HI6008 - Social Network: Advantages and Disadvantages in Sydney

This report explores the advantages and disadvantages of using social networks in business, focusing on the context of Sydney. It begins by defining social networks and their increasing importance for businesses in brand visibility and customer relationship management, contrasting them with traditional marketing methods. The report outlines the objectives of the research, including determining the extent of social network usage by Sydney businesses, assessing its positive or negative impact, and identifying the most common platforms. It summarizes relevant literature, highlighting Facebook's dominance in Australia and its role in connecting small businesses with global markets. The report then details the advantages of social networking, such as revenue generation, brand development, customer attraction, and market research, while also addressing disadvantages like privacy concerns and the need for constant monitoring. Finally, it presents research questions and outlines the research design and methodology, incorporating both qualitative and quantitative approaches, while acknowledging the limitations of the study due to time and financial constraints. Desklib offers a wealth of resources for students, including similar reports and solved assignments.

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF USING THE SOCIAL NETWORK 1
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF USING THE SOCIAL NETWORK IN
BUSINESS IN SYDNEY
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Professor’s Name
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Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
Research objectives.....................................................................................................................................4
The scope of the project...............................................................................................................................4
Literature review.........................................................................................................................................5
Research questions/hypothesis....................................................................................................................9
Primary question......................................................................................................................................9
Secondary questions................................................................................................................................9
Research design and methodology..............................................................................................................9
Qualitative research.................................................................................................................................9
Quantitative research.............................................................................................................................10
Research limitation....................................................................................................................................10
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................11
Reference...................................................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
Many scholars have given different definitions to the term social network, since its
invention in the 1990s (Edosomwan et al. 2011). In this project social network has been defined
as are web-based services that enable people and businesses to create a profile both public and
semi-public, share a connection with individuals they are comfortable with as well as view what
others are doing on the same network. There are over 60 Social networks as ofJune 1, 2018, in
existence today. These networks include but not limited to Instagram, facebook, twitter, skype,
palmchat, WhatsApp, Tumblr, QZone, YouTube, WeChat, Google, BaiduTieba, Snapchat,
Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc. Today, businesses are using social networking to increase the visibility
of their brand, develop and increase their relationship with their customers and influencers
(Edosomwan et al. 2011). In Sydney, business influences customers on social media through
singling on their services only, responding to questions and complaints, among other ways.
This project aims at finding the reasons why social networking is important to business
and possible disadvantages that may accrue from using social networking (Taylor, Wells,
Howell, and Raphael, 2012). Social media has replaced traditional methods of marketing such as
advertising and direct mail to connect positively with the influencers and the consumers
(Stephen, and Galak, 2012). To understand the social network, businesses should think of social
media in two ways. First, social network participation meaning businesses are on social
networking and can constantly deliver value to an online community (Stephen, and Galak, 2012).
Secondly, creation and distribution of original content that entertains educate, inform and

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empower while attracting the right people to your brand (Taylor, Wells, Howell, and Raphael,
2012).
An article by SocialMediaNews.com.au derived from January 2018 Social Media
Statistics Australia show that, social media users in Australia are among the most active and
frequent in social networks across the globe(Taylor, Wells, Howell, and Raphael, 2012). This is
because Facebook alone account for close to 60% of users among the county's population and 50
of the country populace log in at least once a day. Facebook accounts for the largest number of
subscribers in the world with 2.1 billion monthly users and an increase of 500 million new users
in the past 2 years.
Research objectives
This project tries to identify and deeply understand how business organizations in Sydney
use social media to influence the consumer purchasing behavior and whether this may increase
smooth flow of services and product of the business. The main objectives of this research
includes as listed below:
1. To determine the extent at which businesses in Sydney use the social network
2. To find out whether social network has a negative or positive impact on businesses in
Sydney or not
3. To identify the most common social network(s)used by business organizations in Sydney
The scope of the project
The scope of this study will involve identifying the most popular social networking sites
in Sydney and discuss its impact on the business world both positive and negative. The study

