Advantage of Social Media Marketing: Assignment
Added on 2020-01-16
36 Pages9851 Words183 Views
MarketingLanguages and Culture
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Dissertation
Abstract – This research explored the impact of social media on share economy market throughexample by Airbnb company. SM is a form of internet tools and applications that allowpeople to generate and distribute content or to join through Social Networking (SN)(Albarran, 2013) Currently, Social media exists nearly every aspect of our individual andbusiness lives. In business, for any company’s overall strategy, it is not just about marketingand public relationship but social media also carry a vital role of business success. Today,within the business realm, there are most significant social media tools such as Facebook,Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, TripAdvisor and others. These tools are allowingconsumers to interact with each other through online in regards of product information,service, direct feedback and overall business success. Through this kind of practice, helpsbusinesses to analysis consumer’s problems, demands and wish list by gathering consumerinformation and later reflect on product to fulfil consumers demands (Kim, et al., 2015).Furthermore, social media helps to build business reputation or brand and brand community(Appendix 1, a). To exploring the brand community, based on social media which reflectspositive effect on business and build communities’ value creation practices, brand trust, brandawareness and brand loyalty (Habibi, et al., 2012). Furthermore, to maximize the usefulnessof SM, firms not only answer to customer feedback but also proactively use SM to enlargetheir customer base and inspire further purchases using SMM (Gamboa , & Gonçalves,2014). Through using SM platforms, firms can very quickly share marketing substances withlarge number of consumer group. It is very much cost efficiency and time saving ( Dobelea,et al., 2005). Currently, Airbnb disrupting old hotel industry’s marketing strategy and the keysuccess of Airbnb is the use of social media to connect with customer (Holmes, 2013).However, nowadays each hospitality firms use social media platforms to get competitiveadvantage. So, in that case, it important to analysis what SM impact on Airbnb business. Thisstudy investigates the impact of social media on the success of Airbnb overall, as measuredby the impact of social media outreach on lead generation and brand awareness.Introduction The social media have crated huge impacts of organization and their activities. This is revolutionary changes which take place in the past few years. Effective use of social media could give maximise amount of business, minimising marketing expenditures and generate company competitive advantage. Social media is an unavoidable as a main marketing tool to enhance brand awareness and get quick success in any business. With the help of social media entities can increases their business and along with that gain more international customers. SMM to enhance brand awareness of any product or service. Using this transformation, many modern companies have succeeded very quickly rather than using the
traditional marketing approach. The social media helps to entities to again competitive advantage and along with this they can also make their customers more awareness.Among with this customer get also benefits from the using of social media. It helps to them toget awareness regarding to the entities services and products and also make aware. in this regards customers easily find solution of their problems. There are various types of social media channels such as Facebook, twitter, Instagram and many other plat from which helps tocompany to expand their business. The present report is based on the Airbub which I US based company. The company is based on unique idea in which they offer services by rentingtheir houses to people which come to visits to their country. In this people offers their house as rent to other people and earn money. With the help of social media they can offer services to worldwide. Airbnb mostly using social media marketing (SMM) tools which is become a major important aspect of Airbnb marketing instrument and customer relation management. With the help of social media they gain more international customers in their business and maximize their profits and ensure long term growth. Literature reviewBackground of this study – The Short-Term Room Renting’ (STRR) or vacation rental group is the second largest groupof lodgings after hotels industry. Its predictable global market size of nearly $100 billion(Serviced Apartment Summit, 2016). Basically, the first idea of lodging STRR businessevolve in US market by VRBO (Vacation Rental by Owner) which currently a part ofHomeAway Family (Hagiu & Rothman, 2016) (VRBO, 2017). Later this practice spreadaround the world due to its innovations of the product and high market value. STRR are mostlarger