The Role of Social Media in Brand Promotion and Development

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1. Introduction

This part of the paper contains an overview of the available studies that have been prepared regarding the role of social media, influencers for brand promotion and development. Processing of these studies ensures that the data analysis section is performed in reference to theoretical observations explaining reasons of the customer intentions to purchase products of certain brands promoted within social media platforms.

2.2. Rising Role of Social Media for Marketing Purposes

The rules and patterns of doing business vary from day to day align with recent technological developments and innovations. In fact, several companies have already recognised and tested effectiveness of the marketing of the products with attraction of the social media influencers on different platforms including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube. Comparing Facebook and Twitter, in the recent years brands opted to collaborate with influencers in Twitter for ethical concerns (Kleinsman and Buckley 2015). In fact, understanding emerging trends is critical for the managers of the companies that are looking for new opportunities that may be used for better positioning and promotion of the goods in the market. With rise of the popularity of social media platforms, consumers observe capitalisation of different social media influencers. Some companies are still reluctant to use services of these people in view of the fact that this instrument is relatively new and its pros and cons are subject to deeper investigation. Moreover, there is an extremely high level of uncertainty around status of social medial influencer and range of the criteria that should be used in order to advertise specific products. Nevertheless, people spend significant portion of time in social media platforms by liking posts of each other on Facebook, sharing tweets and posting photos. According to recent statistics, approximately 2.6 billion of active social media users have been registered on Instagram, while about 1.9 billion of active mobile social users exist.

In the recent years, global brands and start – ups initiated use of the social channels so to approach customers and influence them with a purpose to conduct purchase or enhance loyalty of the customers to the brand. Moreover, brands are concerned with power of social media advertisement that contributes to the development of strong brand presence, rise of the popularity of the products. In majority cases, companies refer to the use of different social strategies in order to affect choices and decision making processes of the customers. Although, only limited portion of brands tend to hire social influencers for advertising of goods and services. Unfortunately, only few companies succeed with selection of the influencers for advertising of the products as there is no empirical evidence on the exact list of criteria to be used for identification of the most reliable and trustworthy influencers in the social media platforms. Therefore, the paper contains a case study analysis on the selection of the influences with specific criteria in Twitter for advertising Air Pods. The influencers are selected in reference to the list of criteria that has been developed through literature review analysis and overview of the social activity of the users to be hired as independent contractors for Apple Company. The accomplishment of this investigation will be a contribution to the research area on the investigation of the role of influencers for promotion of the products in the social media as well as it should enhance understanding of the companies in selection of these people for advertising purposes through developed list of criteria.

In the recent years, several companies initiated adjustment to new rules in business environment, where managers of the business units decide to use services of the influencers in order to raise brand awareness in the social media platforms. In fact, the participation of the social medial influencers is perceived today as a valuable contribution to the development of the valuable connections on the social media platforms. At the same time, it appears that in several cases managers of the organisations are hesitant to hire influencers just because of the fact that they have thousands of followers in any social media platform. Therefore, the process of selection of the social media influencers has become a challenge to the companies that are looking for reliable partners to be used for promotion of the products. Hence, a problem appears that companies require special procedures of selection of the influencers for advertising of their products, while research field has not responded to this issue yet.

The power of marketing with use of social media influencers has been recognised in the recent years an effective marketing strategy. These people perform the role of power users that may assist to the potential customers with accomplishment of the purchasing decision through social networking. Whether any social media influencer a blogger or industry expert, hiring them is a unique experience to the business area of the company and its product. In the meantime, the selection of the right influencers for promotion of the product in the social media platforms has become an unresolved task as the number of influencers is rising, while the amount of followers is not regarded as the main criteria for selection. Therefore, this paper will become a valuable contribution to the research area as it contains description of different criteria that have been taken for selection of different social media influencers in Twitter for advertising of Apple products impartially. The importance of this research lies in the fact that the rationale for identification range of criteria to be followed for selection of social media influencers may be used by several other people.

