CONTEMPORARY MARKETING

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Marjorie Murphy
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1 CONTEMPORARY MARKETING REFLECTIVE ACCOUNT The Big Debate Motion: The Problems Caused by Social Media Outweigh the Benefits to Marketers K P a g e

2 I am Against the motion that The Problems Caused by Social Media Outweigh the Benefits to Marketers after significant reading of sources. My key argument would be that consumers or audiences can be considered to be extremely powerful and busy when it comes to contemporary technological consumption. Therefore, companies should be reachable and available in every social media communication channel such as Facebook, Twitter, blogs, forums at any time (Gordhamer, 2009). Shau et al. (2009) and Kaplan et al. (2010) for example, provide a real-life context by describing that famous brands such as Jeep or Harley Davidson already established their brand communities on social media platforms such as Facebook and Myspace. Key Points to Consider Against the Motion I believe people were against this motion, like me, because of these particular key points gathered from various sources. Good information provided for me comes from Holt (2016), where it is claimed that social media provides benefits of forming relations directly with consumers and also through its speed of interaction. Social media also provides opportunities to engage significantly and co-create product messages to consumers or audiences (Erdogmus, 2012). Also in a class discussion, in which I was present to witness guest lecture Alpesh Doshi, it was said that through social media it is easier to segment in order to target your audience. E.g. Amazon set specific parameters where they produce online advertising messages that feature on social media platforms, in relation to a consumers online internet activity or habits towards a brand or product category. Overall, according to De Vries et al. (2012) 50% of social media users are followers of brands through it, suggesting there is sufficient loyalty behaviour and therefore has potential benefits to marketers. A successful example provided by Singh & Sonnenburg (2012) that intrigued me, was of Dove's Real Beauty campaign. Dove evolved from a product-focused brand (a beauty soap bar) to a brand that told a story (real beauty) to a brand that co-created a story with consumers (campaign for Real Beauty). Social media provided Dove with multiple touch points (YouTube, company website, blogs, Facebook, etc.), allowing the brand owner to give different forms of extrinsic motives for the consumer to initiate and/or participate in conversations. Key Points to Consider For the Motion On the other hand, I believe people were against this motion because of these particular key points gathered by the opposition. A credible point (against) for me comes from Laroche (2012), mentioning that usage and engagement of Facebook (social media in general) presents a low-cost opportunity to set up and maintain. However, social media activity could provide a hard measurement to determine effectiveness of a campaign. Therefore, this puts forward an argument if followers would be more potent than viewers of traditional marketing practices e.g. Television (Marketing Week, 2015). Also considering what was mentioned, it is significant that social media is potentially less likely to provide efficient ROI (Marketing Week, 2015) compared to traditional practices, as advertising through Television guarantees clear exposure of message consistently to audiences, whereas through Facebook it may be missed or discarded without attention. Another interesting point I felt was from Fournier et al. (2011), who mentions that social media is for people to use as a social tool. Brands therefore, are something that produces an invasion in the social context and 2 P a g e

