Social media marketing (SMM) is the process of utilizing a variety of social media platforms to promote a brand, create awareness for a product or service, educate people, and even provide customer service, and ultimately, to positively impact the growth of a company or organization.

There is more to social media than marketing but for the purposes of the conversation on this website, we will limit the discussion to the marketing aspect of social media.

A successful social media marketing campaign will not only capture the attention of it's intended audience, but also engage with them on a personal level in order to create trust in the brand or company being promoted. Social media can be an important part of any marketing campaign, as long as the process is properly managed, and approached in an intelligent manner--this means that getting the most followers are likes should not be the end goal. Along with other Internet marketing approaches such as search engine optimization, or paid search marketing, social media marketing can play a vital role in the success and health of most businesses.