among United State of America (USA)and European Union (EU), consecutivelyproduces more than $85 billion in income in which averaged nearly $14,000 per estate(Serviced Apartment Summit, 2016). There are number big companies which are highlyestablished following this nature of the business, are all headquarter from USA. Currently,the top STRR player such as AirBnB, HomeAway Family, TripAdvisor, FlipKey and others.However, Airbnb is an individual largest company of STRR, including market share nearabout 30$ billion (Serviced Apartment Summit, 2016) (Zervas & Proserpio, 2016) which ismore than the Hilton worldwide which market capacity is 23.33$ billion (Ting, 2016). WithinUSA, Airbnb has nearly 550,000 listing while California is the chief of all states by 125,803total properties listed, and New York in second place by 94,976 Airbnb listed (Airdna, 2016).Although there is a high potential of the market, many home sharing companies face off due
to the number of prohibitions and geographically-based controls on short-term rentalsIndustry in many different states in US also around the world (Jefferson-Jones, 2015, p. 12)Figure 1 Airbnb listing within USA (Airdna, 2016)Furthermore, STRR investment or distribution are mostly gone through online by represented94% of the overall transactions value over the 5-year period (Serviced Apartment Summit,2016, p. 9). Through enabling people to list or renting short-term lodging including vacationrentals, apartment rentals, homestays, hostel beds, or hotel rooms, Airbnb company is anonline marketplace and provide hospitality service (Airbnb, 2017). The company is merely abroker and received percentage from both host and guest in regard with every booking inonline. Airbnb does not own any lodging. The company is not like other hotels but let peopleto sharing each other houses. Furthermore, due to low cost transaction through online, Airbnbmostly using social media marketing (SMM) tools which is become a major important aspectof Airbnb marketing instrument and customer relation management. Furthermore, Airbnbwebsite itself a social media platform. Effective use of social media could give maximise amount of business, minimising marketingexpenditures and generate Airbnb’s competitive advantage. The literature currently does notgive much more information on peer to peer marketing reference to Airbnb operation inUnited State (US) but in general research of hotel industry, it is strongly recommended thatsocial media is an unavoidable as a main marketing tool to enhance brand awareness and getquick success in any hospitality business (Inversini & Masiero, 2014). Furthermore, in a
bigger picture, United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) (2012), suggestedthat both tourism and hospitality sector should stress online communication with customer,facilitated by social media to gain competitive advantage. Due to the digital transformationand increase of competition, it is currently very complex to implement or easy to getcompetitive advantage by using SMM to enhance brand awareness of any product or service.Furthermore, within this research, it has also studied on how SMM impact on brandawarenessAirbnb and online marketing in the share economyIt is necessary to know what it would take for a brand to boost any online marketplace. Thereare many traditional rules for an overall marketing approach, which has overturned due to theinfluence of digital transformation. Using this transformation, many modern companies havesucceeded very quickly rather than using the traditional marketing approach. Amongst thosecompanies, they are mainly technology based such as Airbnb, Uber and others (Leigh et al.,2017, p. 64). In this research, we select the company; Airbnb, who are running a successfulbusiness by renting out rooms, flats or houses for short-term use within a two-sided platformor sharing economy including guest and Host.Sharing economy is a revolutionary market, collectively known as peer-to-peer markets orpeer economy, which individuals can rent or borrow properties owned by someone else(Investopedia, 2017). Here Airbnb and Uber is one of the most successful marketplaceentrepreneurs within the peer to peer online market. Furthermore, Social media marketing(SMM) is an essential part of online marketing. However, without analysis its advantage anddisadvantage, Social Media Marketing (SMM) is very difficult to build or carry on an onlinemarketplace as there are many hidden traps are building on it. According to Hagiu &Rothman (2016) who explored several hidden traps within the online marketplace, theyidentified four key aspects including growth, trust & safety, disintermediation and regulationwhich is mentioned more elaborately in Appendix 3. Furthermore, peer economy market largely depends upon social media to gain contentmarketing. For example, a company like Airbnb or Uber who are leading businesses within
