Effectiveness of Social Media as a Marketing Tool for Advertising Small Businesses

Abstract

This study aims to determine the effectiveness of social media as a marketing tool when it comes to advertising small businesses. As we all know, social media is a powerful online platform because of how it influences people. Moreover, social media has become a new communication medium, making spreading information about certain things more accessible. This paper investigates how helpful social media is to small businesses and the opportunities it gives entrepreneurs to market their businesses. The researchers used descriptive quantitative research, which focuses on collecting numerical data and using it to understand a specific phenomenon or generalize it across groups of individuals. It is a design that includes the data's description, recording, and interpretation. It summarizes the benefits of social media and how it helps small businesses have more consumers or customers due to its ability to reach multitudes. This paper shows the limitations of social media as a marketing tool compared to the traditional advertising of small businesses due to not seeing an organization's actual product or services. Another disadvantage is it is difficult to measure, time-consuming practice, security and privacy policy issues, and vulnerability to competition. In addition, it can quickly destroy the image of a business by having negative feedback. The results show that social media allows businesses to reach a wide audience at a low cost compared to face-to-face advertising. Social media does help small businesses to build their names in the corporate world and engage with customers. The findings indicate that social media use affects consumer satisfaction during information search and alternative evaluation phases, with satisfaction rising as the consumer moves closer to the final buy choice and post-purchase review.