Social Media Management File Mini Project

Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Social Networking sites have taken over today’s world. From what was started merely for
entertainment, today these websites provide a host of opportunities to its users ranging from
marketing their products, increasing awareness on social issues, sharing photos, video calls,
joining groups and forums of interests, promoting an idea, finding family roots, finding a lost
friend, gaming, entertainment applications and so on. In fact the usage of social networking
sites has been so diverse that many people use it for more than just entertainment. Mena et al
(2012) studied the readiness of health students to use Facebook as a platform for training
professional habits particularly in the case of influenza vaccination. This clearly shows social
networking sites serve as a creative solution to many business problems.
1.1 OVERALL AIM

Marketing is of core importance to any kind of business. It can range from promotions and
advertisements on a large scale to one to one word of mouth marketing. Marketing forms the
essence of a business by which the brand name is reached to the intended audience. The cost
associated with traditional marketing techniques including print and visual media is
increasing at a fast pace. The cost of a full page colour advertisement in ‘Time of India’ is
around₹200,000, if not more. Thus it is important to look out for new and more creative
methods of marketing. Online marketing especially social media marketing is a sensible
alternative.
This report tries to analyse how effective is marketing via social media. The report also
compares and contrasts the advantages and disadvantages of social media marketing with
traditional advertising like print and visual media. Today’s youngsters are aspirers. They
dream big and want to be their own boss. Most of them aspire to be entrepreneurs and the
success stories of entrepreneurs are a huge encouragement for them. A major problem that
these entrepreneurs face while starting a new business is the cost associated with the brand
building and marketing. In this era, though the young population is all set to take over the
world with extended technological advancements, many of them fail due to lack of financial
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resources for brand building. It is in this scenario that this report analyses how well social
media marketing can help new businesses.
Therefore the objectives of this report are as follows:

To study the effectiveness and implementation of social media marketing for different
businesses
To study how social media can be useful for small businesses and new business startups.
To compare and contrast social media marketing to traditional marketing
1.2 METHOD
This report uses academic journals, magazine articles, live survey and newspaper articles
which gives an idea about the relevance of social media as a marketing tool. These were
accessed via the library of Amity University. The search keys given were ‘social media’,
‘marketing through Facebook’, ’Start-ups and social media’ ‘Facebook marketing’ ‘Twitter
marketing’, ‘LinkedIn marketing’ ‘social media marketing’ and so on. Various social
networking websites were also visited to get insights on how marketing can be done through
them. Also, in order to get ideas on how new business start-ups are using social media for
marketing success stories of some entrepreneurs who recently started their business were
read.
The structure of this project report is as follows. Chapter 2 does a literature review on the
topics social media as a marketing tool for B2B markets, social media as a marketing tool for
B2C markets and using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn for marketing. Chapter 3 is a critical
evaluation of these literatures studied and discusses pros and cones of social media marketing
as compared to traditional marketing. It also includes the findings which came to light as a
result of the interaction with the Marketing manager of Indigo.co.in. Chapter 4
concludes the report by stating the effectiveness of social media for marketing. It also gives
recommendations to owners of new start-up businesses on how to manage their social media
accounts to generate more profits from their businesses.
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INDUSTRY OVERVIEW
Social media marketing:-
Social media marketing programs usually center on efforts to create content that attracts attention
and encourages readers to share it with their social networks. A corporate message spreads from
user to user and presumably resonates because it appears to come from a trusted, third-party
source, as opposed to the brand or company itself. Hence, this form of marketing is driven by
word-of-mouth, meaning it results in earned media rather than paid media. Social media has
become a platform that is easily accessible to anyone with internet access. Increased
communication for organizations fosters brand awareness and often, improved customer service.
Additionally, social media serves as a relatively inexpensive platform for organizations to
implement marketing campaigns.
Social media marketing tools:
Besides research tools, various companies provide specialized platforms and tools for social
media marketing:
• Social media measurement
• Social network aggregation
• Social bookmarking
• Social analytics
• Automation
• Social media
• Blog marketing
• Validation
Different Methods of Social Media Marketing
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Social network marketing is popularly called as Internet marketing. Today you can find many
ways for internet marketing. Many people who enter this online marketing are less worried
because of its guaranteed success. If you see in Internet totally all types of products has been
marketed online without much effort. Internet attracts many business people to promote their
business online. Social network marketing is grown to such a height that today many people can't
earn without it. Some of the most recognized network marketing tools are Face book, My Space
and LinkedIn. Twitter became regular place for people who have newly entered the field of
social network marketing.
1. Blogging: When you start Blogging or posting your data about any product, you can see less
response from clients. Later it will become big business via blog. Websites and blogs are most
powerful tools for social network marketing when matched with other networking tools. Blog is
an amazing tool which provides many other facilities in addition to just marketing your business.
It also helps you to communicate with other clients in case if you have any problems.
2. Personal website or blog: It is important to have private website if you are a freelancer. Your
website will help your clients to know about you and it will make them clear that you are a
serious freelance marketer and help to make huge revenue via online marketing.
3. Article selling: It is also best and cheap internet marketing method. It is a mode of advertising
our trade just by writing articles and attracting endless number of users across world. We usually
sell our articles to different article database websites and article directories. Today it provided
free business to many advertisers and publishers and they are really benefited through their
articles.
4. Email sending: Electronic mail sending is the best way to marketing. Collect list of email
addresses through portfolio websites and email about your business to all internet users. Your
Email should be attractive in such a way that your recipient will be impressed to get back to you.
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5. Use social networking websites: Social networking websites like Twitter, facebook can be
used to promote your sales. These provide best platform for all who are thinking of online
marketing.
6. Video promotion: Use several video distribution websites for your marketing. These websites
uploads your service to the whole world. All that you need to do is film a video about marketing
and send it to video uploading sites like You Tube. It seems it is the easiest way of marketing
than any other modes since many people will be interested in view videos rather than word form
of advertisement.
7. Press Release or media release: It attracts several public clients and increases relationship
among them.
8. Search Engine Optimization: It improves the traffic to your website by providing quality
web content. It uses RSS feeds and many SEO techniques.
Social networking websites and blogs:

