By far the most popular, social networks connect people to each other and to organizations. Organizations can use these networks to promote products, services, and content. They can advertise to diverse audiences and work with influencers to reach target audiences. In addition, marketers can listen in on public conversations about their organization, competitors, and industry, and use those insights to improve customer experiences and increase brand awareness.
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Examples of social networking platforms*:
*Please note that some sites may be listed in multiple categories.
Visual storytelling has become a staple on social media. As a result, image sharing networks are quite popular and should be part of most social media strategies. These social media sites allow individuals to share images and visual content. They provide a platform to spark conversations, inspire ideas, and promote products, contests, and experiences that get people talking about brands.
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Video-sharing networks can be split into two main categories: short-form and long-form video.
Short-form video typically includes videos that are less than two minutes long. The most popular platforms are TikTok & Instagram Reels.
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Long-form video refers to videos longer than two minutes. YouTube and Vimeo are the leading platforms. YouTube has better SEO, but Vimeo has a stronger community and no pre-roll ads.
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Following short-form video, one of the fastest growing types of social media networks is livestreaming. Livestreaming delivers live video content that typically interacts with a live audience / viewer. Livestreaming is available on almost all popular social media platforms.
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Interactive Media Networks allow their users to connect, create and share content. Quite often, they offer a variety of unique interactive and highly experimental features such as AR/VR filters, musical overlays, and interactive games. These networks tend to be most popular among Gen-Z and Millennials.
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Community forums encourage people to answer questions posed by the community and to share knowledge, news, and ideas. These websites discourage direct advertising and generally, do not have brand pages. Answering questions correctly and honestly in these forums can increase a member’s credibility and that credibility or trust could lead to increased website visits and sales.
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These networks provide a place to publish written, long-form content and can be an important component of your content marketing strategy. Consider writing about how to use your products in creative ways, or post news about your industry to drive more traffic to your website or online accounts.
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More and more organizations are taking advantage of the opportunity to market their products and services using audio. Audio podcasts and social audio networks allow listeners to gain knowledge, share ideas, and/or join discussions in an audio format.
For many listeners, these audio experiences are easier to consume. People can listen wherever they are, including while commuting, offline (if downloaded), or simply as background noise during daily activities. Podcasting is less restrictive than watching a video or even scrolling through a feed.
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Social audio is yet another social media network type that offers live discussions with the audience rather than pre-recorded audio conversations. Like livestreaming, these networks are great for connecting with an audience in real-time and getting immediate feedback.
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Messaging apps have evolved to be more than just a simple way to share text messages. With features for calling, creating groups, broadcasting messages to multiple users, exchanging money, and the option of creating chatbots, messaging apps can help your organization in many ways. For example, many small businesses are using Facebook Messenger chatbots to interact, support, provide suggestions, and share news with their customers.
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For more ideas on how to use these, check out this article, The Best Messaging Apps for Customer Service.
Bookmarking and content curation networks are platforms where users discover, save, and share a variety of ideas, articles, posts, and other content for later use. The purpose of these websites is to discover new content based on shared interests and to discuss trends. By creating and curating content that is current and relevant to your industry, marketers can use these networks to direct people to their website and engage with the community by sharing content to bookmark.
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Review networks allow people to find, review, and share information about brands and their products and services. These types of networks reveal the customer experience. Good or bad, reviews help identify what is working and what is not and provide an opportunity for organizations to make improvements and/or resolve issues. How an organization responds to a review will often showcase a brand’s values and how they handle customer feedback. When reviews are managed well, organizations can build trust and loyalty with their community, which can bring positive social proof to the organization and its claims.
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Social shopping networks create a community of individuals who share similar interests and opinions, and influence each other's purchasing decisions. These networks help buyers spot trends, share great finds, make purchases, and follow their favorite brands. They focus on e-commerce, and the social element makes it engaging and entertaining. These social shopping sites are ideal for building awareness about your brand and selling to a wider audience.
Many social networks now also include social shopping elements. For example, Facebook Marketplace allows people to sell items to their friends, followers, and other buyers nearby, making it much easier to sell used products.
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In contrast to those social networks that cover a wide range of topics, interest-based networks focus solely on a single area of interest, e.g., books, cycling, pregnancy, or home design. For organizations looking to connect with niche target audiences, these networks can deliver high quality relationships, focused market insights, and critical market trends.
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For more examples, check this list of social network apps for interest-based communities.
Like interest-based networks, sharing economy networks also cater to specific niche audiences. These networks are built around the sharing of goods and services, with the goal of improving efficiency, sustainability, and community. Essentially, by choosing to share items such as vehicles, recreation equipment, or tools, there is less strain put on the market to produce goods since purchases are replaced by borrowing and lending across the community. For example, a sharing economy site focused on pets could help a user find someone willing to take care of their dog while on vacation. It would be less costly than a kennel and more comfortable for the pet. If your company sold pet toys or food, you could potentially gain new customers by advertising or offering product or service promotions for users to try.
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Anonymous social networks let you post anonymously. Since these sites allow users to post anonymously, there is no accountability and these networks can easily become sites for cyberbullying, to vent, gossip, or snoop - none of which help a business or brand.
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