Research Project: Social Media's Influence on Birchbox Consumers

This research project investigates the impact of social media on consumer purchasing decisions, with a specific focus on Birchbox. The report begins with an introduction to the background, aim, objectives, and research questions, followed by a literature review that explores the concept of social media and its relationship with increased productivity. The methodology section details the research approach (deductive), design (descriptive), data collection methods (primary), and sampling techniques (systematic). The report also addresses research limitations and provides a timeline for the project. The core of the study examines how Birchbox can leverage social media platforms to enhance marketing, increase customer engagement, and ultimately, drive sales. The research emphasizes the importance of strategies such as creating dedicated social media pages, providing regular updates, and soliciting customer feedback to improve products and services. The conclusion summarizes the findings and highlights the importance of social media marketing in the modern business environment. This report is a valuable resource for students and professionals interested in understanding the influence of social media on consumer behavior and marketing strategies.

Research Project

TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE..............................................................................................................................................1
Background of the research............................................................................................................1
Aim.........................................................................................................................................1
Objectives...............................................................................................................................1
Research Questions................................................................................................................1
Literature review.............................................................................................................................2
Concept of social media.........................................................................................................2
Relationship between social media and increased productivity.............................................2
Research methodology....................................................................................................................4
Research approach..................................................................................................................4
Research design......................................................................................................................4
Data collection........................................................................................................................4
Sampling.................................................................................................................................5
Research limitations...............................................................................................................5
Timeline..........................................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

