Social media marketing has become vital for the development of companies in recent years. With the help of social media marketing, companies can reach their prospects and customers in a cost-effective and easy manner. If planned and executed well, social media marketing is the cheapest yet one of the most effective strategies to the promotion and development of any organization or brand. Brand building is one of the most important facets of social media marketing and even celebrities and sports clubs use the social media tool for brand building purpose. So, it is not surprising that many companies nowadays hire specialists dedicated to social media promotion of their brand or company. The companies which are active in social media marketing have marched ahead of their competitors especially in terms of popularity of the brand on the internet. Nowadays, it is not uncommon to see companies getting together with their present customers, future prospects as well as providing support and answering questions through various social networks. Virtually every most respected company has a twitter profile or a Facebook page nowadays and it helps their existing customers and future prospects to interact with them easily. Some of the advantages of social media marketing for companies and brands are listed as follows:

1. Companies can use networks for raising awareness about their brand and their popular products. Many companies nowadays use social networks for mentioning and raising awareness about their best-selling products. Many of them also arrange special competitions, giveaways or special promotions dedicated to just a particular network such as Facebook etc. Websites such as Facebook and twitter are probably the most visited websites in the world. So, such social media marketing helps a company to increase their brand loyalty and to reach a massive new untrained market spreading all over the world.

2. Companies get an opportunity to interact with their existing customers through the medium of social network. Most people nowadays have accounts in social media sites and so, it makes is easier for companies to take feedback from their customers directly through social networks. Companies can increase their bonds with their customers as a result of such one-to-one connections. The feedback received from their customers can help in enhancing the standard of the products too. Most people mention their various preferences in their social media profile and so, the preferences of the customers can be easily identified by the companies through such websites so that future products can be tailored for those interests.

3. It is easier for the companies to announce their new products through networks. Most companies nowadays post new press releases in Facebook, twitter etc. as soon as they post the headline in the website. At times, companies hint at future products through networks even before the products are launched. Social media is a cheap yet very efficient way to launch new products to a massive market. And such press releases on networks are quickly embroiled by journalists and website owners who are also present in such websites. At times, it is seen that news channels and popular websites report the press releases created by companies in networks even before they obtain the blog post from the respective company or brand.

4. The amount of members including regular visitors to the networks are massive. And social media makes it easy to directly reply to a particular update in order to inquire into an update. So, through the medium of networks, any person can easily access or hook up to the company. So, networks effectively removes a barrier between user and the company. People feel free to express their opinions here in order to interact with the company representatives without worrying much about legal outcome.

5. Customer care can also be increased if social media is used properly by a company. As mentioned earlier, many companies provide support directly from their social networking pages. Facebook is a good example where several companies including small ones without a proper support website provides support directly from their official Facebook Page. It is very easy to look into their clients' problems in a very transparent manner and in the presence of other people. The openness in such answers also helps the company in building trust amongst the other customers as well as future prospects.

With the advent of modern technology and new methods of marketing in an extremely competitive market it is extremely hard for a company to stand out from others without aid from social media marketing. So, social media and networks play an extremely important role in the development of a company in this modern age.