Social networking websites allow individuals to interact with one another and build
relationships. When products or companies join those sites, people can interact with the product
or company. That interaction feels personal to users because of their previous experiences with
social networking site interaction.
Social networking sites and blogs allow individual followers to ―retweet or ―repost comments
made by the product being promoted. By repeating the message, all of the user‘s connections are
able to see the message, therefore reaching more people. Social networking sites act as word of
mouth. Because the information about the product is being put out there and is getting repeated,
more traffic is brought to the product/company. Through social networking sites,
products/companies can have conversations and interactions with individual followers. This
personal interaction can instill a feeling of loyalty into followers and potential customers. Also,
by choosing whom to follow on these sites, products can reach a very narrow target audience.
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Engagement
In the context of the social web, engagement means that customers and stakeholders are
participants rather than viewers. Social media in business allows anyone and everyone to express
and share an opinion or idea somewhere along the business‘s path to market. Each participating
customer becomes part of the marketing department, as other customers read their comments or
reviews. The engagement process is then fundamental to successful social media marketing.
Example-
2008 Presidential Election

The 2008 presidential campaign had a huge presence on social networking sites. Barack Obama,
a Democratic candidate for US President, used Twitter and Facebook to differentiate his
campaign. His social networking site profile pages were constantly being updated and interacting
with followers.
Kony 2012
A short film released on March 5, 2012, by humanitarian group Invisible Children, Inc. This 29
minute video aimed at making Joseph Kony, an International Criminal Court fugitive, famous
worldwide in order to have support for his arrest by December 2012; the time when the
campaign ends. The video went viral within the first six days after its launch, reaching 100
million views on both YouTube and Vimeo.
Implications on traditional advertising:
Minimizing use:-
Traditional advertising techniques include print and television advertising. The Internet had
already overtaken television as the largest advertising market. Websites often include banner or
pop-up ads. Social networking sites don‘t always have ads. In exchange, products have entire
pages and are able to interact with users. Television commercials often end with a
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spokesperson asking viewers to check out the product website for more information. Print ads
are also starting to include barcodes on them. These barcodes can be scanned by cell phones and
computers, sending viewers to the product website. Advertising is beginning to move viewers
from the traditional outlets to the electronic ones.
Leaks:-
Internet and social networking leaks are one of the issues facing traditional advertising. Video
and print ads are often leaked to the world via the Internet earlier than they are scheduled to
premiere. Social networking sites allow those leaks to go viral, and be seen by many users more
quickly. Time difference is also a problem facing traditional advertisers. When social events
occur and are broadcast on television, there is often a time delay between airings on the east
coast and west coast of the United States. Social networking sites have become a hub of
comment and interaction concerning the event. This allows individuals watching the event on the
west coast (time-delayed) to know the outcome before it airs.
Social media marketing mishaps:-
Social media marketing provides organizations with a way to connect with their customers.
However, organizations must protect their information as well as closely watch comments and
concerns on the social media they use. A flash poll done on 1225 IT executives from 33
countries revealed that social media mishaps caused organizations a combined $4.3 million in
damages in 2010.The top three social media incidents an organization faced during the previous
year included employees sharing too much information in public forums, loss or exposure of
confidential information, and increased exposure to litigation. An example of a social media
mishap includes designer Kenneth Cole's Twitter mishap in 2011. When Kenneth Cole tweeted,
"Millions are in uproar in #Cairo. Rumor is they heard our new spring collection is now available
online at [Kenneth Cole's website]".This reference to the 2011 Egyptian Revolution drew
objection from the public.
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General Social Networking Statistics:-
• 62% of adults worldwide now use social media

• Social networking is most popular online activity, with 22% of time online spent on
channels like Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest
• 65% of the world‘s top companies have an active Twitter profile
• 90% of marketers use social media channels for business, with 93% of these rating social
tools as ―important‖
• 43% of marketers have noticed an improvement in sales due to social campaigns
• 72% of marketers who have worked in social media for three or more years said that they
saw a boost in turnover due to social channels (the longer you‘re working in it the better
you get)
• 91% of experienced social marketers see improved website traffic due to social media
campaigns and 79% are generating more quality leads.
• The average time spent by marketers on social media is 1-5hrs per week for those just
getting started and 6+ hours per week for those with 3+ years of experience
• The most popular social networking tool for marketing is Facebook – being used by 92%,
followed by Twitter (84%), LinkedIn (71%) and blogs (68%)
• LinkedIn is 4X better for B2B lead generation than Facebook and Twitter
• Only 10% of marketers are actively monitoring social media ROI
• Only 22% of businesses have a dedicated social media manager
• 23% of Fortune 500 companies have a public-facing corporate blog
• 58% of Fortune 500 companies have an active corporate Facebook account, 62% have an
active corporate Twitter account
• 47% of customers are somewhat likely to purchase from a brand that they follow or like
Indian Market:-
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• India‘s Internet economy is expected to reach Rs. 10.8 trillion by 2016, as the country‘s
growth rate in this segment is far ahead of many of the developing nations, reported by
BCG.
• According to BCG, the India Internet economy contributed to 3.2 trillion rupees to the
overall economy in 2010, 4.1% of the country‘s GDP, & could triple in 4 years‘ time.
• More than 39 million Internet users who form 86% of the total Internet audience, visited
social networking sites in July 2011.
• The total Indian social networking audience grew 43 percent in the past year, more than
tripling the rate of growth of the total Internet audience in India.
• India now ranks as the seventh largest market worldwide for social networking India is
adding Internet users at the rate of almost 5-7 million a month, and at the current pace it
will surpass the US, which has about 245 million users, in less than two years.
• Active user base per month in India is close to 30 Million marks which is still a pretty
large market but not as big as portrayed by some consultants.
• India has close to 10 million online shoppers and is growing at an estimated 30%.
• India e-tailing market in 2011 was about $600 Mn and expected to touch $9 Bn by 2016
and $70 Bn by 2020 – esti the country the third largest Internet market in the world after
China and the United States.
• There are more Internet users in towns with a population of less than 5 lakh than in the
top eight metros put together.
• About 2 billion people worldwide access the Internet and 25% of them are from China.
India contributes about 6% to the world's Net population and the US 12.5%.
• The survey found that more than 75% of Internet usage is among school- and college-
going students and those who have recently graduated.
• Mumbai has the highest number of Internet users (6.2 million) followed by Delhi/NCR (5
million), Kolkata (2.4 million) and Chennai (2.2 million).
• The percentage of companies using social media in top 5 markets is:
China: 82%
USA: 71%
India: 70%
Brazil: 68%
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Canada: 51%
E-Marketer estimates advertisers will spend $3.63 billion in the US and over $4 billion more in
the rest of the world on social networking sites this year. And that‘s just paid ad spending.When
the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) surveyed US marketers this year, 90% said
they were using social networks for their efforts—about even with last year, at 89%. While this
percentage has risen dramatically since 2007, when just 20% of marketers used social media,
growth has plateaued— and shifted to other new digital media platforms instead.
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Chapter 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
Social media has taken over the world in every sense. In the field of marketing, advertising,
brand building, promotions social media is the most sought after method adopted by
entrepreneurs’ young and old. The word social media brings to mind the most used
networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Linked In though there are other social media
websites such as MySpace, Flicker and YouTube. Social media is widely used in various
businesses like small business, banking, retail marketing, B2B marketing, travel and tourism
marketing, financial institutions marketing and so on. This chapter aims to throw light on the
way in which social marketing can be used effectively for business development. The initial
part of this chapter will give an overview of how social media as a whole can help promote
businesses and further down the report, specific cases pertaining to a particular social
networking website used for developing a particular business unit will be examined.
2.1 IMPORTANCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN TODAY’S WORLD

