Effectiveness of Corporate Social Media Activities to Increase Relational Outcomes

This study applies social media analytics to investigate the impact of different corporate social media activities on user word of mouth and attitudinal loyalty. We conduct a multilevel analysis of approximately 5 million tweets regarding the main Twitter accounts of 28 large global companies. We empirically identify different social media activities in terms of social media management strategies (using social media management tools or the web-frontend client), account types (broadcasting or receiving information), and communicative approaches (conversational or disseminative). We find positive effects of social media management tools, broadcasting accounts, and conversational communication on public perception

Factors influencing effective electronic word-of-mouth marketing

Marketing serves to satisfy customer needs and wants while building strong customer relationships in an effort to gain value from customers in return. On understanding that customer satisfaction is needed for a business to survive and grow, the important role marketing plays within a business is emphasised as it contributes to overall business performance. Building relationships also emphasises the importance of communication within marketing. Traditional person-to-person word-of-mouth communication has always played a role in marketing a product or service. The evolution of technology over recent years has enabled electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM), which is frequently carried out and has proven to be another effective marketing tool. Due to the fundamental role that marketing plays within a business and the frequent use of electronic word-of-mouth as a marketing tool it is important that business owners and marketers are aware of the factors influencing the effectiveness of it. This study explores eWOM from a marketing perspective, through investigating the factors that contribute towards the effectiveness of eWOM as a marketing tool. Therefore the primary objective of the study was to investigate the factors influencing effective eWOM marketing. A quantitative research approach was followed to empirically test the hypotheses and determine whether relationships exist between the four independent variables (factors influencing eWOM) and the dependent variable (effective eWOM marketing). A self-administered, five-point Likert-scale style structured questionnaire was used to obtain the data. The sample for this study comprised of 360 consumer respondents within the Nelson Mandela Metropole. An exploratory factor analysis extracted four valid constructs namely feedback, trustworthiness, social status and networking as the factors influencing effective eWOM marketing. Cronbach’s alphas confirmed the reliability of all extracted constructs. Most correlation results indicated moderate associations between the variables. However, effective eWOM marketing proved to have a strong correlation with social status. The results of the multiple regressions for the factors influencing effective eWOM marketing identified three statistically significant relationships between feedback, social status, networking and effective eWOM marketing. MANOVAS confirmed eleven statistically significant relationships of which only three were of practical significance. Practical significant relationships exist between ethnic affiliation, current position, years working experience and social status. In addition to identifying the three specific factors influencing effective eWOM marketing, namely online feedback, the need to obtain social status and the desire to engage in online networking, this study has made several contributions, specifically to eWOM marketing. This study has recommended specific online marketing strategies to increase effective eWOM for online feedback, for individuals to obtain social status and to engage in online networking. The hypothesised model developed from the study, illustrating the three factors that influence effective eWOM marketing for South African consumers, can now be used by other researchers in other countries as a framework for further testing or for businesses/marketing organisations to obtain information on the attributes to pay attention to increase the effectiveness of their eWOM marketing. The role that demographics such as ethnic affiliation, position in the business and years working experience play in satisfying the need of individuals to obtain social status in an online setting via eWOM marketing, were also confirmed. Furthermore, this study has provided practical advice to businesses/marketing organisations on how to utilise this knowledge to their advantage when wishing to stimulate eWOM conversations about their products and services. The findings of the research will also assist businesses/marketing organisations to initiate eWOM engagement and communicate more effectively with consumers online to obtain information on how to improve on and change existing products/services or the need for new product/service offerings to retain customers, ensure continuous consumer satisfaction and increase business turnover

Social Media And Credibility Indicator: The Effects Of Bandwagon And Identity Cues Within Online Health And Risk Contexts

Three studies were conducted to investigate how social media affordances influence individuals’ source credibility perceptions in risk situations. The MAIN model (Sundar, 2008), warranting theory (Walther & Parks, 2002), and signaling theory (Donath, 1999) served as the theoretical framework to examine the effects of bandwagon cues and identity cues embedded in retweets and users’ profile pages for health and risk online information processing. Study One examines whether bandwagon heuristics triggered by retweets would influence individuals’ source credibility judgments. Study Two investigates how bandwagon heuristics interact with different identity heuristics in credibility heuristics on an individual level. Study Three explores bandwagon heuristics at the organizational level. Three post-test only experiments with self-report online surveys were conducted to investigate the hypothesis and research questions. Results indicate that different online heuristic cues impact the judgments of competence, goodwill, and trustworthiness at different levels. Authority strongly influenced source credibility perceptions. A reverse-bandwagon effect was observed in influencing source credibility judgments. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed

Factors Affecting UAE Consumers’ Attitudes Towards Using Social Networking Sites in Hotel Selection

This study focuses on the influence of social networking sites on travelers' attitudes towards hotel selection in the UAE. A social networking site (SNS) is a form of social media that provides a platform for people to connect with each other. It is very important to examine how individual travelers are utilizing SNS when they select a hotel. Therefore, the objective of this study is to investigate if Perceived Ease of Use (PEU), Perceived Usefulness (PU), and Perceived Risk (PR) have any influence on attitude toward using social media (ATUSM). The study will use an exploratory research design which employs quantitative data. Convenience sampling technique was used to distribute the self-administered survey questionnaires on different hotels in the UAE. As hypothesized, the results show the positive effect of Perceived Ease of Use (PEU), Perceived Usefulness (PU), and Perceived Risk (PR) on consumers' attitude toward using social media (ATUSM) in hotel selection. Keywords: social networking sites, attitude, perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, perceived risk, hotel selection DOI: 10.7176/JMCR/66-03 Publication date:March 31st 202