2.2. Social Media Influencers

For the purposes of the accomplishment of the investigation on the connection between social media influences and brand promotion, an overview of the available sources on the notion and power of social media celebrities and influencers has been conducted. According to Wong (2014), social media has allocated balance of power between customers and brands within social media framework. Currently social media influencers have strong positioning and extensive followers’ bases in relevant niche subjects. Crowdtap (2014) stress the fact that peer – created content and user – generated content is regarded as the most reliable by the consumers in comparison to traditional sources of marketing. This is justified by the long – lasting path to the establishment of trustful relations between customers and social media influencers in Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube. In this respect, a new term “social media influencer marketing” has developed (Strategic Direction Interview, 2012). Schaefer (2012) states that social media channels should not be perceived as traditional means of communication between customers and companies. According to the essence of phenomenon of social media influencer marketing, people tend to follow their lives in social media and take an example on living after advertising certain products or services (Brown and Hayes 2007). In fact, influencers share their opinions and reviews on quality of the products, their experience with brands in the social media and receive responses from the followers regarding it (Wood 2016). According to Schau and Gilly (2003), social activity of the influencers in Instagram aims to achieve better self – presentation. This information is developed further by O’Connell (2016) as he states that having certain products confirms status of the individual. Albeit, the power of the social marketing and its relevance for brand promotion has been recently confirmed by Mediakix (2016).

The notion of social commerce is growing within cyberspace where consumers are looking for new opportunities to be purchased via social media (Chahal 2016). From this perspective, Kassoway (2015) stresses that influence is perceived a long – term proposition that has grown within social media framework. Wong (2014) provides a definition on the influencer marketing and states that it should be perceived as a marketing form used for identification and targeting individuals with influences over potential buyers. Although, having an influence does not equal to the number of followers in the social media as it just performs the role of sole criteria for confirmation of the status of influencer (Flick 2016). The relationship between customers and influencers extends to the responsiveness of the followers, credibility of the influencer and several other factors evidencing unique status of the influencer (Erkan and Evans 2016). Nevertheless, Dinesh (2017) believes that brand promotion is not possible in the modern business environment without power of social media influencers.

Social media influencer is regarded by scholars as third – party endorser that creates and forms consumer attitudes through the use of social media platforms (Freberg et al. 2011). Besides, the processing of the results of the previously prepared studies indicates that there lack of empirical evidence on the actual audience perception of the influencers (Freberg et. al. 2011). According to Gillin (2007), brands are looking for partnership with social media influencers with a purpose to focus on marketing of the products or services. In this respect, identification of the relevant influencers should be aligned to the nature of the branding strategy selected by the organisation (Kumar and Mirchandani 2012). These strategies are divided into follows:

ü Marketing to influencers which is applied in case company is looking for brand awareness within specific social media platforms;

ü Marketing through influencers as use of the power of the influencers in raise of the brand awareness to target markets;

ü Marketing with influencers when SMI perform role of the advocates of the brand (Gillin 2007).

Scholars insist that understanding overall operation and power of the influencer marketing is a prerequisite to the successful promotion of the goods and services of the organisation (Djafarova & Rushworth 2017). There are two types of the influencer marketing where the earned dimension stems from non – commercial cooperation with influencers. The second type of the collaboration is paid use of influencer marketing campaigns taking forms of such promotion strategies as sponsorship, pre – toll discussions. In the meantime, Djafarova & Rushworth (2017) asserts that commercial compensation for use of the services of the social media influencers depends on the audience reach. Although, scholars agree that compensating services to the social media influencers is not a major problem in the cooperation with these users, while the main impediment lies in measuring correct influencer to be used. Gillin (2007) notifies that reach is a measure of audience size. In this respect, influencer should have more than average audience which is rather active in comparison to the regular users. According to the latest observations, nearly 40% of the users on Twitter tend to purchase products if they are recommended by influencer (Djafarova & Rushworth 2017).

2.3. The Role of Social Media Influencers

Over the last few years, the role of the social media influencers has shown a boost to the customers within social media platforms (Djafarova & Rushworth 2017). According to Freberg et al. (2011), the power of social media influencers should be considered not in rising number of these people, while shift of the brands to use of these persons because of their persuasive power to purchase specific products and goods. Given a fact that the world has already recognised power of social media influencers in the modern business environment, Booth & Matic (2011) suggest that it is highly important to consider actual basis for their influence. Merwe & Heerden (2009) specify that social medial influencer should be considered an opinion leader that is aware on specific subject. In turn, Lv, Guang & Tian (2013) stress that social media influencer (SMI) should be perceived as micro – celebrity or talented person who is attractive for certain number of people. Moreover, Abrams and Hogg (1990) decided before emergence of the SMI that these persons should be regarded as social leaders due to their ability to impact decision making process of the others, identify them with their values and intend to have a membership with their social community.