Marie Swift (2006) suggests that placing an advertisement in the print media is not the best
solution for brand promotion. The problem with traditional mass advertising according to
Marie is that, these media appeal to a wide range of people who may not even be interested to
know who we are. On the other hand, promotions and brand building must be done with
people whom we think are potential customers for our business. This can be achieved by
channelizing a greater part of promotion and advertising budget for activities such as
networking, volunteering, hosting events and so on. Out of these methods, networking is the
best that suits the need of the time (Marie Swift, 2006). With the technological advancements
in today’s world, it is fairly easy to be connected with the outside world with the help of
social networking sites. Peer networking is an important way of advertising and this is all set
to take over the world of marketing in the near future. The biggest advantage of social media
marketing is that it can be used for any kind of business regardless of whether it is B2B or
B2C. Also the relative cost is much lesser as compared with traditional advertising.
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2.2 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR BUSINESS TO BUSINESS MARKETING
Michael Rodriguez et al (2012) conducted a study on the effectiveness of social media
marketing by analysing 1699 business to business clients from around 25 industries. The
study proves that social media is indeed helpful for B2B firms in generating new sales. Social
media is the best tool for finding new clients and deepening the relationship with existing
customers. The study assumed five hypotheses as follows: Social media usage creates
opportunity, social media usage helps in understanding customers, social media usage helps
in relationship management, social media usage aids in relationship sales performance and
social media usage helps in outcome based sales performance. Based on the social capital
theory, these hypotheses were tested and data obtained was analysed using the standard
protocol (Churchill 1979; Churchill and Peter 1984). The result of this analysis supported the
hypotheses that social media usage creates opportunities, social media usage helps in
relationship management and social media usage helps in relationship sales performance.
However, the hypotheses that social media usage helps increase outcome based sales
performance and social media usage helps in understanding customers were not supported.
Thus taking all these into consideration, it can be concluded that social media usage helps in
developing B2B sales. With over 955 million active users, Facebook tops the social media in
terms of usage and number of active users (Mashable website, 2013). Thus it is important to
know how Facebook can be used for B2B marketing.
2.2.1 FACEBOOK FOR B2B MARKETING

Although the idea of integrating business into personal life doesn’t seem to be a right choice,
Facebook being a larger community than all countries of this world expect India and China
can help develop B2B business (Handley, 2013). For this the company must have a business
page as opposed to the normal individual profile page. The following things need to be kept
in mind while promoting business through Facebook:
(1) The utmost important thing is to get as many people to ‘like’ the official company page.
Also contents must be added frequently so that users constantly get the news of the company
through the news feed on their home page. This will keep them updated about what is going
on in the company.
(2) Secondly communicate to the customers visually as opposed to text only communication.
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Facebook uses an algorithm which gives more priority to videos and photos than text and
increases visibility of news item proportional to the number of people commenting or liking
on it. In simple terms, if a news item is liked and commented by a few people in the initial
phase, there is more chance that it will be seen by more people.
(3) The number of times updates are added and the time of the day when the posts are added
is equally important. Choose a time which is most likely to hit maximum number of clicks
and limit the number of posts to one or two per day.
Similar to the usage of social media in B2B markets as mentioned above, social media also
aids B2C marketing. The following part of this report analyses how various B2C clients are
benefitted from social media usage.
2.3 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR BUSINESS TO CONSUMER MARKETING

Social media can be effectively used for various B2C clients to increase sales. This includes
business markets such as travel and tourism, banks, retail outlets and so on.
2.3.1 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR TRAVEL AND TOURISM

Various industries within the travel industry are focusing on social media marketing along
with the traditional marketing techniques. The airline industry is one which heavily relies on
social media for promotions and advertisements. Hvass & Munar (2012) studied the
effectiveness of the airline industry using social media for promoting their travel and tourism
packages. Initially a total of 29 full service carriers and 20 low cost carriers were selected for
this study and afterwards three airlines were chosen from this set. These airlines had an
account in Facebook or Twitter or both. The study proves that most airlines use an official
tone/language while posting their updates thereby reducing the interactive nature of the post
(Danescu-Niculescu-Mizil et al 2011). Followers would like the content of these pages to be
more informal but authentic. In fact many airlines have more than one official page which
can cause both confusion and clarity. It causes confusion because fans or followers may be
reluctant to join more than one page for the same company as it would be difficult to
distinguish between original official page and duplicate page. On the other hand maintaining
more than one official page on the social media can help to clearly distinguish between
various functionalities of the company. For instance, content pertaining to employees need
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not be made public to the customers and so two pages can be maintained which caters to
employees and customers. In any case, the result proves that maintaining a social media
account helps increase customer base for the travel and tourism industry and as mentioned
above many companies in the tourism industry are already into it
2.3.1.1 TWITTER FOR THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY

