial to your continued growth.

Connect with Other Business Professionals

It’s sometimes about who you know in business, and the more people you know and are in contact with, the more opportunities you might have to grow. Social media accounts give your business the opportunity to connect with other business professionals and companies that could be valuable partners in the future.

Research Your Competitors

On a similar note, you can use social media to conduct market research and to see what your competitors are up to. Businesses are often quite vocal about exciting new initiatives they have planned, as they want to increase excitement for their goods and services. You can see which posts people are interacting with or interested in to gain insights into how you can conduct your own business.

Drive Traffic to Your Website

Again, the big benefit to social media is that you are increasing the accessibility of your goods and services by promoting them in another environment that is not your website. You can use social media to get consumers clicking on posts or links to your website where they can then see how great your mission, vision, products, and services are, further enticing them to buy into what you offer.

The Downside

One of the biggest downsides to social media is that you are effectively increasing the threat surface for your business by adding new accounts and avenues of attack to your infrastructure. Imagine if a hacker seized control of your social media accounts; they could ruin your reputation, use your account to spread malware or conduct phishing attacks, and so much more. You need to make sure that you are also keeping an eye on how your social media accounts are used, as improper use of them could create considerable trouble for your organization.

How does your business utilize social media? We’d love to hear from you and to hear some strategies you implement to be successful online. As always, if you want advice on how to secure your social media accounts to prevent hacking attempts and other disasters, be sure to contact us at (415) 295-4898.