Social Media vs. Social Marketing

You may have heard the term “social marketing” before, but this isn’t the same thing as social media marketing. Let’s break it down.

Social Marketing can be described as using commercial methods to “induce behavioral change”* in order to achieve a social goal. For example, a social marketing campaign may be started to bring awareness about climate change. Some of the traditional tools used in the campaign may be television and printed collateral, but would aim at sustainable ‘Pro-social” behaviors.

Social Media can be defined as the creation and sharing of information, content, or other media within networks or virtual environments. Examples of social media would be Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. In all of these examples, media is contributed to the social web (also known as Web 2.0) and exchanged.

Social Media Marketing
Social Media Marketing is using social media to gain traffic or attention through the use of social sites. One unique characteristic of social media marketing is that it uses third party references, rather than the company or individual, to suggest a particular brand, product, or individual. This contrasts traditional marketing media that comes from the company itself, which is many cases is paid for.