Saltzman (2009) conducted a real life case study on usage of Twitter by various travel
operators. It is interesting to note that different travel agents use different strategies for
marketing through twitter. While Southwest airlines do not address most of customer service
issues through twitter, it responds to all other queries including latest fares, promotions offers
and so on. As for Marriot International which started with relatively less number of followers,
the main agenda was to implement the feedback provided by the followers. The main success
factor of Marriot’s page is that they don’t limit their tweets to company specific deals and
offers. Interesting fun facts are also given due importance. Though Marriot also doesn’t
encourage customer service issues through Twitter as it may damage the reputation of the
company, any issues posted on Twitter are dealt with. For pleasant holidays, the major reason
they use Twitter is to communicate last minute deals to its customers and other travel agents.
Carnival Cruise Lines address customer queries most effectively so that Twitter is more of a
communication medium between the company and the customers. Thus different strategies
are adopted by different travel operators for marketing through twitter. This strategy has
proved successful for all the travel agents because their growth in terms of number of
followers is whooping. All of them have grown to either three digit or four digit numbers in a
short span of five years and this proves that marketing through twitter is successful. Though
the real success factor lies in the amount of revenue generated through usage of social media,
the gain in popularity of these sites can’t be ignored. Table 1 shows the growth of various
travel operators in terms of number of followers.
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FOLLOWERS FOLLOWERS
(AS ON AUG (AS ON 27 SEP PERCENTAGE
TRAVEL OPERATOR 2021) 2022) GROWTH
Southwest Airlines 406,091 1,372,970 338%
Marriot International 13,446 197,089 1465%
Carnival Cruise Lines 8,671 60,556 698%
Fairmount Hotels 4,550 42,033 923%
Pleasant Holidays 2,767 7,727 279%
Holland America Line 1,472 15,617 1060%
Four Seasons Hotels 4,157 49,251 1184%
Another area of wide usage of social media for B2C marketing is in financial institutions
especially in the banking segment. The next part of this report concentrates on how financial
institutions utilize social media for their marketing strategies.
2.3.2 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

Many studies have been conducted to analyse the importance of social media marketing in
the financial institution segment. The use of Linked In which is referred to as ‘professional
Facebook’ is a very effective platform to build business. “LinkedIn provides a prime opportunity
to showcase your business and its employees as experts in their field” (Hershberger, 2013). An
important fact about LinkedIn is that it has the highest average income of all social sites. This
means that LinkedIn is more to do with business than entertainment. These days business
validation is done by searching for the company in most popular social media. If financial
institutions do not have a profile, it is most likely that the company will not be regarded as
authentic. The advantages of managing a profile on
LinkedIn are as follows:
• The company website, other social media presence like Facebook and Twitter can be
integrated with the LinkedIn page.
• Products and Services tab on the LinkedIn page can be customised to suit the
company’s requirements.
• Icons, Banners, Photos and videos pertaining to brand building of the company can be
included on the LinkedIn page to increase viewership of the page.
Several real life case studies have been written about how banks in particular use other social
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media sites such as Facebook and twitter for marketing. The next part focusses on banks
using Facebook as a marketing tool
2.3.2.1 FACEBOOK FOR BANK MARKETING

According to Price (2011), customers who interact with a company through social media are
not discount shoppers. Financial institutions like banks use Facebook as a tool to deepen
existing potential customers. Evidently Facebook is a place where people like to spent time
in. When a company’s presence is felt on a place where you want to be, there are more
chances that the company’s brand building boosts up as a by-product of the liking for the
social media website as a whole. Bank Atlantic is an example which has 2217 likes as on 26
September 2012. The following is the strategy implemented by Bank Atlantic:
• Use Facebook to create experiences, services and values unique to Facebook users.
This can be surveys, games and so on
• Place interactive contents like videos and photos which will drive the customers
towards the bank’s official pages
• Encourage users who are active on the page by promoting their content like blogs.
Just as different tour operators have different marketing strategies on twitter, different banks
have different marketing strategy on Facebook as well. Albro (2012) reports the strategies
used by various banks in the United States of America to increase their sales through
Facebook marketing. For First National Bank operating mainly in Virginia, Facebook is an
important way of keeping in touch with the customers. The posts on the bank’s page are
planned well in advance so that the bank is prepared to counter any queries from customers
regarding the posts. The bank dedicates a person for responding to customer queries on the
page. Similarly Bath Savings Institution believes in a two way synchronisation between the
banks official website and the official Facebook page. While updates are posted on both the
website and on the Facebook page, the bank aims at creating an interaction with the
customers through the Facebook page. An important aspect of Bath Savings Institution is that
it does not discuss products or services of the bank through Facebook. The bank believes that
details of products or services are not what customers want. Just as banks use Facebook for
marketing, Twitter is also widely used by many banks to promote their brand. The next part
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of the report throws light on Twitter marketing by banks.
2.3.2.2 TWITTER FOR BANK MARKETING

A difference in using Twitter for marketing as compared to Facebook or LinkedIn is that
Twitter is more demanding. Frequent tweets should be written in order to engage customers
and this may require an additional person in marketing to keep the page live and updated at
all times (Walt Albro, 2012). Also even if multiple tweets are written, the number of potential
customers in Twitter is much less than of Facebook due to fact that it has far lesser active
users than Facebook. However, many banks have already started using twitter as a means to
communicate with their customers. Baylake Bank has two persons from the marketing
department to work full time for the bank’s social media presence. Baylake Bank is active on
Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. The advantage that the bank sees in being on Twitter is the
nearly real time conversations it can offer to customers. Thus customers receive feedback on
their query in a very fast manner. The content for social media is reviewed every two weeks
and approved for posting. Avidia bank has outsourced its marketing operations through
Twitter since the bank has only a small number of marketing staff. Avidia bank aims at
creating new customers and strengthening its brand name through Twitter. Interestingly
North Jersey Community Bank has about a dozen twitter accounts. The bank uses one as its
official twitter page while the others are for communication between employees and the
bank’s clients. Thus various banks are utilizing social media for its marketing.
Apart from financial institutions and travel and tourism industries, retailers are also on the
lookout for utilising social media presence for marketing. The next part of this report gives an
idea of how retailers use social media for marketing.
2.3.3 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR RETAILERS