TITLE
To understand the influence of social media on purchasing of consumers in Birchbox.
Background of the research
Social media has brought various changes in the technology and it gets reflected as well
in various fields. In the field of consumer purchasing as well, it has been observed that social
media has brought enormous changes (Armstrong and et.al., 2015). As now, there are various
websites through which shopping seems much easy, thus people prefer to use these websites
because shopping through them is much easier and simpler. Social media has a huge impact on
the purchasing of the customers. This is because it involves various ways through which the
product can be promoted, thus more and more people get to see it. There are various means in
social media that can be used to promote their products as well as services. Thus, it can actually
have a positive impact on the purchasing of the customers. The report is about understanding that
how and by what means of social media, the productivity and popularity of Birchbox can be
increased.
Aim
To understand the influence of social media on the purchasing of the consumers in
Birchbox
Objectives
 To analyse the concept of social media in Birchbox.
 To evaluate the relationship between social media and maximized productivity in
Birchbox.
 To recommend ways for understanding the influence of social media in Birchbox.
Research Questions
Q1 What is meant by social media?
Q2 What is the relationship between social media marketing and increased productivity rate of
Birchbox?
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Literature review
Concept of social media
Birchbox deals with a wide variety of cosmetic range. Social media involves various
platforms that are being widely used by enormous number of people for different purposes. Some
use it for fun, some for increasing their knowledge, some for passing time etc. More than major
part of the world have access to these social media networking websites (Hajli, 2014). Therefore,
it can be considered as an efficient platform for the people to get know about the products or
services that are being provided by Birchbox for its customers. Social media factors and
strategies can be considered much wide as they can actually help in increasing the popularity and
productivity of the company. Also, Birchbox can involve new feature's in their website and
develop a specialised application especially for the customers of Birchbox. By this way, it will
seem easy for the customers of the store to have access to the products and services of Birchbox.
Also, it seems a flexible option for the people to go through the products.
In this way, the social media marketing can actually help the company. Also, the
company after delivery of the products can take feedbacks on the application or their website. By
this means, the customers will also consider that they are important for the company which helps
in maintaining their interest in the company. By means of social media, the customers of
Birchbox are free to reach them anytime. Social media marketing can help in validating the brand
as for the Birchbox and increases the loyalty of customers as well. So, social media can be used
widely by the Birchbox as it can actually help the company in an increased rate of productivity
and popularity as well. From some time, it has been observed that Birchbox has been facing a
few issues regarding the marketing and sales of their products. Hence, involvement of social
media marketing can actually help in resolving these issues and thus, help the company in
increasing popularity and productivity of Birchbox as well.
Relationship between social media and increased productivity
Social media includes various different factors that can be adopted and involved by
Birchbox in order to promote all their products and services by different means so that more
people can get to know about it. Also, more than half of the population these days spend much
time on these social networking websites. Therefore, Birchbox can focus on adopting such ways
as they can make a page of their in social networking websites so that people can get to know
about it more. Also, they can send their customers messages often about the ongoing offers and
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discounts. Social media marketing can help in maintaining the touch between the Birchbox and
the customers (Hanna, Rohm and Crittenden, 2011). When more people will get to know about
their products and services, there is a possibility that they try more often it. As a result, it can
actually help in increasing the productivity of the company. Also, they can pop notifications
about some happy hours for their customers. Moreover, on the websites, pages and their
application, Birchbox can take regular feedbacks from their customers about their services and
products delivered. It is because this is a better way of having an interaction with them. Taking
feedbacks from the customers is considered as a very attractive feature that companies involve in
order to gain a huge amount of popularity. Thus, for Birchbox as well, it can be considered as a
very important factor that can actually attract a huge number of customers, thus gaining
productivity as well as popularity at higher rates. Also, the consumers thinks the fact that they are
important for the company, it further helps in maintaining the interest of the consumers in the
company. After receiving the feedbacks, Birch box can focus on making the modifications
required or if some product or service does not seem to be satisfied enough as per the customers,
then they can make some modifications and improvements in the product as soon as possible so
that the customers does not have to get disappointed. Regular feedbacks from the customers can
actually help Birchbox in attracting a wide number of customers because these can be considered
as some strategies that can help in maintaining the interest of the customers towards a specific
organisation.
If Birchbox involves these ways as making pages on social networking websites,
modifying the website and application as according to the current requirements of the market and
what customers want, then the social media marketing can actually help the Birchbox in gaining
higher number of customers and that too satisfied. The target of every organisation is to provide
satisfaction to the customers so that they can stay happy with the products and services of the
company. So, if Birchbox involve the social media marketing for promoting their products and
services, it can actually help them. When their services will be efficient, the customers will be
happy as well, so does their reviews will be. It is important because when some customer visits
the website or page of some new organisation, the first thing they go through is the reviews of the
company, so the company can regularly check the reviews on their website and can focus on the
negative ones.
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Research methodology
Research is considered as a systematic way of collecting the information and data by
various means to make the whole research better (Pookulangara and Koesler, 2011). Research
methodology is classified as a systematic plan that provides many ways of collecting the
information and data by various means in order to make the research more effective and
appropriate. There are variosu aspects of research methodology and these are discussed as under:
Research approach
Research approach is considered as a step by step plan which helps in the integration of
the compounds. It can be further classified as either inductive or deductive. The inductive
approach deals with emerging of new theories while the deductive one deals with further
observations of the already existing theory. In this research, the researcher will make use of the
deductive approach because it can help in better analysing the influence of social media on
consumer's purchase.
Research design
Research design is considered as an overall strategy that makes the process of integrating
the compounds more easily and efficiently. The result can be in a more logical way that can seem
more efficient for the given research. It is classified in various types such as descriptive, semi
experimental, experimental, co relational and review (Goh, Heng and Lin, 2013). In this research,
the researcher will make use of the descriptive design because it does not deal with any case
control study, instead it deals with the naturalistic observations and thus it can prove much
helpful in understanding the impact of social media on the purchasing of the consumers.
Data collection
Collection of data is considered as gathering of the entire information and data by various
means. Some very popular means of collecting the data can be classified as primary data or
secondary one. Primary data is the data that is being gathered for the first time but the secondary
data is the data that has already been collected by some external body (Solomon and et.al., 2014).
Sources of primary data involves the information from the means of focused groups, interviews,
surveys etc. whereas the sources for the collection of secondary data involves books, online,
journals etc. In this research, the researcher will make use of the primary data because it can help
in analysing better about the influence of social media.
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Sampling
Sampling is classified as a process in which few samples are taken from a larger
population. It is divided into various parts such as stratified, cluster, simple random sampling,
cluster and systematic. In this research, the researcher will make use of the systematic sampling
because it can help in providing a better understanding of the impact of social media on the
purchasing of the consumers. It is because this method of sampling is considered as a sort of
probability sampling in which the samples are random and starts from some random point and
from a fixed interval, which is known as the sampling interval.
Research limitations
Research limitations are considered as the factors that may act as barriers or challenges in
the research (Wang, Yu and Wei, 2012). A very basic example of this can be considered as the
fact that if the researcher wants to expand the time of the research in order to make it more
effective, they should also consider that at the same time that if the time will be expanded, they
will be requiring more cost as well. So, if at that time efficient cost is not available, then it can act
as a barrier or challenge. Thus, the researcher should complete the research in the given deadline
only so that no such external factors may act as barriers or challenges.
Timeline
The timeline on the basis of all activities along with the time frame is represented as under:
Basis Week
1
Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8
Identificati
on of the
issue
Understand
ing the aim
Making the
objectives.
On the
basis of
themes,
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gathering
of
information
Research
methodolog
y
implementa
tion
Collecting
primary
data
Evaluating
the
gathered
data and
information
Conclusion
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the report that Birchbox has been going some sort of issues
regarding the sales and marketing of their products. Hence, Birchbox can make involvement of
social media marketing so that they can again gain much number of customers so that the
productivity rate can be increased as well. There are various means of social media that can be
adopted by Birchbox in order to make better promotions about the products and services.
Consequently, it can have a huge influence on the purchasing of the consumers. Various aspects
of the research have also been included in order to make the whole research more efficient and
appropriate.
Also, it is concluded that it is very important to focus on the influence of social media on
the purchasing of consumers because it deals with resolving enormous issues that are going in the
Birch box.. There have been observed various advancements in the world because of social
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media as it involves variety of factors that can actually help in increasing the growth of the
business. As it has been observed from a few times that the productivity of Birchbox has been
affected, so the involvement of social media technology can actually help in maximising the
popularity rate of the company, thus increasing the productivity rate as well. It is because there
are various ways that come under the social media and Birchbox can make use of it to promote
their products and services so that more and more people will get to know about it, thus, it can
help in increasing their productivity rate.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
Armstrong, G. and et.al., 2015. Marketing: an introduction. Pearson Education.
Goh, K. Y., Heng, C. S. and Lin, Z., 2013. Social media brand community and consumer
behavior: Quantifying the relative impact of user-and marketer-generated
content. Information Systems Research. 24(1). pp.88-107.
Hajli, M. N., 2014. A study of the impact of social media on consumers. International Journal of
Market Research. 56(3). pp.387-404.
Hanna, R., Rohm, A. and Crittenden, V. L., 2011. We’re all connected: The power of the social
media ecosystem. Business horizons. 54(3). pp.265-273.
Pookulangara, S. and Koesler, K., 2011. Cultural influence on consumers' usage of social
networks and its' impact on online purchase intentions. Journal of Retailing and
Consumer Services. 18(4). pp.348-354.
Solomon, M. R. and et.al., 2014. Consumer behavior: Buying, having, and being (Vol. 10).
Pearson.
Wang, X., Yu, C. and Wei, Y., 2012. Social media peer communication and impacts on purchase
intentions: A consumer socialization framework. Journal of interactive marketing. 26(4).
pp.198-208.
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