Communication is the process by which people are able to interact with other people or entities. It is the means of conversing with other individuals and is usually performed with some kind of a purpose. This might include explanation or information. There are many purposes for which communication is used, both formal and informal. One of the most common uses of communication is for business purposes. Usually the purpose of business communication is informative in nature. It is used in businesses for both internal and external purposes. There are various methods of communicating in case of business purposes. The aim of using business communication for professional purposes is usually to reap larger amounts of revenue and profits. There are various types of business communications and these include written communication, oral communication, interpersonal communication and non-verbal communication. This report focuses on the purpose of business communications in the light of previous researches and sheds light on the asp[ect of the usage of social media for business communication purposes.
In recent times, there has been a growth in the usage of social media for purposes of business communication. Data collected from the survey of a sample of professionals in a study assert that the usage of social media has increased the collaborative efforts of the team and has helped them to reach the targets with respect to various professional purposes within lesser periods of time (Cardon & Marshall, 2015). The implementation of various strategies and techniques by the enterprises when done with the help of social media communication helps in easy execution of the strategies.
There are other studies which assert that the usage of social media platforms for purposes of communication amongst employees working and operating at different levels of the organisational hierarchy (Carlson et al. 2016). As a matter of fact, according to this study the use of social media for purposes of business communication within an organisation helps in increasing the amount of cooperation and collaboration and also helps in increasing the intensity of motivation amongst the employees. The use of business communication for internal purposes also helps in building workplace relationships which might in turn help in the execution of tasks on priority levels.
According to van Osch, Steinfield & Balogh (2015), there are various challenges as well as opportunities of the use of business communication within an organisation. This paper aims to discuss the usage of various technologies that enable the implementation of social media for business communication purposes. In fact this paper tries to establish means using which researchers, scholars and practitioners can apply the knowledge for the practical implementation purposes of social media inside a business organisation. The challenges or problems generally faced while implementation of the processes further help to understand why certain methods should not be used or relied upon during implementation of social media for purposes of business communication.
There are other reports that assert the importance of social media usage for purposes of business communication with respect to the external environment, that is, amongst different business organisations. Researches and reports also assert the importance of the usage of social media platforms and enterprises for knowledge sharing and transfer of expertise across various levels of organisational hierarchy and amongst employees associated with different departments within an organisation (Leonardi, 2014). It is reported that the flow of information and understanding of new strategies and techniques or even business processes become easier with the usage of social media platforms and enterprises. This in turn helps the employees of the respective organisations to function with greater intensity of confidence and larger utilization of potential and capacity.
Other studies aim to differentiate the usage of social media for purposes of business communication that aim at increasing the ease of achieving personal goals and those which aim at easing the achievement of professional goals (Ellison, Gibbs & Weber, 2015). In other words, these studies help in highlighting how implementation of social media for business purposes can increase the overall growth of the organisation. The process of identifying tools and techniques that enable easy sharing of information across different levels of hierarchy within an organisation are explained in various studies. Moreover, studies help in formulation and implementation of channels of communication that will enable flow of information within lesser spans of time along one particular level of the organisational structure in any business organisation. As there are a lot of stakeholders related to the usage of social media, the firm generally takes calculated and analysed steps for the execution of the desired channels of communication using social media (Wang, Pauleen & Zhang, 2016). There are different multitudes of organisations that use a particular strategy of business to business communications for partnerships as well as other professional purposes.
Communication with the customers is one of the most important processes for growth of any business or organisation in the corporate field and the application of social media for communicating with the customers is one of the most important methods of connecting with them. This in turn helps the business to cater to the changing demands of the customers and helps them to have comparative advantage in the market as compared to its competitors in both the short and the long runs. The most important advantage of using social media enterprises for connecting to the customers is the use of visualisation techniques and strategies. This in turn allows and enables customers to make better and faster decisions so that both the customers and the firms are satisfied and the customer relationship evolves for the better. The process of conversing with customers and getting feedbacks from the clients consumes way lesser time due to the usage of social media (Jussila, Kärkkäinen & Aramo-Immonen, 2014). This in turn helps the firms to solve their problems faster and hence increase the worth and reputation of the business. The context of campaigns and promotions has also been enhanced due to the usage of social media for these very purposes. The social media pages and enterprises help to go live and explain the features and characteristics of the products and services offered by the firm (Scott, 2015). Moreover, the use of social media pages also helps to increase the brand value of the firm and helps them to connect to a larger cohort of customers. It helps the customers to align themselves with a brand and hence feel associated with the firm.
