Social media has become ubiquitous in the 21st Century. It is part of our day-to-day lives and has changed the way we connect and communicate with each other, from face-to-face to screen-to-screen. Nearly everyone we communicate with has one social media account or the other. From individuals to organizations and businesses, and government agencies, no one wants to be left out of the social media presence.
Following these social media pages and friends can be a great way to connect and stay in the loop about updates, news, changes, offers and trends. Did you know that while social media provide significant financial benefits to its users today, it also has great negative impacts on your money and finances? Read below for the good, the bad and the ugly of social media, and what you can do to improve your finances while taking advantages of the great benefits offered by social media.
FINANCIAL BENEFITS FROM SOCIAL MEDIA
The following are ways social media can provide significant financial benefits to its users:
Job Opportunities
Social media provides opportunities to find and connect with people and organizations you may be interested in. While you may know the people or organizations you wish to connect with, many at times, we find that the social media provides suggestions of who to follow based on the preferences you had set. This gives you access to people or organizations you may not know existed before and who may have a potential job opportunity you might be interested in. By following their pages, you are able to learn more about the organization and have access to job openings.
Also, most hiring managers today search the social media for prospective candidates. Those who keep social media handles under their real names are most likely to come up in the search, and if you keep your page professional and demonstrate your knowledge of the industry and possibility of good fit for them, at least you stand the chance of being invited for an interview and maybe a job offer.
Access to Offers and Discounts
Offers, coupons, discounts! Great ways to save some extra bucks on the things you would ordinarily buy at a full price. A major key to growing your wealth is the ability to manage what you currently have. Paying less than the full price of items you normally buy is a sure way of putting some extra bucks back into your pocket, and when done over time, can really add up no matter how little; in finance speak “every penny counts”.
Today, most businesses are relying on social media to announce their offers and discounts to their followers. Some of these offers may not be readily available in the stores or anywhere else. So following these pages provides access to these member-only benefits that you can take advantage of, so keep in touch with your money while on social media. Don’t forget that “every penny counts!”
Access to Target Marketing
If you are an entrepreneur, you have the ability to grow your business through social media. Social media sites now provide opportunity for target marketing. When marketing your products and services, you could be very specific in targeting your potential customers. For instance, if you sell a product or service for young adults in a specific country, you could run a Facebook ads to target only users in that country say ages 18 to 30. You can be even more specific depending on the product or service you offer. You can target the unmarried or married of the specific age group.
The ability to provide target marketing offered by social media ensures that entrepreneurs spend their resources to effectively reach the target audience who use their products or services and are more likely to purchase. So when next you log on to your social media page, explore ways you can target-market your product or services. Take advantage of the opportunities social media provides and grow your business.
Extra Income for Individuals
Thanks to social media, individuals now have the opportunity to do some side gigs to raise extra income. A lot of organizations and individuals are offering some kind of affiliate programs that people can benefit from. For instance, you can use a wonderful product or read an inspiring book and are inspired to provide a review of the product or service. Social media provides a platform for you to do so in one of your pages. Some product owners can pay you for these reviews. You can also provide a link to the product in your page and get paid if someone makes a purchase through your page (if they offer affiliate programs).
These are just ways of making some extra money by using the social media. So take advantage of this and put some extra money in your pocket. Remember, while social media can help you save money and put some extra money in your pocket, it can also make you lose money if you don’t take extra care to manage and control your use of it.
SOCIAL MEDIA CAN HURT YOUR FINANCES
Here are some ways that social media can hurt your finances:
Influences Our Spending Habits
The most common “bad and ugly” side of social media on our finances is the fact that it influences our spending habits by luring us to spend more through viral contents. We now hardly open our social media page without seeing one form of advertisement or the other. Content marketing is a marketing strategy now used to target and reach potential customers through videos and articles. These may persuade them to buy what they may not necessarily need.
The phrase “Keeping up with the Joneses” seems to have become a common phrase synonymous with effect of social media. You just saw the picture of a new car, new clothing, vacation, food, entertainment, that your friend shared on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest etc.; and you feel like you need those too? Maybe those tweets or shares are getting a lot of likes and you want to do same too? Keeping up with the Joneses means that we are spending a lot of money on these items or lifestyle to try and match our friends’ social media lifestyles.
In a study by Sunnyblog, 49% of the people say “they have been aware of their friends posting online about the money they are spending, with 45% of those admitting that they then go on to spend their own money on similar items or experiences to try and compete with them”. This is called social pressure or social suggestion. Remember, expanding our social media presence may mean expanding our sense of competition.
What to do?
Set a financial goal for yourself! This single action is the first step and the key to taking charge of your finances. Set a goal that is achievable in the short term (within 1 year). Also set goals that you want to achieve in the future. Plan on how to attain this goal. This will be your guide as you work hard to meet these goals; so that when next you want to keep up with the Joneses, ask yourself “is this really a need or a want? Is this part of the plan to achieve my goal or will this jeopardize my chances of attaining my goal? Or maybe, do I need to start saving to be able to meet this new want or need?” With this, you are being conscious of your goal and will help you stay focused.
Future Job Opportunities
As stated above, one of the benefits of social media is the opportunity it provides to connect and showcase your skills for future job opportunities. There is a flip side to this! When you keep your social media handles under you real name, and you don’t keep your page professional, or try to showcase some kind of skill or expertize in your industry, you just may stand the chance of losing a potential job opportunity.
What to do?
If your username is your real name, Keep it professional!
Low Productivity
Today, social media is eating deep into our time. While the time we spend on it may be on something useful, many times, we are spending significant part of the time looking at pictures, playing games, or even tracking the number of likes or follows we receive. Most of us could barely perform our assigned task at work for a few minutes without opening our social media page. The more we get engrossed, the more our productivity gets hurt.
What to do?
Try to strike a balance between your use of social media and your productivity. Create a good time for social media so that it does not affect the work you do. Rather than using social media to keep up with the Joneses, be more productive with it, use it to find new ideas and “how to” of things you might be struggling with, take advantage of it to improve your finances.
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Remember, it is possible to end poverty in Africa through financial education.