the sharing economy. These companies also have social media platforms which they workthrough over company’s websites, applications, and others social media platforms that allowsclients to generate and distribute content or to join in social networking (Google, 2017).Furthermore, Airbnb and Uber have got specific product and selected consumer segments.Although Airbnb itself is a social media channel, there are some giant SM channels, such asFacebook and Twitter who have more users than Airbnb. Therefore, it is essential for Airbnbto focus upon online marketing on the social media to enhance their 'content marketing' orincreasing brand awareness. The Possible advantage of Social Media Marketing (SMM)According to Mercadal (2014) express that the public and private organizations use socialmedia marketing as a comparatively new addition to the IMC (Integrated marketingcommunications) systems to link with their target market or consumer. It is promotional tooland controls several components including, brand awareness, direct marketing, salespromotions publicity, advertising, and more (Mercadal, 2014). The basic role of SMM is tocreate media content which attracts and influence users to share it and create publicawareness (Mercadal, 2014). Furthermore Brown & Hayes (2007), pointed out that socialmedia also carry a significant role on influence marketing through the impact of blogs, wikisand others social media platform. By replacing traditional sources of influence, firms usingSM platform to enable new influencers to emerge. Furthermore, they argued that to bringdown the competitive advantage, organisation needs to generate market awareness, createsmore leads and address sales barriers which are closely related to the persistent growth andadvantage of word of mouth (WOM). In addition, currently, it is very commons use of SMMapproach in both strategy building and firm’s operation role, such as social customerrelationship management, social media monitoring for marketing intelligence, viralmarketing, advertising on social media and more on (Charlesworth, 2015) The use of social media as tool of marketing strategy, there are many businesspersons faceproblem because of lack of knowledge in how to use SM in SMM strategy (DeMers, 2014).By the same time many small and large firms globally spending billions of pounds in eachyear and most the of the money has been spent on wrong people (Brown & Hayes., 2007).
Possible challenge with Social Media MarketingAccording to Sethna et. al, (2013, p. 254) they expressed that there are some cases where asmall number of followers on Facebook or fans on Twitter are actually genuine, but, themaximum amount of followers are from their rivals or other local businesses. They alsoexpressed a fine connection between the image of the business and the individual personality,and that some businesses could be mistakenly affected through their name by posting wrongindividual information. For example, in 2014, Coca-Cola faced extreme criticisms from bothRussia and the Ukraine by creating controversial New Year's greeting on a Russian socialmedia site which contained a map of Russia where it happened to omit Crimea, the region ofUkraine. After confronting the issues raised from several Russian SM users, Coca-Colaannounced an amended version of its map which comprised the whole of the region. But,after altering the map of Russia to contain Crimea, this only provoked additional anger fromUkrainian handlers who delivered a series of abuses across social media sites and asked forthe prohibition of Coca-Cola. (Makortoff, 2016). There are some issues which can be seen inmarketing communication on and offline with social media. According to (Smith & Zook,2011, p. 467), recently many businesses who used to rely upon SMM and suffered due to’less web visible’, or lack of adding fresh information of the company’s product whichapparently creates no-traffic followers and without mass followers makes SM sites becomeincompetent. In contrast, he also added that on some occasions constant observation is a highrequirement due to the security hackers’ scams; fake followers; and spammers risking andcrashing. In addition, an uninvited email is reflected even more offensive and, as a result,spam or junk mail which is against the law in recent consumer markets in respect of directmarketing via internet (Smith & Zook, 2011, p. 398). Furthermore, in regards of SMM within the two-sided market, many marketers facesproblems to analysis it. There are a number of researchers who have examined the differencebetween several divisions of the hotel industry but it would be a wrong practice if they treatAirbnb in the same way. According to Liua & Mattila (2016) they have been justified throughresearch such as Airbnb, to individualise itself from the usual hotels by offering guests a‘feeling at home’ experience (e.g., belongingness) and an ‘atypical place to stay’ expeerience(e.g., uniqueness) (Airbnb, 2017, b). Therefore, two of these issues can be addressed withinthis research.
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