Literature Review On Social Media

The use of social media marketing has become a standard way in which organizations advertise their products or services. Social media marketing allows consumers to have immediate access to other consumers reviews or to post a review about a product or service. There is engagement between the company and the consumer (Evans, Dave 2010). Social Media emerged in the late 1980’s when websites such as Prodigy, Compuserve and America Online. Prodigy was first of it’s kind and was known as a ”consumer online service”. Half of the page is devoted to advertising. Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Hi5, Bebo and Orkut are all social media platforms that are utilized as platforms today.

Social media has become an influential ground for consumers to share their opinions about a company’s brand and products. In addition, it helps in having a strong brand that produces positive relations and distinguish the brand from competitors, is a critical component for effective marketing. According to Dahlén and Lange (2009) “the quality of the product is not the evident factor when it comes to purchasing a product, the deciding factor depends on how the brand is perceived” (Para. 1). This demonstrates the importance of incorporating social media as a tool to promote brands, allow for interactions, and customer satisfaction by engaging with customers more frequently for feedbacks or reviews. Thus create an opportunity for the company to show its devotion to their customers, and initiate good reputation, which can increase sales. In other words, social media has the ability to upsurge the awareness for businesses as well as the brand.

The way that individuals and businesses communicate and interact has radically changed. With the development of technology and the internet, people can connect almost instantaneously and with very little effort. Social media has come to play a huge part in the way that the world communicates with each other. In fact, a recent report shows that in a single month people spend over 25 hours on social networks (“The Digital Consumer”). With consumers committing that much time to social media sites, social networking has become an important aspect of everyday life for individuals—and businesses. Like most marketing activities, social media marketing poses some risk. However, it is advantageous for businesses to exploit this opportunity, and develop an effective and ethical marketing strategy that includes using social media as a marketing tool.

Social media has negative effects on adolescents who overuse it. It is important as parents or guardians to remember to monitor how much kids use social media and when they use it. As a parent or guardian, you must remember that the disorders kids can get from overusing social media is real. Also remember that the internet isn’t always the safest place for our children. The use of social media can be damaging and it has no benefit. Keep control of your children’s use on social media to avoid these negative effects. The internet does interfere with daily

Given the meteoric rise of social networks and the significant implications they have for marketing, the many areas of unconventional marketing, from viral to social media-based campaigns, show significant potential. The intent of this analysis is to for evaluate the companies who are gaining the greatest results from using unconventional marketing, followed by a literature review and analysis of the best practices of viral marketing communications. Theorists and researchers have defined the term viral marketing communications (VMC) as a strategic term to encompass all forms of unconventional marketing (Cruz, Fill, 2008). The traditional buyer behavior model of awareness, interest, evaluation, preference and purchase is being completely redefined through viral marketing strategies today (Kraus, Harms, Fink, 2010). Companies who are excelling in this area are taking a more unconventional and even nonconformist approach to defining their viral strategies, looking to engage with the customer earlier in the creative process, leading to greater participation and shared ownership of the program when launched (Hinz, Skiera, Barrot, Becker, 2011). What emerges from this literature review is an appreciation of how the traditional buyer behavior model is being compressed both from a time and depth of content standpoint. In addition the role of social media and its implications on buyer behavior,

Chassiakos and colleagues (2016) discusses the costs and benefits of digital and social media use in children and adolescents. There are various ways digital and social media may impact the child’s development. The authors explain that digital media may improve cognitive and social development for young children depending on the amount of exposure, type of digital content, and active parental guidance. Additionally, the authors explain how digital media advocates social engagement and community that helps teenager’s development and self-esteem. However, the authors provide plenty of evidence that the use of digital and social media may be linked to the risk of obesity, cognitive development, safety, mental health, behavioral risks, and sleep deprivation. For instance,

The ultimate objective of marketers interested in creating effective viral marketing programs is to create viral messages that appeal to individuals with high social networking potential (SNP) and that have a great probability of being presented and viral by these individuals and their rivals in their communications with others in a short period of interval

As we know business environment is changing rapidly so as trend of marketing and advertising has also changed and is still changing. Long before advertising was only limited till pamphlet and poster on walls. As market of electronics and public demand and taste changed over time. Then company came with new idea to advertise product using film stars and felt they were able to influence public. Social media marketing programs usually center on efforts to create content that attracts attention and encourages readers to share it across their social networks. The resulting electronic word of mouth refers to any statement consumers share via the Internet (e.g., web sites, social networks, instant messages, news feeds) about an event, product, service, brand or company.

