Write about the Reflective Essay for Medical Internet Research.
Social media can be defined as the platform that allows the individuals and the business as well to communicate and interact with other people. It is the platform that is compute based and can be used when the computer or the system has the internet connection (Jussila, Kärkkäinen, and Aramo-Immonen, 2014). Change and the advancement have also altered the nature of social media these days and continuous rising change in the social media tools these days. In earlier times when social media has stepped into the technological world, the platforms of social media were used as the tool for sharing the information. With the advancement in the technological framework such as development of web 2.0 technology has changes the scenario as well as the use of social media. It allows the users to use social media tools for chatting and video conferencing (Tsimonis and Dimitriadis, 2014). It has been analysed that today, social media has become the part of daily life of the people and allowing the user to be connected with the whole world. Even the students are getting addicted to these sites and get new information about the world.
I have observed that there are people who are getting addicted to the sites like Facebook, twitter, snapchat etc. this addiction has become so severe that people are on their phones the whole day and not getting social in the real world. The world has divided into two parts for those people that are virtual and real. People talk about their Facebook friends and their real friends. This division is somehow affecting the real life of the people (Weinberg, This is the usual thinking of many people that these things like social media distract the person from their actual goals of life. I was one of them. I used to think that using the social media tools will interfere in my life goals and it may waste my time that can be utilised in better way. When my friends used to talk at the their virtual life, I found that they are so much into that thing that they have made distance from me because I was not one of them who is on Facebook or snapchat. They get to know about each other everything from these sites only. I started feeling isolated at some times. But, still I was against these things.
Understanding about social media has changed my view a lot. This is because I thought that social media is the platform that only allow the users to chat and communicate with each other. After having the experience and study about social media, I realised that there are many benefits of using social media in life. Earlier I just knew about Facebook and snapchat as the social media tools that allow the users to communication and post their photos and videos to share amongst the friends. After studying about the different tool such as twitter, YouTube etc., I have realised that these tools can also be used in other ways that are very beneficial. As far as the benefits of these tools are considered, it has been analysed that Facebook is not these just for chatting but it also allows the business to market their products and as the customers we get to know about various products and offers on Facebook (Ngai, Tao and Moon, 2015). We can even have the opportunity topost our reviews on the posts. Thus, this application is benefitting the customers as well as the companies. Another tool that is YouTube is considered, it provides the facilities to all the people to upload the video on the portal which can be viewed by many people. Some of the videos are for entertainment industry and some of the videos are knowledgeable. Teachers are using this portal for posting their education related videos. Thus this site is also helping the users to get the knowledge (Dolan, 2016). This is also a source of marketing these days. Posting the das of the products allow the companies to market their products in very low cost as compared to the television ads. Other tools such as MySpace twitter etc. area also used by the people to share their opinions about any of the happenings in the world. I have realised that there are difference pros and cons of using social media by the people. But the major thing tis that addiction of any media is not acceptable (Jeske and Shultz, 2016). Even if the social media is providing many benefits but getting addicted to such tools may ruin the real life of the people. As far as the benefits of social media are considered, the first benefit that is enjoyed by all the people are making connection and having higher network reach. Social media is used as the platform that directly allows the users to reach to the wider audience in less time and money. The speed of spreading the information is also very high (Coulson, et al.2016).This is because of the high reach and the availability of the social media on internet. Internet is the subset of social media and this makes the social media technology even more strong. Social media technology supports the companies promote their brands in different ways such as text, videos; pictures etc. different ways helps the companies to be versatile in marketing. It has been analysed that the communication can be effective only when it is two way communications. Earlier, the communication involved in marketing of the product was one way because the information is flowing from company to customers, only in one direction. Use of social media has enabled the customers also to reach up to the companies to share their views regarding the products. This completes the communication between the companies and the customers. As far as the cons of the social media tools are considered, it has been analysed that there are many negative effects of using social media. As the media is open for all thus any of the negative post or the review of one customer can affect the purchase decision of another person as well regarding the products. This may rupture the image of the company (Ruths and Pfeffer, 2014).
I have realised that using the tools of social media in terms of marketing the products and communicating with others is good but it needs to be carefully used. It is required to have the proper skills its and knowledge about the features of the social media tools so that it can be used in wrong way. I would be implementing the tactics in my future career. As the social media tools can be implemented in the organisation for better internal communication, it has been analysed that is ill also suggest my organization and the agreement to implement such tools so that the employees of hat organization can internally communicate with the other colleagues. I have realised that even I can use social media tools as the medium to post some of the knowledgeable information and also get access to more and more of the information about the world. Even at the workplace, the social media tools will be used to share the information (Peluchette and Karl, 2008). Making the accounts on social media also allows the employees to have informal communication with other and to circulate the important information. As we know that working in the team is very natural these days. Thus, the companies require better communication medium internally and social media can helps with the same. Earlier, when I do not have such knowledge I used to think that social media is ruining the real society and making the world virtual which is not false but it has been analysed by me that if the people start using these mediums with accuracy and with intelligence they will definitely achieve benefits out of it rather than having negative experience. Thus, it depends on the people that how they are using it (Kent, 2013).
To conclude I can say that I will try to achieve and experience more and more benefits of these social media tools and will try to make my real life better by having better connection and develop myself socially. This is because it will definitely help me in developing my communication and social skills and also any knowledge regarding the subjects and the incidences that I have been untouched with (Van, 2013) Understanding the different aspects of social media has changed my view regarding the topic. I realised that I was wrong but not fully because social media is affecting in negative ways as well. It is the need of hour to have better knowledge about these tools and the positive ways in which they can be used for our and societal benefits.
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Dolan, R., 2016. Social media stack up: Pros and cons of the'big five'. Australian and New Zealand Grapegrower and Winemaker, (627), p.68.
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Weinberg, B.D., de Ruyter, K., Dellarocas, C., Buck, M. and Keeling, D.I., 2013. Destination social business: Exploring an organization's journey with social media, collaborative community and expressive individuality. Journal of interactive marketing, 27(4), pp.299-310.