The August (2009) issue of Market Watch: Technology suggests that usage of Twitter if
monitored well can help in increasing sales revenue beyond expectations. Many retailers are
already reaping the benefits of being on Twitter. For instance ‘Dell Retail Outlet’ had
704,000 followers on twitter in 2009 and an accumulated turnover of $2 million through
twitter since the inception of its twitter page in 2007. Today it has 1,506,824 followers which
record a 214% growth in terms of number of followers in a short span of 3 years. Fashion
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retailer ASOS is also actively tweeting their offers, promotions and discounts through twitter.
Similarly Fresh and Easy which is the US subsidiary of Tesco launched a new family meal
pack as suggested by its customers through Twitter. A leading furniture retailer in the UK –
Habitat – cautions that twitter usage, particularly the use of hashtags for promotions must be
done with extreme care. The company faced a bad reputation when it used non relevant
hashtags to improve viewership. Thus usage of twitter for retailers is also found useful.
Though the above study proves that social media usage aids in developing both B2C and B2B
businesses, Handley Ann (2012) suggests that using Facebook for business needs may create
a negative impact on the person trying to promote the business. She suggests that Facebook is
something personal and people don’t expect business deals through Facebook. It is supposed
to be a social networking site meant for making friends and keeping in touch with existing
friends.
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Chapter 3
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
It is clear from the literature review that usage of social media for marketing has been
embraced by businesses of all kinds. It is proved that business to business marketing and
business to consumer marketing is possible and highly effective through the usage of social
media especially Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. The next part of the report concentrates on
how social media presence can be increased for business firms and how is it better than or
worse than traditional advertising techniques. It also focusses on how social media usage can
enhance small businesses. Merely implementation of social media may not be useful for
businesses but there should be a way to measure the impact of using social media for
marketing. Thus discussion on how to measure the return on investment in social media will
also be covered. In addition to this the general thumb rules of using social media sites for
marketing will be discussed.
3.1 IMPLEMENTATION OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Usage of social media helps to create a feeling for the customers that they have a direct and
immediate access to the company (Rodriguez et al, 2012). It is more of a pull strategy rather
than a push strategy for business development as proposed by Lager (2009). An important
aspect of social media marketing is that the results of social media marketing will be known
only after some time of implementation. Merely setting up a page on any social networking
site such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn is not enough to generate sales. The most
important part of implementation is that it should regularly and frequently be updated.
Twitter in particular which is more of real time status updates, requires frequent updating and
feedback to queries. At the same time, too many posts should not be posted since it will
damage the reputation of the brand and over populate the customer home page. There are
different tactics for implementing pages on different social media sites as follows:
3.1.1 IMPLEMENTING FACEBOOK

There are several things to keep in mind before plunging into the world of Facebook
marketing. Facebook is not the ideal place for marketing all kinds of businesses. A firm’s
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objectives should be laid down and it should completely match with the Facebook marketing
style (Maxwell 2012). This means that Facebook marketing should completely fit with the
brand being marketed. Keeping in mind the fact that average age of people using Facebook
rose from 33 to 38 in 2011 (Maxwell 2012), a brand which caters to audience in their late thirties
can easily be marketed using Facebook. Once the brand is recognised to be good
enough for Facebook marketing, the next hurdle is to urge people to ‘like’ your page. For this
interactive and interesting content should be shared on a regular basis. The next step is to
engage the people who have liked your page by providing them unique deals through
Facebook. Having done this, integrating the company official website, other social media
pages such as Twitter and LinkedIn pages with the company’s official Facebook page is the
next important thing. These icons must be placed promptly, in a place which is visible to all
visitors easily and there should be easy navigation between these pages (Maxwell 2012).
Status updates, videos, photos, creative games and so on must be updated at steady pace of
intervals so that viewers never think that the company’s page is not maintained well. On the
other hand, do not overload the customers with too many posts. One post everyday will be
most rewarding as people won’t get bored seeing the firm’s page. There should be someone
responsible for keeping the page live and active throughout the year, every year. There are
various methods for this. The easiest is to delegate the work for the marketing department.
But another solution to decrease workload and to increase creativity of the posts is to
circulate the responsibility of posting with the various departments such as HR, Finance and
accounts department. This can be done since Facebook is very popular and does not require
any technical expertise to update posts. Another method is outsourcing and there are many
companies which outsource social media marketing. Collecting feedback from the customers
and implementing them in the business is very important since they are invaluable
suggestions from people who want your brand to grow. A legal media policy for data
protection should also be implemented so that the company’s legal side is also taken care of.
3.1.2 IMPLEMENTING TWITTER