The power of social media influencers is better considered with regard to the notion of normative social influence developed by Kelman (1985). According to scholars, there are three main sub – types of normative social influence as compliance, identification and internalisation (Langner, Hennings and Wieldmann 2013). These classifications extend to compliance takes place when an individual decided to accept opinion of the others with a purpose to develop favourable reaction of others; identification implies that a person agrees to accept opinion of the others with a purpose to have intended relationship; internalisation is the most powerful element in the notion of influence based on which an individual accepts specific assumptions and beliefs of other people in public and private (Kelman 1985).

In support of the abovementioned statement, one should be aware of the notion of informational social influence that was developed by Lee et al. (2011). This kind of social influence implies use of the information or recommendation expressed from a person that have not been previously in any relationship with a person (Hsu, Lin and Chiang 2015). Informational social influence is relevant in terms of the social media, while the user – generated content represents the most valuable data. According to Christen et al. (2016), processing of the social media data should be aligned with informed consent of the users. With regard to the effect achieved with use of the social influence in social media platforms, a person may change is purchasing behaviour in response to the review of the products on behalf of the online customer. Social medial influencers are selected by the brand managers for creation awareness around the brand. Use of the services of the social media influencers contributes to the formation of SEO value of the brand. The impact of social media influencers services is reflected in Google Algorithm (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Influences of SMI (Social Media Influencers) on Google’s Algorithm

Source: (York n.d.)

According to the data included in Figure 1, one may agree with the fact that social media influencers impact frequency of the requests submitted in search engines. This metric reflects actual state of affairs regarding engagement of users in the information shared by the influencers within social media platforms. In addition, this figure indicates that sharing pages by the social media influencers encourages users to stay active within social media platforms (York n.d.).

Impact of the activity of the social media influencers can be considered in different industries in reference to the actions of the persons that are public figures or their lifestyle has a predominant effect over the preferences of the users. SMI are capable to reach significant number of people within a platform they stay active. According to scholars, users trust to the choice of the influencer in selecting products and services. Moreover, a recent investigation accomplished by Nielsen Group shows that more than 90% of the customers trust to influencers much more than to the ordinary advertisements. This statement implies that a user is much more reluctant to purchase product or service after it is being reviewed by influencer than it is recommended as part of conventional advertisement.

According to Murphy (2014), the role of the social media influencers in promoting different products should be considered in reference to the theory of reasoned actions and technology acceptance model. These models perform role of underpinning conceptual framework that should be used a basis for development of the marketing strategy by the brands (Butt 2014). The nature of the theory of reasoned action stipulates that the behaviour of the customer is defined by intention of the individual, while the intentions are set by the attitude of the person toward behaviour and respective subjective norms (Solis 2016). In this respect, Meskaran, Ismail & Shanmugam (2013) state that trust is found the most critical requirement supporting intention of the customers to accomplish purchases after reading reviews of the influencers. At the same time, lack of trust may be considered an important limitation to successful online purchase (Rahi, Ghani & Muhamad 2017). Given these facts, the social media influencers are found as the most reliable marketing instruments for creation trust in perceptions of the customers regarding quality of the products that will be purchased online (Kietzmann et el. 2011).

Discussing the role and power of the social media influencers, scholars also warn on the fact that the use of these marketing instruments may be ineffective for several reasons (Zipporah and Mberia 2014). For example, if influencer has a significant number of followers, the managers of the brand should be suspicious about hiring this influencer (Mamat, Noor and Noor 2016). This statement implies that the managers should not refer to the quantity, while quality of the services provided should be of higher priority (Sassine 2017). According to Sassine (2017), quality of the services is linked to high engagement rates, while loyalty from followers and transparent communication with users is much valued. Sassine (2017) notes recent example of the introduction of beauty lip line by the beauty blogger Huda Kattane under collaboration project with Sephora Middle East. The products have been sold in few minutes (Liu et al. 2015). From one perspective, the results are astonishing, while purchase of the product made by blogger does not mean elaboration of long – term partnership for Sephora (Sassine 2017).

The other problem reported by the scholars with regard to the activity of the social media influencers now is referred to the commercial background of the users (Lee et al. 2011). In particular, influencers become quite commercial and money driven so that they are not passionate regarding creation and promotion of unique marketing campaigns for the brand. Moreover, the audience of these influencers becomes tired of constant advertising of the products on commercial basis. According to Sassine (2017), companies should not hire social media influencers in case they post the major portion of commercials instead of sharing any activity regarding lifestyle of this influencer. Finally, scholar recommends do no overuse services of the social media influencers as there is a risk to hire irrelevant influencers that will not keep the voice of the company (Sassine 2017).