The term ‘Viral Marketing’ describes the phenomenon by which a marketing technique that uses preexisting social networking services and induces websites to pass on marketing message to other users and sites that creates a potential exponential growth in brand awareness and to achieve marketing objectives. It is a marketing strategy that focuses on broadcasting brand image and awareness hence motivating a buyer to purchase a product even though it might be more costly than other products. Kaplan and Heinlein (2011) further define it as an ‘electronic word of mouth’ whereby a form of marketing message is related to the company brand or product which is conveyed in an exponential growing way, mainly by the use of social media and websites.

Social media in today’s sociality has become our primary means of communicating. It has also become the most inexpensive way to market and promote argues Chu & Du (2017). More studies argue that social media has simplified the way to connect to students, and offers the quickest way to for universities and colleges to spread information to students (Chu & Du, 2013). Che & Du (2013) also argues that social media is catching on within academic libraries around the globe. Their research showed that 71.1% of academic libraries were already using social media to connect and engage with students (Chu & Du, 2013). While Stvilla & Gibradze (2017) agrees, they also state how important it is for librarians to stay updated with the latest trends of social media to connect with students. While connecting with students is a very important in marketing events, it’s just as important to ensure these events are marketable to students, that spark interest. (Andrews, 2014).

Businesses should research the different methods of utilizing information collected from online content before deciding which one would be the most effective in helping it reach its marketing goals. Further, in this case, we learned about the different approaches to online marketing strategies. Nowadays, more and more consumers are relying on social media to influence what products and services they purchase. Thus, there are companies that collect, analyze and compile this information for the potential value it may hold. In addition, we learn that utilizing online word‐of‐mouth or viral marketing methods are becoming a more effective way to reach consumers. Similarly, LinkedIn’s approach towards helping a client increase brand recognition and sales was by targeting online influencers. However, that approach might not be as effective as the CEO of Umbria believes it is (O’Brien & Markas, 2011). Influencer marketing is one of the ways that businesses are using to bring awareness to their brands. Be that as it may, there is a danger to selecting an influencer simply based upon how many followers they may have. For example, Kylie Jenner has over 100 million followers across all social media platforms. Nevertheless, despite her impressive numbers would she be the right influencer for a company like, LinkedIn? Probably not. Wherefore, a business must ensure that they have established brand recognition with the right influencer who can effectively turn the post into profits.

Viral marketing is one of the most significant tools contributing many benefits to businesses in the twenty-first century. Due to the development of internet commerce, computer networks allow people to have an opportunity to select interesting information for them. As a result, the decrease in consuming information through TV, newspaper and radio while the consumption of online information has a dramatic increase. The reason why the internet has become popular is internet not only provides specific information to user but also have many programs which helps user to communicate in online social networks such as Facebook, Tweeter or YouTube. (Weber,

For years businesses have understood the power of word-of-mouth advertising; both positive and negative. Enough negative comments spread by unhappy customers can have a devastating impact, and it is obviously desirable to have people spreading the word about the positive attributes of a business's product or service. Yet until recently, although companies certainly have paid attention to popular buzz, marketing campaigns have not been planned based mostly, or entirely, on getting people to "spread the word." E-commerce has changed this. A form of word-of-mouth marketing known as viral marketing has proven to be an effective strategy in electronic commerce. The term "viral marketing" describes any

Social Media are an integral part of the integrated marketing communication (IMC), which has been defined thus: “True IMC is the development of marketing strategies and creative campaigns that weave together multiple marketing disciplines (public relations, paid advertising, social media, promotion, and owned assets) that are selected and then executed to suit the particular goals of the brand" (Bennett, 2013). Owing to its nature of generating large user content (user generated content, UGC), its stickiness and user behaviour which make them generate useful insights for businesses, the ease of sharing contents and the viral ability of these media, empowering the users to voice their sentiments, businesses have few choices than to tap into the opportunities provided by these media.

“If you’re not online, you’re off the radar” goes the advertisement from a local newspaper. The statement underlines the importance of having social presence in the World Wide Web. In this Social Network Era, businesses just like individual customers also have presence on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube. The arrival of Web 2.0 allowed users to network and collaborate with one another using social media sites. Just like ordinary people connecting and sharing their opinions, thoughts, perceptions and pictures with friends and the greater online community, businesses also use social networking sites to reach out to its target customers. Customers on the other hand use social media to post either their approval or dismay over products and services. In certain situations, things can go “viral” very quickly as millions of people share one customer’s pleasant or unpleasant experience over the internet. Customers that share information over the internet pour out their emotions which in turn arouse either positive or negative emotions from their friends and followers and the public in general. As the level of emotional stimulation arises, so does the level of virality of an online content (Berger & Milkman, 2011). From a business standpoint, a consumer buzz over the internet can potentially make a lot of money and create opportunities for the business or can easily become a public relations