As opposed to Facebook, Twitter requires more real time tweets and hence it is more
demanding. There should be a person in charge of ‘tweeting’ the relevant information at the
23
right time (Marketing Magazine, 2012). There are several points to be kept in mind while
tweeting:
• Consistently tweet at the peak hour of the day and respond to queries directly and
promptly. Do not tweet too many times in a day.
• Plan in advance regarding what to post and when to post. Keep the posts short and
interesting.
• Sharing unique content on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and the company’s website
will urge users to follow the company’s page on all the social media websites.
• Find people who are sharing information related with your business and engage them
in your social media marketing.
• It is important to keep in mind that in order to draw attention from Facebook or
Twitter users who are already busy, engaged and entertained, the company needs to
post something even more interesting which will increase the company’s sales
revenue indirectly
• The person who is designated to send tweets must know about the company well and
he/she must be very much aware of the business language of the firm. Either content
should be reviewed before posting or someone experienced should be given the task
of social media marketing.
• A specific amount of time at regular intervals like morning, midday and evening
should be spent for responding to twitter queries if any.
• Do not just promote the business but promote interesting content such as funny
videos, useful information and so on. All the content shared should have some
relevance with regard to the firm itself.
• Use simple language which can be understood by a common man. Take special care
not to include jargons in tweets.
• Maintain a positive attitude in the tweets and do not get too personal (Gunelius ,2011)
Having studied how to implement a twitter page and a Facebook page, the next important
thing is to measure the outcome of these efforts. Hence calculating the return on investment
from social media is equally important.
24
3.2 MEASURING THE IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING
When a CFO of a firm looks at cutting down costs, the ones most likely to get cut are the
ones whose ROI is not known. Hence, investment on social media marketing is likely to get
cut and thereby the firm will suffer bad consequences (Price 2011). Thus it is very important
to calculate the ROI for social media marketing. Follow the steps for the same.
Track the initial numbers- revenue, average customer spending, website user traffic, new
customers and so on. Make a note of the expenses related to maintaining and updating the
social media page and track the amount of revenue generated from the social media.
Subtracting the expense from the revenue and dividing it with the initial investment will yield
the ROI. The challenge here is that the expense here will be a measure of time whereas the
revenue generated will be in pounds. This time can be converted to currency by multiplying
the time with the hourly wage and adding the computer and internet cost to it. After posting
regular updates on the page for a month or so, calculate the increased revenue (Price 2011).
Apart from this various tools are available to track users who visit a page on Facebook just
like Google Analytics is used to track people visiting a website. The tools available in the
market are as follows:
i. Facebook Insights: Gives data on customer interaction, ‘likes’ comments and so on in
a visually pleasing way which is easy to understand and analyse.
ii. HootSite: Consists of a web application and a mobile application which can be used
by novice users as well to interpret traffic on a webpage
iii. Nutshellmail: Gives reports on social media usage as an email which has details like
comments, ‘likes’ and so on for Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
iv. TweetDeck: Used to get a peripheral idea on who is using the company’s twitter page
and who is coming back.
Similarly, it is important to measure the impact of using Facebook for bank marketing. This
can be done by monitoring the change in visitors’ number when a promotion has been
updated on its Facebook page and by measuring customer satisfaction levels from time to
time (Price, 2011). Since the implementation of social media and measuring the impact of
social media is done, the next question is whether social media marketing is viable for small
businesses and new start-ups. The next part of the report focuses on viability on social media
marketing for small businesses start-ups.
25
3.3 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR SMALL BUSINESS START-UPS
Ankeny (2011) finds out how is it possible for small business start-ups to utilize Facebook as
their marketing tool. There are numerous small business start-ups which use Facebook as an
effective tool for marketing. The biggest advantage of small business start-ups in using
Facebook for marketing is the massive expense cut. Initial phase of a company is the time
when the brand needs to be built through strong PR events. With about a billion population
and around half of them logging in everyday, there is no cheaper medium of promotion as
Facebook especially for small business start-ups. By encouraging people to interact on
Facebook by providing unique promotions, business opportunities and so on, people get more
acquainted with the brand itself. By providing discounts and other offers to Facebook
customers alone, the need for reviewing the page again and again becomes a necessity.
Hence, the page gets clicked many more times and thus the brand building takes place
without much hassle. When Facebook page of a new start-up company is being designed, it
must be designed in such a way that it engages more customers. Thus by increasing the
amount of time spent on the Facebook page of the company, the brand name gets more
deeply engraved into the customers mind (Ankeny 2011).
The success of a small business start-up by Anna Strahs proves that Facebook marketing
works really well for new business start-ups (Ankeny, 2011). She started her own bakery
which baked alternative food which was corn free, nut free and diary free. She started a
Facebook page as soon as she started the company and regularly updated photos and videos
of her progress. Facebook managed her market research, feedback collection and promotions.
While she managed to know what the customers want through Facebook using customer
feedback, she did her promotions by updating posts and photos through Facebook. By
understanding the true potential of Facebook, she invested in Facebook advertisements as
well and the response was truly rewarding. From what started as a business to cater to the
necessity of people with dietary restrictions, the company has grown far and wide and ships
its products across the United States of America. This was possible with a mere $300 spent
for advertisements. This is the true potential of social media for new start-ups. At a time
when financial resources are very limited and brand building is of high priority, social media
advertisements can eliminate the huge amount of money spent on advertisements and at the
same time create a brand image in a relatively shorter span of time
26
Having studied the way in which social media can be exploited for small businesses start-ups,
the next important thing is to compare and contrast between traditional advertisements and
social media promotions and conclude which is better and why.
3.4 COMPARISON OF TRADITIONAL ADVERTISING WITH SOCIAL MEDIA

ADVERTISING
Traditional advertising media includes print media, radio and visual media. In fact, only the
print media was considered to be traditional media but in this context of discussing the
impact of social media advertising and its comparison with other media advertisements, all
other existing media except the social media is considered as traditional media, at least for the
sake of this report. Though social media is gaining importance and acceptance, 45% of
advertisement revenue is still paid for advertisements in the print media Hampel (2012). This
figure can be debated to be a result of the inexpensive social media advertisements as
mentioned earlier. Though the investment for advertising in social media is very less, the
mass appeal is much higher and hence more returns can be expected. Hampel (2012)
identifies that “consumers are becoming increasingly resistant to traditional advertising”
(Pieters and Wedel, 2007). Precise targeting of consumers is not possible in mass media such
as print and television. Whereas by using the Internet as a source of advertisements, people
who are interested in a particular product can be drawn towards the company more easily. As
mentioned before, this is called as a pull strategy as opposed to a push strategy. Even within
the traditional media of advertising, premium print advertisements which are far more
expensive than normal advertisements are being widely used. “More prestigious perception of
an advertising stimulus converges with the advertised brand, thereby leading premium-print
advertisements to be perceived more prestigiously” (Hampel, 2012).
According to Hill & Moran (2012) the interactive nature of social media is the factor which
draws a large number of people towards it as compared to the traditional media such as TV,
radio and print media. Social media is more customisable as compared to traditional media.
In social media, it is easy to find what a consumer needs. Contrastingly, in case of traditional
media, the consumer is forced to enjoy whatever is broadcasted by someone else. Social
media makes it easier to search for relevant information thereby cutting down the time,
27
energy and money required to search for it. Above all man being a social animal is on the
constant outlook towards interacting with other people around him. Traditional media does
not give an opportunity for this whereas social media was actually built for this purpose in the
first place. Though there are some downsides to social media marketing such as privacy
concern, legal concern and over exposure towards public, these limitations can be overcome
if social media is used promptly, wisely and effectively. Thus social media is by any chance
better than traditional media in terms of expense, wider appeal and lesser indirect costs.
28
SURVEY ON SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING
BACKGROUND
This report presents selected results from the Social Media Management Survey for the
Indigo.co.in. The survey collected perception towards the social media marketing
from a representative sample of management students studying in different departments of
Amity University, Uttar Pradesh. Survey methods included online questionnaire to collect
student’s perception towards the social media marketing. All data collection activities
conformed to standard procedures for conducting online marketing surveys. The sampling,
survey design, and reporting methodologies are recognized by marketing manager of
Indigo.co.in.
SURVEY OBJECTIVE
Social media marketing survey objective was to provide consumer behaviour data for
Indigo.co.in. The resulting databases will be used to update and expand the marketing
activities on social media by the organisation. In order to achieve the desired results, the
social media marketing survey had the following goals:
• Capture random students from the management courses within the Amity University,
Uttar Pradesh.
• Collect perception of all persons towards marketing through social media.
• Collect data on which social networking site is more suitable for marketing.
29
RESPONSES
1. Do you think social media is the most sought after method adopted by
entrepreneurs’ young and old in the field of marketing, advertising, brand
building, promotions?
Ans:-
27%
57%
Options Number of responses Percentage