Summarising all observations regarding role of the social medial influencers in promotion different goods and services, one may agree with the fact that effectiveness of the collaboration between brands and social media influencers completely depends on the detailed elaboration of the marketing strategy which should filter out requirements for hiring of the influencers (Lv, Guang anf Tian 2013). In addition, literature review analysis has shown that the services of the social medial influencers may lead to both types of results including positive and negative outcomes to the brand promotion and awareness. In this respect, the selection of the social media influencers for cooperation should be considered the most important step in selection of the basis for collaboration.

2.4. Literature Review Gaps

Overview of the available studies has revealed that the interest of the scholars to the discussion of the role of the social media influencers and future prospects on use of their services is rising. Regardless the fact that the number of studies focused on measurement of the services increases, there is lack of empirical evidence about criteria that should be used for hiring of the influencers for different brands. Hence, this gap should be partially filled in by the scholars in order to add value to the effectiveness of the influencer marketing.

Analysis of the current studies shows that the most papers have been prepared with a purpose to define role of the social media marketing and collaboration with influencers in fashion industry, while special attention should be given also to the rest of the industries where influencers may have significant role. At the same time, research field does not contain studies performed for investigation of the actual effects of utilisation of social media marketing and some other tools falling in group of e - marketing mechanisms. Future studies should also include discussion on future perspectives on the collaboration between brands and social media influencers as even now the companies report that the use of SMI services has become less effective. This statement implies that the future studies should include discussion on the fact if any common mechanism for selection of the most reliable and effective influencers for branding purposes can be developed.

CHAPTER THREE

METHODOLOGY

3.1. Introduction

This part of the paper contains an overview of the research strategy and tools that have been developed for accomplishment of the investigation between power of social medial influencers on Twitter and identification of the criteria to be used for selection of the influencers for marketing purposes on behalf of the brand. Inclusion of the research approach and design ensures reliability of the information received in the end of the investigation.

3.2. Research Approach

The framework of this research paper implies processing of the information with Node Xl for determination of the responsiveness of the users to the posts as an indicator of the effectiveness of advertising. Analysis of the social media activity has become much more convenient as it contains numerous network structures to be extracted and processed (Johnson and Onwuegbuzie 2004) Given a fact that for this paper, Twitter is selected as platform for evaluation of the effectiveness of the advertising of the products by social media influencers, the identification of the connections which are visible in the text of each tweet of by requesting of the whole list of the users that follow the author of the advertising.

Analysis of the social media network data from Twitter is performed with use of NodeXL. This software represents an open tool to be used for research purposes. An objective of this platform is to enhance automatically processing of the data flow that initiates with the collection of the information and network data that passes via numerous steps until the final network visualisations and reports are prepared. The benefit of use of NodeXL for data collection purposes allows to generate information rather fast and generate useful network statistics, metrics and relevant visualisation in terms of Excel spreadsheet. According to Crawford, Miltner and Gray (2014), criticising and processing big data can be made only via special software designed for data mining and analytics.

3.3. Research Design

For this paper, text analytics and text mining are used. Text mining reveals numerous capabilities for business units in terms of creation of predictive intelligence by revealing patterns and relationships with operation of structured and unstructured data (Metcalf 2016). There are two primary types of the research design as qualitative and quantitative (Saunders, Lewis & Thornhill 2012). Given the fact that the purpose of this paper is to measure actual effect of the social media advertising on Twitter, this paper utilises quantitative research method as the most reliable instrument for consideration of the scope of influence of social media influences on popularity of the product (Sunders, Lewis and Thornhill 2009). Quantitative research design for the purposes of this paper implies processing of the number of responses to tweets shared by the influencers, quantity of shares and overall number of followers reached with the publication of the information regarding Air Pods experience.

3.4. Data Collection Methods

Raschotte (2011) notes that marketing research studies are divided into explanatory and conclusive. An explanatory research has been selected with a purpose to gain insights into development of the relevant approach to the problem considered. The researcher selects answers that are connected to the research problem with use of qualitative approach (Burns and Burns 2009). In this respect, a qualitative approach is a basis for accomplishment of the present study since the purpose of the investigation is to define criteria for selection of the influencers on the social media for advertising purposes (Rothstein 2015). Data collection method is found unstructured, while data analysis is statistical. The primary outcome of the use of this research method lies in the enhancement of the understanding on the approach to be used for selection of the most effective social media influencers for marketing of the products and services in the Internet. In addition, the research design is developed in compliance with Interpretivism as applied theory for deepening understanding on the connection between operation of the social world and human behaviour (Chowdhury 2014).

