Social media is the ultimate equalizer. It gives a voice and a platform to anyone willing to engage

Social media is a computer-based technology that facilitates the sharing of ideas, thoughts, and information through the building of virtual networks and communities. By design, social media is Internet-based and gives users quick electronic communication of content. Content includes personal information, documents, videos, and photos. Users engage with social media via a computer, tablet, or smartphone via web-based software or applications. While social media is ubiquitous in America and Europe, Asian countries like Indonesia lead the list of social media usage. More than 3.8 billion people use social media. Social media originated as a way to interact with friends and family but was later adopted by businesses that wanted to take advantage of a popular new communication method to reach out to customers.

In the past, traditional forms of media were the only ways you could get your message out to the public. In today’s digital landscape, there are assortment of new methods for reaching a mass audience. It beseech the question, traditional media against social media. How do one decide which works best? Or do one need to decide at all?

Traditional media refers to forms of mass media that attract on delivering news to the general public or a targeted group of the public. Traditional forms of media include print visual material (newspapers and magazines), broadcast news (television and radio) and the digital version of those media outlets, such as digital newspapers and blogs. Social media is prompt, while traditional can be deferred. Traditional media tends to have a longer timeline than social media. Traditional media pieces are more final, where social media is dynamic.

Once a story is written on a traditional form of media, the reporter that one worked with on a story may be agreeable to make alterations after the fact to an online piece. If the story hit newsstands or went live on television or radio, possibilities are it’s too late. Since social media is a form of owned media, one have the control to make updates whenever it is needed.

Social media propose more control over the message than traditional media. It also offers greater control over the message. Although one can not control how the public will respond once the message is out there, one has the opportunity to control what is said in the first place. Social media is a two-way conversation, and traditional is one-way. The classical flow of a traditional piece looks a lot like this: the PR pro pitches the story; the reporter publishes the story and the public reads the story. The cycle ends there, until it begins again. With social media, the public has the opportunity to voice their opinions, and boy do they!

The term Cross-Media is often explained as something that includes the distribution of content (e.g. music, text, pictures, video etc.) amongst different media. One commonly used combination is television, newspapers/magazines mobile devices and Internet. Cross media is usually seen as the use of classical media along each other in a creative way. The cross-media sector itself characterize the term as follows: “The cross media-sector provides multimedia products and services by using radio, television, Internet, mobile devices, print and events simultaneously along each other.” In various sectors cross media is combined with innovation and technique. Publishers, for instance, use the word cross media for database publishing; articles, designed for magazines, distributed amongst other media like CD or e-paper.

Reduced cost is one of the advantage. Companies have more power and produce products at a reduced cost. They can then either pass on this reduction to the consumer or increase profit. Another advantage is synergy. They are able to pool there sources of the underlying companies to produce a better product at a reduced cost. The Media is very persuasive. Much of this persuasive power lies in the hands of fewer producers. Bias and partiality harshly restricted. There are both advantages and disadvantages of this global substitution. Social media platform is characterized as web-based and mobile-based internet application that allows the invention, access and exchange of user-generated content. Users usually approach social media services via web-based apps on desktops and laptops, or download services that propose social media functionality to their mobile devices. As users engage with these electronic services, they create reciprocatively platforms through which individuals, communities, and organizations can share, discuss, participate, and modify user-generated content or self-curated content posted online.

One example of social network is Facebook. Now these networks have become hubs that transform nearly every aspect of modern life; from reading news to sharing vacation photos to finding a new job, into a social experience. Facebook is the most powerful social media and social networking site out there. Moreover, it it easy to find like-minded people by seeing their interests. One can readily connect with them using wall updates, private messages, and video chats. Even though Facebook has cleared its privacy settings, many unknowing users still end up announcing private images and status updates publicly. Facebook is full of fake profiles. There is no restrictions to these profiles. An example of media distribution network is YouTube. Media sharing networks give people and brands a place to find and share media online, including photos, video, and live video. One can now upload YouTube stories, polls or post updates which can help tremendously with engaging with audience. For example, one could do a poll on which topic the viewers would like to see next, which not only gets your audience involved but let one to understand what people want to see from your channel. YouTube can help boost your SEO by creating backlinks. Anyone can post a video. This can cause copyright issues, and there could be issues with privacy invasion.

“Social media isn’t the end-all-be-all, but it offers marketers unparalleled opportunity to participate in relevant ways. It also provides a launch-pad for other marketing tactics. Social media is not an island. It’s a high-power engine on the larger marketing ship.” --- Matt Dickman, Vice President and head of digital communications, Comcast Corporation