Yes 85 85%
No 15 15%
Social media has taken over the world in every sense. In the field of marketing, advertising,
brand building, promotions social media is the most sought after method adopted by
entrepreneurs’ young and old. 85% people agree with it but 15% of them still believe in the
traditional way of marketing.
30
2. Which is the most effective solution for brand promotion?
Ans:-
27%
57%

Social Media 66 73%
Print Media 24 27%
Marie Swift (2006) suggests that placing an advertisement in the print media is not the best
solution for brand promotion. The problem with traditional mass advertising according to
Marie is that, these media appeal to a wide range of people who may not even be interested to
know who we are. 73% of the people agree with it while rest is still thinking print media has
its own significances. Someone said “print media is the only media which has the highest
reach as it is read by the old and young population.”
31
3. Do you think social media marketing will help the firms to find their potential
customers?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Yes 63 70%
No 9 10%
May Be 18 20%
Promotions and brand building must be done with people whom we think are potential
customers for our business. This can be achieved by channelizing a greater part of promotion
and advertising budget for activities such as networking, volunteering, hosting events and so
on. Out of these methods, networking is the best that suits the need of the time (Marie Swift,
2006). With the technological advancements in today’s world, it is fairly easy to be connected
with the outside world with the help of social networking sites. Yes, most of the people agree
with it.
32
4. Which social networking site are you most familiar with?
Ans:-
27% 27%
2%
17%
16% 57%

LinkedIn 18 20%
Facebook 24 27%
Twitter 6 7%
YouTube 15 17%
My Space 3 2%
Most of the above 24 27%
In today’s world there are many social networking sites which are helpful for the mass
marketing. The objective of this question was to find the website which is the most popular
one. Most of the people are familiar with Facebook, LinkedIn then YouTube. Many of them
are familiar with most of the social networking sites.
33
5. Do you think the relative cost is much lesser as compared with traditional
advertising?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Yes 51 20%
No 24 27%
Depends 15 7%
More than 50% people think relative cost is much lesser as compared with traditional
advertising while more less than 30% think it is not. The studies say that the relative cost is
lesser as compared the social media marketing with traditional advertising.
34
6. Is social media helpful for B2B firms in generating new sales/clients?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Yes 57 63%
No 15 17%
It depends how reputed the firm is. 18 20%
Social media helpful for both B2B and B2C firms in generating new sales/clients. 63% of the
people agree with it. While others think in B2B everything is taken place in a formal way so
it’s not possible to generate new sales through the social media.
35
7. “Social media can be effectively used for various B2C clients to increase sales.” Do you
agree?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Yes 63 70%
No 9 10%
Partially 18 20%
70% of the people agree with this because most of the people are familiar with social
networking sites and they frequently visit these sites.
36
8. Which one do you think is the most effective social networking site for online marketing?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Twitter 21 23%
Facebook 60 67%
LinkedIn 9 10%
It shows that most of the people are familiar with Facebook in comparison with other sites
like Twitter and LinkedIn. Cab providers like Ola Cabs and Taxi For Sure are more active in
Twitter than facebook. So it depends on different industries.
37
9. Do you follow your favourite brands on social networking sites like Facebook, twitter
and LinkedIn?
Ans:-
27%
57%

Yes 78 87%
No 12 13%
Most of the people do follow their favourite brands in Facebook and twitter to know about
their offerings and all.
38
10. If yes, why do you follow them?
Ans:-
16%
27%
57%

Just because you like those brands 24 27%
You’re very keen to know about
their new offerings. 51 57%
To know how well they are in
marketing. 15 16%
27% of people follow their favourite brands just because you like those brands. 57% are very
keen to know about their new offerings while 17% follow to know how well they are in
marketing.
39
CHAPTER 4
Key Challenges Posed by Social Media