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will use secondary available data from reliable internet sources such like online books, journals,
magazines, etc. from world known authors and experts in social media networks. The paper
looks at the flexibility of the Social Network Sites and determines its implications and
implementation on different organizations.
Literature review
According to 2018, Social Media Statistics Facebook is the leading social network site in
Australia will close to 15,000,000 monthly active users, YouTube coming second with active
visitors at the same rate of 15,000,000(Miller, and Tucker, 2013). Those who are actively using
Instagram in Australia accounts for 9,000,000 monthly Word press follows with
5,700,000WhatsApp with 5,000,000 active Australian users and approximately 4,200,000 linked
in active users. The other most popular social network Australia is Snapchat with approximately
4,000,000 daily active Snapchat users according to Snapchat data. The other social network sites
have less than 4,000,000 monthly active users.
According to Australian Bureau of Statistics Population Clock Australians are
approximately 24.6 million. Facebook own data show that there are 15 million active Facebook
Australian users. This accounts for 60% of the total Australian population Facebook active users
(Miller, and Tucker, 2013).
According to Kaylie Smith, a Facebook new head of Small Medium-sized Businesses for
New Zealand and Australia, Facebook has enabled a different kind of commerce, for small
Australian business to connect with global markets(Saldanha, and Krishnan, 2012).Smith states
that, although they are not giving the exact number of small Australian businesses using
Facebook platform, there are over 210 million people connected to Australian small Medium-

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sized businesses across the globe through the platform. “We are enabling a different kind of
commerce, enabling Australian small businesses to connect with markets globally.” These
statistics show that Australia is a really a rich small business market(Chu, and Kim, 2011). Smith
states that, Facebook is in the process of introducing new tools that will make it easy for
businesses to grow and get new clients in all parts of the world. One major of these tools will be
dynamic language optimization that will enable business to place multiple languages within one
ad where after Facebook will enable to match the right language to the target customer (Meske,
and Stieglitz, 2013). Smith further state that, Facebook is focused to “Pay to Play” but not
limited to the organicreach of business pages to boost the use of paid content on Facebook
(Rosenkrans, 2009). Examples of businesses that has seen positive impact of using Facebook is
Falcon (Ugander, Karrer, Backstrom and Marlow, 2011). She says that, Pay to Play applies you
want to promote or sell or grow your business (Meske, and Stieglitz, 2013).
Advantages of Social Networking in Business
The most important use of social networking is revenue generation. Advertising of
products and building a community across social network platform increase revenue collection
for the businesses (Harik, Google Inc, 2013).
Social media helps in brand development and enables customers to connect with your
brand on a personal level as well as creating an opportunity to give your business a voice and
further develop its brand for already established businesses (Correa,Hinsley and De Zuniga,
2010).
Social media provides with a good platform for attracting both prospective and existing
customers. This is achieved through social media campaign that aims at attracting customers

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through promotions and giveaways (Mangold, and Faulds, 2009). Until you attain the good
number of followers you, you will need to get to more personalized campaigns that will keep
customers with you.
Many businesses only use social networking for research mostly to know what their
competitors are doing in this or that platform or just getting information on what their customers
are saying about their products(Hanna, Rohm, and Crittenden, 2011). Other companies will
mostly utilize social networking for job advertisement to help them get skilled personnel
(Saldanha, and Krishnan, 2012). These companies will mostly utilize social network like
LinkedIn.
Other times some business will be on social media for the purpose of creating good
networks. Networks are valuable ways of ideas exchange with people who have similar minds on
how to change and improve the way businesses are done (Correa, Hinsley and De Zuniga, 2010).
There are other advantages a business will get from social networking and should be studied
thoroughly.
Disadvantages of using social networking in business
Despite many advantages accruing from social networking use by business, there are also
pros and cons of using social networks. The issue of privacy to information concerning the
business arises in all organization (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Privacy violation could be
possible with the irresponsible IT business information managers (Hanna, Rohm, and Crittenden,
2011). Other disadvantage would be the requirement of daily monitoring as social media is very
immediate. Social media also requires additional resources to manage online business presence.

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Research questions/hypothesis
Primary question
Are the social networks bringing good or bad to the business world compared to traditional
methods like emailing?
Secondary questions
Does every business in Australia use social networking to increase their customer base?
Are businesses that use social media more profitable than those that do not?

