WHAT ARE THE IMPACTS OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON STAY-AT-HOME PARENTS RUNNING BUSINESSES?

By Megan Johnson, Intern at The Digital Arts Experience

Stay-at-home parents have become increasingly interested in maintaining their careers even after starting families. In the past, having children meant one parent had to stay home to care for their child and, thus, put their career on pause. However, recently, 52% of businesses are run from home, meaning parents don’t necessarily have to choose between their family and their career. With the increasing popularity of social media, stay-at-home parents can continue their careers using social media to network, market their business and learn more about their industry, while still spending time with their children.

Social media allows stay-at-home parents to communicate with their customers with much greater ease. Instead of using word-of-mouth to spread the word about their businesses, these parents can work from their home to directly interact with customers and quickly answer customers’ questions via comments or tweets. They are able to track their social media accounts’ analytics to evaluate their marketing techniques and see how many people are seeing and responding to the posts. Communicating over social media allows for fast, easy engagement with both present and future customers. Therefore, although these parents are working at home, they still remain accessible to their clients.

Social media is an excellent tool for stay-at-home parents to use with their businesses because of their constant networking. Of course, working from home can require extra amounts of motivation and focus, but a successful entrepreneur has the determination and ability to take their success into their own hands. Scarlet Paollcchi is a good example of using social media to her advantage and advancing her career goals right from her own home. As Scarlet Paollcchi, a “mompreneur” herself, says about using social media, “Networking seems to be part of the package of being a stay-at-home mom, so I naturally started building networks…We love to share things that we enjoy doing…And social media is the most effective way for us to communicate with all our peers at once.” Furthermore, instead of arranging meetings or events to network and meet new clients, social media makes it easy to target different groups on your own time without ever leaving your home office.

Stay-at-home parents also use social media as a simpler way to market their businesses. Social media can make all the difference when marketing a business by allowing you to inexpensively build and develop your brand. According to the Internet Advertising Bureau UK Survey, 80% of consumers would be more likely to buy a brand just by being exposed to the brand on social media and 83% of those exposed to the brand would try those products. Stay-at-home parents can promote new products at little to no cost with just a click of a button and post on all of their social media sites. Building a brand identity is essential in determining how a customer will perceive a company. Luckily, social media makes it easy to coordinate and reinforce a brand identity to a large amount of people in a short amount of time.

Incorporating social media into an at-home business can allow stay-at-home parents to stay up to date on the latest news in their industry. Facebook’s newsfeed and Twitter’s timeline allow you to follow relevant contacts in your industry and keep up with industry changes as they occur. Reading articles from industry experts can give stay-at-home parents the tips and advice they need to run their businesses, instead of having them figure it all out on their own or miss important news in their fields of interest. Using social media is a great way to keep learning about running a business, all from the comfort of your home.

Just because you’re a stay-at-home parent doesn’t mean you have to give up your career life. Social media has made it easier than ever to run an at-home business without losing out by not working in an office. You can stay actively engaged with your clients and reach out to new ones, promote your products, establish and reinforce your brand identity, measure your reach, and stay up-to-date on new industry information. Today, social media marketing is a crucial aspect of running a business and can make all the difference in its success.

Additional reporting by Remy Kuhn, Intern at The Digital Arts Experience

Sources:
http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0611/6-ways-social-media-helps-home-based-businesses.aspx
http://www.startupnation.com/business-articles/9697/1/social-media-moms-style.htm
http://www.workingmother.com/content/work-home-your-online-business-and-social-media-surprises
http://www.mnn.com/money/sustainable-business-practices/blogs/fact-social-media-is-good-for-business#
http://www.tkgenius.com/2013/07/home-based-businesses-that-made-it-big-with-social-media-vol-6/
http://voices.yahoo.com/starting-home-based-social-media-marketing-business-7154964.html?cat=3