Despite the fact that social media play the vital roles such as communication, collaboration,
education etc, it poses few major challenges too. The following are the most prominent challenges
posed by the social media.
Privacy: The primary challenge posed by the social media is the privacy. Many people restrain
themselves from taking part in a dialogue with a fear of losing their privacy.
• Access for those with disabilities: Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of the US
provides guidelines for making federal websites accessible to people with disabilities, including
the visually and hearing impaired. A brief on this act is appended below: In 1998 the US Congress
amended the Rehabilitation Act to require Federal agencies to make their electronic and
information technology accessible to people with disabilities. Section 508 was enacted to eliminate
barriers in information technology, to make available new opportunities for people with
disabilities, and to encourage development of technologies that will help achieve these goals.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_508_Amendment_to_the_Rehabilitation_Act_of_1973)
This section provides guidelines for making federal websites accessible to people with disabilities,
including the visually and hearing impaired. There is a need for the formulation and
implementation of such guidelines to remove the barriers for differently abled people. Such an
issue should be taken up for the better implementation, both in letter and spirit.
• Commercial advertising on social media: Advertising on social media should follow the
formalities of censor; and porn content in advertisements should be avoided on the websites,
intended for the very purpose of social networking. If such restrictions are not imposed, strictly, it
may ruin the minds of youth, thereby indirectly increasing the crime rate. This is one of the vital
challenges posed by the social media in the contemporary web world.
• Terms of agreements: Most of the social media sites allow the audience to create an account,
after accepting terms of agreement, which are often vague. The terms of agreement can be
interpreted in multiple ways. They pose a threat, indirectly. Most of the social networking websites
get an agreement accepted by the users that their information can be used by the owners of the
social media. It indirectly causes invasion of privacy. Such a challenge is one of the crucial
confront posed by the social media.
• Security Concerns: Social media sites pose an equal threat to the security of personal
information and other concerned data. Hacking of the websites is the most common feature; with
hacking there is an imminent threat to the audience of social media. This turns to be another key
challenge posed by the social media.
40
• Deception: The identity of the individual who joins the social networking sites may either
original or fake. The veracity of his/her identity is not known to the fellow user. In the recent past,
many cases of deception around the world have been registered. Social media turns to be an easy
way of deceiving people using the technology.
41
Chapter 5
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
4.1 CONCLUSIONS
Social media is working more as a search engine these days because people trust people
rather trusting companies. Also people think that it would be cheaper to buy from the people
directly rather than going to the company website. Hence, an area of interest is searched on a
social media and concerned people are found and communicated with. Social media
marketing creates a positive effect on many business markets such as financial institutions,
travel and tourism businesses, retail businesses, knowledge businesses, entertainment
industry, and so on. Since the process of social media marketing saves money, time and is
highly engaging and interesting social media marketing seems to be the next big thing to hit
the world as a whole.
One of the biggest advantages of social media marketing as opposed to traditional advertising
is that potential customers can be precisely targeted. For example, in Facebook, if a person
species that his area of interest is interior designing; his home page would have
advertisements of interior designers on it. Thus, it doesn’t seem to be a hassle for the
customer because they would definitely want to see those advertisements. As for the business
owner, he/she needs to pay only if a person clicks on his/her advertisements. Thus it is a winwin
situation for both the business owner and the customer.
Similarly small business start-ups should utilize the endless opportunities provided by social
media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. The biggest advantage for small
business start-ups is that the amount of money to be spent on advertisements can be
massively cut down and brand building can be done effectively. As in LinkedIn which is
customisable, more than one products being sold by the same company can also be marketed.
This works perfectly for B2B clients who cater to more than one product from the same
verticals.
In fact social media sites themselves are changing at a fast pace to keep up with the
marketing trend that is present today. Though LinkedIn was started for professional
networking, it has added much functionality recently which makes it an attractive platform
42
for business development. Likewise although Facebook is considered as a medium for
personal space, it is changing at a rapid pace to cater to the needs of businesses as well. More
companies are trying to market their products through Facebook. Twitter is least preferred social
networking website used for business development. The main reason for this is that
Twitter is more demanding in terms of frequent tweets and more time should be spent on it to
respond to customer queries. However, Twitter is also changing to cater to business
development needs. Marketing Week (2012) reports that Twitter now provides various tools
for gauging the impact of promoted tweets. Now brands who want to advertise on Twitter can
customise their advertisements on the basis of what is working for them. Thus all popular
sites are into marketing and it can be seen as a good sign of opening the horizons for a new
way of marketing which cheaper, greener and more effective.
4.2 RECOMMENDATIONS
From this report it can be concluded that social media presence is inevitable in the coming
years. Not only that social media is useful as a marketing tool, it has become the order of the
day to be present in social media. Therefore this report recommends all kind of businessessmall
scale, large scale, business to business clients, business to consumer clients,
manufacturing industries and so on to be actively present in the social media. An important
fact to be kept in mind in this context is that most social networking sites have a cyclic
growth. It starts from minimum, attains a maximum and goes down to a minimum again.
Thus, this is the perfect time to invest time and resource in popular social media sites such as
Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Owing to the relatively small amount of investment, it is not
a high risk investment as the usage of social media will come to a minimum only gradually.
In comparison with traditional advertisements, social media marketing caters to a more
focussed group of people and thus can yield better results. This does not mean that companies
should stop using traditional media and start using online and social media alone for
advertisements. This may result in disastrous results. An important thing to be kept in mind is
that when we say one in every seven people are on Facebook, there can be millions of
duplicate accounts and almost half of the total number of accounts is not being accessed
every day. This limits the chances of meeting new prospects and thereby causes a hindrance
43
for generating new business leads. Also still the remaining people of the world are relying on
traditional media which means that we can’t ignore them. Therefore the best solution is to
combine both traditional and social media for marketing (Wakolbinger, 2009). This will
bridge the gap between those people who are active on social media sites and those who are
still relying on traditional media. Companies must be careful in selecting particular adverts
for particular media. A company which sells clothes may have to rely on social media for
advertising their clothes for people of the age group 15-50 whereas they still have to depend
upon traditional advertisements like TV, radio and print media for the rest of the age group
population. Thus effective combination of social media adverts and traditional adverts will
result in better results.
The online presence of firms must be frequently updated and it must be linked with each
other and with the company website. It must be maintained well and only relevant posts must
be updated. Small businesses should embrace this wonderful technology and reap the benefits
of being on the social media for marketing.
44
Chapter 5
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52
ANNEXURE
QUESTIONAIRE
1. Do you think social media is the most sought after method adopted by entrepreneurs’
young and old in the field of marketing, advertising, brand building, promotions?
• Yes
• No
2. Which is the most effective solution for brand promotion?
• Social Media
• Print Media
3. Do you think social media marketing will help the firms to find their potential
customers?
• Yes
• No
• Maybe
4. Which social networking site are you most familiar with?
• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• My space
• Facebook
• YouTube
• Most of the above
5. Do you think the relative cost is much lesser as compared with traditional advertising?
• Yes
• No
• Depends
6. Is social media helpful for B2B firms in generating new sales/clients?
• Yes
• No
• It depends how reputed the firm is.
53
7. “Social media can be effectively used for various B2C clients to increase sales.” Do
you agree?
• Yes
• No
• Partially
8. Which one do you think is the most effective social networking site for online
marketing?
• Twitter
• Facebook
• LinkedIn
9. Do you follow your favourite brands on social networking sites like Facebook, twitter
and LinkedIn?
• Yes
• No
10. If yes, why do you follow them?
• Just because you like that brands
• You are very keen to know about their new offerings
• To know how good they are in marketing
54

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Chapter 1

1.1 OVERALL AIM

Therefore the objectives of this report are as follows:

Social media marketing:-

Social media marketing tools:

Different Methods of Social Media Marketing

Social networking websites and blogs:

2008 Presidential Election

Implications on traditional advertising:

Social media marketing mishaps:-

• 62% of adults worldwide now use social media

2.1 IMPORTANCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN TODAY’S WORLD

2.2.1 FACEBOOK FOR B2B MARKETING

2.3 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR BUSINESS TO CONSUMER MARKETING

2.3.1 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR TRAVEL AND TOURISM

2.3.1.1 TWITTER FOR THE TRAVEL INDUSTRY

2.3.2 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

2.3.2.1 FACEBOOK FOR BANK MARKETING

2.3.2.2 TWITTER FOR BANK MARKETING

2.3.3 SOCIAL MEDIA FOR RETAILERS

3.1 IMPLEMENTATION OF SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

3.1.1 IMPLEMENTING FACEBOOK

3.1.2 IMPLEMENTING TWITTER

3.4 COMPARISON OF TRADITIONAL ADVERTISING WITH SOCIAL MEDIA

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Options Number of responses Percentage

Key Challenges Posed by Social Media

REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY

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