Entity Profiling to Identify Actor Involvement in Topics of Social Media Content

The efficiency of using social media affected modern society's nature and communication; they are more interested in talking through social media than meeting in the real world. The number of talks on social media content depends on the topic being discussed. The more topic interesting will impact the amount of data on social media will be. The data can be analyzed to get the influence of actors (account mentions) on the conversation. The power of an actor can be measured from how often the actor is mentioned in the conversation. This paper aims to conduct entity profiling on social media content to analyze an actor's influence on discussion. Furthermore, using sentiment analysis can determine the sentiment about an actor from a conversation topic. The Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) method is used for analyzes topic modeling, while the Support Vector Machine (SVM) is used for sentiment analysis. This research can show that topics with positive sentiment are more likely to be involved in disaster management accounts, while topics with negative sentiment are more towards involvement in politicians, critics, and online news

The impact of social media influencers on consumer perception about the product and purchase intention

Dissertation presented as the partial requirement for obtaining a Master's degree in Information Management, specialization in Marketing IntelligenceThe growing popularity of social media networks has been enabling individuals to attract large audiences on these platforms. This new group of opinion leaders, the social media influencers (SMIs), have massive network potential and influential power over consumers, representing a new type of independent third-party endorsers who shape audience attitudes and beliefs through the use of social media. SMIs increasing popularity and persuasion power are leading companies to start recognizing their value as endorsers and include SMIs in brand communication strategies, with the goal of diffusing brand messages to target consumers. This study is designed to identify the factors associated with SMIs that increase their endorsement effectiveness and stimulate consumers’ positive perceptions about the endorsed products and purchase intention, focusing on source credibility, source attractiveness, product match-up and communication. A quantitative method was used to operationalize this study and a sample of 306 participants, aged between 18 and 57 years old and who follow SMIs, was collected through an online questionnaire. The results showed that all the SMIs’ effectiveness factors – source credibility, source attractiveness, product match-up and communication – have a significant positive influence on consumer perception about the product and on purchase intention, individually and together. The factors with most impact on purchase intention are source attractiveness and communication when studied individually, and source attractiveness and product match-up when studied together. Moreover, consumer perception about the product positively impacts purchase intention directly and mediates the relationship between the set of SMIs effectiveness factors and purchase intention.A crescente popularidade das redes sociais tem permitido aos indivíduos atraírem grandes audiências nessas plataformas. Este novo grupo de líderes de opinião, os influenciadores das redes sociais (IRSs), têm uma grande rede de contactos e poder de influência sobre os consumidores, representando um novo tipo de endorser que molda as atitudes e opiniões do público através das redes sociais. A popularidade e o poder de persuasão crescentes dos IRSs estão a levar as empresas a reconhecer o seu valor como endorsers e a incluir os IRSs nas estratégias de comunicação da marca, com o objetivo de divulgar as mensagens da marca aos consumidores alvo. Este estudo foi desenvolvido para identificar os fatores associados aos IRSs que aumentam a eficácia dos seus endorsements, que despoletam perceções positivas dos consumidores sobre os produtos e estimulam a intenção de compra, com foco na credibilidade do endorser, atratividade do endorser, ligação entre o endorser e o produto, e comunicação. Este estudo foi operacionalizado através de uma metodologia quantitativa, cujos dados foram recolhidos através de um questionário online, e contou com a participação de 306 pessoas que seguem IRSs, com idades compreendidas entre 18 e 57 anos. Os resultados demostraram que todos os fatores de eficácia dos IRSs - credibilidade do endorser, atratividade do endorser, ligação entre o endorser e o produto, e comunicação - têm uma influência significativamente positiva na perceção do consumidor sobre o produto e na intenção de compra, individualmente e em conjunto. Os fatores com maior impacto na intenção de compra são a atratividade do endorser e a comunicação, quando estudados individualmente, e a atratividade do endorser e ligação entre o endorser e o produto, quando estudados em conjunto. Além disso, a perceção do consumidor sobre o produto impacta positivamente a sua intenção de compra de forma direta e medeia a relação entre o conjunto de fatores de eficácia do IRS e a intenção de compra dos consumidores

The impact of e-word-of-mouth, engagement and brand image on soccer fans' intention to purchase football tickets

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Management in Strategic Marketing, Johannesburg, 2016This study was conducted with the aim of investigating the influence electronic word of mouth (e-WOM) engagement and brand image have on purchase intention. The study was based on understanding factors influencing football fans’ consumption behaviour in relation to sports, specifically football. The study involved different aspects, including the impact of social media and branding on consumer behaviour. The literature consulted assisted with conceptual model and hypotheses development, around which the study was centred. Data for this study was collected from 260 Orlando Pirates FC fans at the Sebokeng branch, where participants were all supporters of the football club which was the subject of the study. Data was collected through a self-administered survey. Using the SPSS 22 and AMOS 22 packages to analyses the data, all the hypotheses were confirmed at 99% confidence level. E-WOM proved to be the most influential factor on fans’ consumer behaviour towards purchase intention while engagement showed the least. The conclusion and recommendation section was informed by the results following the data analyses. Recommendations which emanated from the findings were split between marketing practitioners and academic researchers. Maintaining a positive brand perception proved to be beneficial for brands based on the outcomes of the study. The outcomes also proved that the participant ranked engagement on the club’s Facebook page as the lowest factor t influence their consumer behaviour. As there are few studies on fans’ consumption behaviour in the sports environment, let alone football in South Africa, it would be interesting to see more studies done in this field in future.GR201