There are several strategies that are increasingly used by corporate organisations to increase the amount of communication amongst the employees employed at different levels of the organisational structure. The building of the intranet is one such strategy. It helps in building a private network that only people authorised can access and is increasingly being used by most firms. It also helps to break down wider channels into smaller channels for employees working in different departments (Ainin et al., 2015). It makes the use of cross-functional systems operation for cases of utilisation of resources available to different teams. It also helps to set a standard of communication amongst the different employees. The use of chats and messages are also being increasingly used by managers and employees involved in a particular project so that there are easier and faster updates based on the projects and faster exchange of messages especially in case of emergencies. The use and implementation of chat rooms is equally viable and pragmatic in nature.
The use of discussion forum is also becoming an increasingly popular method and tool used for efficient and effective business communication especially in cases of trainings and forums. It help in accessing the forums later when needed so that the information required by the employees later on can be traced out from the records of the forums or conferences conducted. Under certain cases the use of tracking becomes very useful and important as a means of communication (Vernuccio, 2014). It helps in resolving issues in a strategic and easy resolving of existing customer issues. This technique also helps in tracking and reporting productivities of different teams and departments. Internal blogs are also being increasingly used by companies and firms for broadcasting knowledge such that these can be used by new employees or even by experienced employees so that sudden issues can be resolved or worked upon. It helps to recognise and solve past mistakes and make new rules which can be used in order to avoid previous risks.
Although the use and implementation of social media strategies and techniques make it easier to communicate both for internal and external business purposes, there are certain challenges linked to the usage of social media for communication purposes. The first is the setting up of social media goals and objectives or plans so that these benchmarks can help the firm decide if they are on track or not. The second is the application of smart devices in analysing and understanding whether the tools and techniques being used to connect and communicate with consumers are actually reaping returns or not. It also helps in understanding if the business has internally been able to increase the amount of productivity and capacity utilisation for the employees of the teams and departments within the organisation. The third challenge is the monitoring of the feedbacks and issues of the customers continuously and simultaneously catering to their demand fluctuations. It is equally challenging to continuously innovate and improvise the pages and the options on the social media as well as the products and services being offered by the organisations to the customers. Further, the selection of the tools and techniques for communicating by means of social media also becomes very hectic and challenging especially for start ups and new firms that have just entered the market.
The needs behind the application of social media platforms for communication purposes are twofold. Firstly, it helps to increase the size of the target market and hence the amount of revenues earned. Secondly, it helps to reduce the communication across different groups of employees in the organisation. In spite of all the challenges facing the organisation, the application of social media reduces the cost incurrence of the organisations for purposes of connecting to the client. As mentioned earlier it also helps in the solving of issues and concerns on the part of the consumers. It helps in easy analysis of the demands of the customers and cater to the same. With increase in the ease of communication, the use of social media helps in reaching to a larger cohort of customers all over the world. The usage of the social media pages for explanation of product features helps in gaining greater attention from the consumers of the firm. Further, the usage of social media for internal communication also increases the ease with which information can flow across different levels of the organisational hierarchy and helps the employees to maintain transparency. This in turn helps in increasing the total amount of productivity of the organisation both directly and indirectly by increasing the amount of motivation among the employees.
It is thus inevitable that the use of social media for the purpose of business communication apart from all other methods is helping to increase the efficiency of the process. Companies should increasingly use this method for promotional purposes and also for carrying out internal flow of information. The various strategies and tools should also be used depending upon the specific purpose of the organisation.
Conclusion
In order to conclude it can be asserted that business communication is one of the aspects of the usage of communication. It can be used through different methods and the use of social media is one of the measures. It is one of the best measures to use as it is easy to use and has the least cost incurrence. It helps in handling both the internal and external communication needs of firms in the corporate sector.
References
Ainin, S., Parveen, F., Moghavvemi, S., Jaafar, N. I., & Mohd Shuib, N. L. (2015). Factors influencing the use of social media by SMEs and its performance outcomes. Industrial Management & Data Systems, 115(3), 570-588.
Cardon, P. W., & Marshall, B. (2015). The hype and reality of social media use for work collaboration and team communication. International Journal of Business Communication, 52(3), 273-293.
Carlson, J. R., Zivnuska, S., Harris, R. B., Harris, K. J., & Carlson, D. S. (2016). Social Media Use in the Workplace: A Study of Dual Effects. Journal of Organizational and End User Computing (JOEUC), 28(1), 15-31.
Ellison, N. B., Gibbs, J. L., & Weber, M. S. (2015). The use of enterprise social network sites for knowledge sharing in distributed organizations: The role of organizational affordances. American Behavioral Scientist, 59(1), 103-123.
Jussila, J. J., Kärkkäinen, H., & Aramo-Immonen, H. (2014). Social media utilization in business-to-business relationships of technology industry firms. Computers in Human Behavior, 30, 606-613.
Leonardi, P. M. (2014). Social media, knowledge sharing, and innovation: Toward a theory of communication visibility. Information systems research, 25(4), 796-816.
Scott, D. M. (2015). The new rules of marketing and PR: How to use social media, online video, mobile applications, blogs, news releases, and viral marketing to reach buyers directly. John Wiley & Sons.
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