The process of the data collection is sophisticated with the stage of selection and hiring of the social media influencers that should test Air Pods and share unbiased reviews about these items (Wood and Hayes 2012). In this respect, specific rules have been applied as part of the research process. In particular, the selection is divided into the following steps:

ü Identification of the targeted group of influencers that are relevant to the promotion of the brand as well as they are aware of the products of the company;

ü Search of the instruments allowing to establish communication and trustful relations between brand managers and social media influencers;

ü Achieve consistent relationship with social media influencers. This stage implies that an influencer is requested to share his review at his social media profile in order to express its commitment to cooperate with brand.

Abovementioned stages have been developed by scholars in collection of social data (Olteanu et al. 2016). In the meantime, social media is a platform for application of the research opportunities where power of the influencers can be identified and measures (Papalexi et al. 2016). With regard to the specificity of the object that is under review for this research paper, the following section contains an overview of the rules that are applied for selection of the social media influencers.

3.5. Sample

Social media platforms encourage scholars to find out interconnection between communication and influence within framework of any of the platforms. As a result, scholars referred to the use of actual measurement tools of online influence based on experience of Twitter posting activity. According to Bakshy et al. (2011), quantification of the influence of Twitter users by identification of the reports of their URLs should be in place for measuring extent of the communication with users. In this respect, Bakshy et al. (2011) succeeds to measure the whole range of the entire diffusion tree of an event and develop an appropriate model in order to predict individual influence.

Contrasting to abovementioned discussion, Kwak et al. (201), Cha et al. (2010) and Weng at al. (2010) notice that Twitter user’s influence should be considered through number of followers, amount of retweets and number of mentions, Page Rank. However, Cha et al. (2010) warn that the number of followers in the social media platforms does not lead to higher amount of retweets and mentions. Hence, Weng et al. (201) propose TwitterRank model as an extension to the PageRank algorithm with a purpose to identify topic – sensitive impact of Twitter users.

Following the discussion, the earlier study prepared by Romero et al. (2011) serves the role of the background for the development of research design and framework for this study. Scholar relied on the use of concept of passivity and developed algorithm to value influence of the users in Twitter (Romero et al. 2011). The author specifies that the concept is contingent upon user retweeting rate and an appropriate audience retweeting rate. This statement implies that the correlation between popularity (number of followers) and influence is lower than a person may expect, while taking into account passivity factor is critical. In conclusion, the literature contains evidence on the following social influence metrics on Twitter (Table 1).

Table 1. Outcomes of Earlier Studies on the Variety of Social Influence Metrics on Twitter

Study/Metric

#followers

#retweets

#URL reposts

#mentions/replies

PageRank

TwitterRank

Bakshy et al. (2011)

X

Cha et al. (2010)

X

X

X

Kwak et al. (2010)

X

X

X

Romero et al. (2010)

X

Weng et al. (2010)

X

X

X

Ye & Wy (2010)

X

X

X

Source: (Roy 2015)

Table 1 above evidences on the fact that multiple studies have confirmed that the number of followers should not be considered as a determining factor in measuring social influence in Twitter. In this respect, the criteria for selection of the independent social media influencers for advertising Air Pods should be expanded based on the results of the literature review analysis prepared concerning extent of communication between influencers and its followers. These criteria include results of the literature review analysis adjusted to the purposes of this study (Table 2).

Table 2. Criteria for Selecting Social Media Influencers on Twitter

Literature Review Criteria

Criteria Selected for This Study

1) Authenticity

a. Integrity

b. Activity

c. Social status

2) Trustworthiness:

a. Credibility

b. Transferability

c. Dependability

d. Confirmability

3) Value for the influencer

4) Influence in a niche

5) Reach and Size of audience

6) Engagement and responsiveness of followers (text mining)

7) Centrality

1) Audience demographics

2) Connection with other influencers

3) Quality and style of writing, photography and video

4) Speed of communication

5) Use of technology + tools

Source: (Author 2018)

According to Table 2, mentioned criteria should be met for selection of the social media influencers. Following this classification list, social media influencers have been searched by three paramount criteria as activity in Twitter, influence in the niche, engagement and responsivene