3 because of this there are subsequent possibilities of brands being ignored. Overall, here I believe these are suggestible problems caused by social media that outweigh the benefits to marketers. Main Areas of Disagreement 1.) Traditional Marketing (e.g. TV) vs Social Media (e.g. Twitter) I believe this is one key area of disagreement. This is because it is important to consider each side s impact on factors such as ROI measurement, the potential of audience reach, costs, regulations and control or unpredictability. Overall, whichever side of traditional marketing or social media has a positive impact towards these factors, I believe would be regarded a success to marketers. 2.) Followers (of social media) vs Viewers (of traditional marketing) I believe this is another key area of disagreement. This is because it is significant to consider each side s interaction capabilities with messages or campaigns. Overall, I believe quality ways to expose messages or campaigns (either through SM or TM) would have a determining influence towards the success of followers or viewers to marketers. Key Missing Arguments (AGAINST & FOR) From my reading: Social media marketing is related to relationship marketing and therefore for firms the need is to make connections with consumers than trying to sell (Gordhamer, 2009). Especially for Small campaigns or acts, who have greater opportunity to reach lots more people and accomplish objectives in a very short time period (Coon, 2010). According to Kaplan & Haenlein (2010), for survival purposes, industry sages and researchers encourage businesses to be present in social media and take advantage of it. From my reading: Singh and Sonnenburg (2012) describe that social media environment is based on improvisation and therefore makes it uncontrollable and unpredictable, compared to classical options where there is more chance of manipulating activity with increased familiarity. Henning-Thurau et al. (2010) also mention the point that when brands and consumers co-create brand stories, owners don t have complete control of their brands. Quality of Speakers and Most Convincing Side On general circumstances, I believe a majority of the population during the debate session showed a great a deal of tentativeness and dispassion to share significant ideas and points they may have planned and scripted down. For me, this resulted in a stagnated flow of arguments or discussion and the same voices were consistently heard throughout. This 3 P a g e

4 showed that I and many other peers of mine were depending highly on a small percentage of individuals. I felt the people who did speak shared their arguments and points with overwhelming maturity, decisiveness, and willingness. Also I think the individuals for each side demonstrated confidence and comprehensive supporting evidence which were able to make sense towards the topic. Overall, for me the side against the motion produced the more convincing arguments and evidence in order to leave me in the position to stay with my decision from the beginning. This is because social media provides its benefits which marketers can thrive from (Erdogmus, 2012; Holt, 2012), it can be easier to segment through social media to target audiences, a good percentage of social media users are followers of brands suggesting there is brand loyalty through use of certain platforms (De Vries et al. 2012) and lastly, there is proof from the Dove Campaign that social media can influence relevant success and change for a brand (Singh & Sonnenburg, 2012). 4 P a g e

5 References: Coon, M. (2010) Social Media Marketing: Successful Case Studies of Businesses Using Facebook and YouTube With an In-Depth Look in the Business use of Twitter, Communication M.A. Project, 4 th June, (Accessed: 27 February 2016). De Vries, L., Gensler, S., and Leeflang, P.S.H. (2012) Popularity of Brand Posts on Brand Fan Pages: An Investigation of Effects of Social Media Marketing, Journal of Interactive Marketing, (26), pp Erdogmus, E.I., and Cicek, M. (2012) The Impact of Social Media Marketing on Brand Loyalty, Social and Behavioral Sciences, (58), pp Fournier, S. and Avery, J. (2011) The Uninvited Brand, Business Horizons, (54), pp Gordhamer, S. (2009) 4 Ways Social Media in Changing Business, Available at: (Accessed: 27 February 2016). Hennig-Thurau, T., Malthouse, E.C., Friege, C., Gensler, S., Lobschat, L., Rangaswamy, A., and Skiera, B. (2010) The Impact of New Media on Customer Relationships, Journal of Service Research, (13)3, pp Holt, D. (2016) Branding in The Age of Social Media, Harvard Business Review, March, pp Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. (2010) Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media, Business Horizons, (53), pp Laroche, M., Habibi, M.R., and Richard, M.O. (2013) To be or not to be in social media: How brand loyalty is affected by social media?, International Journal of Information Management, (53), pp Marketing Week (2015) Social Media, source: (Accessed: 9 March 2016). Schau, Hope J., Albert M. Muñiz, and Eric J. Arnould (2009) How Brand Community Practices Create Value, Journal of Marketing, (73), September, pp Singh, S. and Sonnenburg, S (2012) Brand Performance in Social Media, Journal of Interactive Marketing, (26), pp P a g e

CONTEMPORARY MARKETING

CONTEMPORARY MARKETING Social Media in Marketing The Benefits of Using Social Media to Achieve Brand Loyalty K1118972 1 P a g e CONTENTS PAGE Introduction p. 3 The Key Arguments The Key Debated Points