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Research design and methodology
Qualitative research
Qualitative research design will use familiarization and immersion process to try and bring the whole
picture of the texts while removing contradicting statements. This method will use the process of the
encoding process to reduce description to numbers (Bernard, 2017). This design will also help provide
details on behaviours, personal traits and emotions that quantitative design is not able to provide when
analyzing data (Neuman, 2013). The questions that will be answered about the business behaviour will
include how the business uses social media, when does it use social media, where is the social media
used and finally why is the business using social media (Neuman, 2013). The design will extract data
from small samples of social media types from the over 60 social media platforms identified to be in
existence in Australia as of 1st June 2018. From the secondary data available everywhere, the design will
help as to determine immediate reaction and emotional responses to experience with social media
among small businesses in Australia (Bernard, 2017).
Ethnography
The research design will apply ethnography method to help gather information from interviews and
documentary, observation method to produce comprehensive and detailed accounts of various social
phenomena (Bernard, 2017).
However, data from this research design may not have confidence in numbers reflective of Australia
business population as a small sample will be used.
Quantitative research
This project will also use quantitative research design using the data from the internet to avoid the
subjective risk errors that may occur as a result of using disorganized qualitative research process since
it is more useful as it is more objective than qualitative design (Neuman, 2013). It will apply online
survey technique as well as involve 1000+ small medium-business enterprises in Australia as sample size.
The data used for the research originate from internet sources written by known world researchers and
experts to make data more reliable (Bernard, 2017). This research design will answer the “who” is
supposed to use social networking and what behaviour is more beneficial to apply to social media
(Neuman, 2013). This research design will use survey where a large number of the respondent will be
involved to gather and analyze quantitative data.

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The limitation of using this study will be lack of moderation since it will require the stimulus presented
be more functional for use without involving a moderator. It is also hard to prove participants in the
moments during their responses (Neuman, 2013).
The research will need to combine the two to achieve the most concerns of the questions such as who,
why, where, when, what, and how of the businesses use of the social networking.
Research limitation
It should be noted that this research would have been more accurate if the university would
have given more time for the data collection to increase the content of research. The other limitation
would be the challenges of finances and time constraint as the researcher needs to balance between
class and research time.
Time schedule
1st to 7th June 2018- Project topic
8th to 14th June 2018- Project background introduction
15st to 21st June 2018- Project need
22nd to 29th June 2018- Project objectives and implications
30th to 6th July 2018- Literature review
7th to 13th July 2018- Methodology
14th to 20th July 2018- limitations and evaluations
21st to 29th July 2018- recommendations and conclusion
Conclusion

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From the above discussion, we have seen that social networking has gained world acceptance in
the businesses especially in Australia and its regions like Sydney. Social nearness for businesses
is the most important today, if the businesses want to attract customers from comfort of their
homes. Social networking is here to stay and every business must be aware of how to use it to
reap maximum benefit. The need for increased sales, brand promotion, networking, customer-
business relationship establishment and research on what the competitors are doing are the
driving force towards online presence for almost all businesses. It should be noted that, apart
from benefits associated with social media presence and social media being here to stay, it
should be used consciously with specific objectives laid down by the business. This will enable
businesses to reap maximum benefits from the careful use of social networking on daily basis.

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Reference
Bernard, H.R., 2017. Research methods in anthropology: Qualitative and quantitative
approaches. Rowman & Littlefield.
Chu, S.C. and Kim, Y., 2011.Determinants of consumer engagement in electronic word-of-
mouth (eWOM) in social networking sites.International journal of Advertising, 30(1), pp.47-75.
Correa, T., Hinsley, A.W. and De Zuniga, H.G., 2010. Who interacts on the Web?: The
intersection of users’ personality and social media use. Computers in Human Behavior, 26(2),
pp.247-253.
Edosomwan, S., Prakasan, S.K., Kouame, D., Watson, J. and Seymour, T., 2011.The history of
social media and its impact on business.Journal of Applied Management and entrepreneurship,
16(3), p.79.
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.
Harik, G.R., Google Inc, 2013. Generating information for online advertisements from internet
data and traditional media data.U.S. Patent 8,438,154.
Kaplan, A.M. and Haenlein, M., 2010. Users of the world, unite! The challenges and
opportunities of Social Media.Business horizons, 53(1), pp.59-68.
Mangold, W.G. and Faulds, D.J., 2009. Social media: The new hybrid element of the promotion
mix. Business horizons, 52(4), pp.357-365.