You probably asking me, after reading golf equipment industry in social media (part 2) why do I emphasize the importance/role of social media in golf product communication and how it will gear up sales.
Starting point is 72% today's consumers do not trust advertisers. Their attention span is limited to 2-5 seconds. The very same consumers will pay attention to those news, information that matters to them and they believe in. My impression is that people do not forward interesting findings by email they just simply add them to their Facebook/Twitter profile or bookmark it to one of the social bookmarking sites (e.g. del.icio.us, digg.com, reddit.com etc.
Therefore today's marketing is not anymore about advertisements, but rather about how we can generate such content that able to preoccupy/engage prospects' interest and motivate them to forward to peer group members. Such forwarded messages will motivate people to renew their golf clubs and golf balls since they are coming from a reliable source, from their friend or somebody who they consider as a trustful person/company. When we create a brand page on Facebook or on Twitter or trust (our credibility indicator) level will depend on our followers' and fans' number. Two other increments are shift in attitude and golf brand preference. Why does it work better in public/social format?
We must be aware of that basic human need to pertain to/be part of a group where people share same ideas, values etc. Thanks to web 2.0 technologies not just people can be connected but also companies and golf brands as well. This allows us to create communities (or with the words of Seth Godin: tribes) or simply to join existing ones or combine number of communities together. Since we have less time to live social life, social networking platforms as Facebook, Ning, Twitter, Squidoo etc. are providing solutions to bridge the situation. Thus friendships will gain a new dimension.