Digital Social Media Marketing
Problem Statement
In general, digital social media marketing has become a significant issue in today’s business. Entrepreneurs across the globe have made some mistakes in the social media platform and have lowered their customer interactions. For starters, some online entrepreneurs may wish to buy fans and followers. In this scenario, they do this since they desire to get social proof. Also, when engagement is low, search engines never show posts to people (Herhausen et al., 2020). Moreover, this is because several persons who have liked the page may not be interested in its recommended updates. Also, people selling fans and followers tend to have made accounts that are fake and will be closed as soon as the platform notices the accounts are invalid hence affect the users’ social connection with the client (Octavia et al., 2020).
On the other hand, setting policies on what can and cannot be updated on the site is an issue. An online entrepreneur needs to lay out policies and guidelines to respond to feedback, criticisms, and suggestions. Therefore, if users detect an ultimate form of disparity in the manner in which communication flows, they may not stick for long. Besides, individuals having distinct personalities and a simple response on the platform may damage the brand’s image (Octavia et al., 2020). And hence, ensuring that a good reputation is maintained, updates and engagement always have their ultimate policies.
On the contrary, being in every social network around is never suitable for those taking part in online trade. However, we find that the social network that an individual needs to focus on should be based on the industry and niche. And hence, users have failed to consider the primary demographic and the implicit sites using them, thus becomes a problem.
Succinctly, such entrepreneurs have failed to use hashtags that tally with the trends and posts on a wall. Besides, hashtags often become viral quickly, and an individual may end up giving visibility of a brand to be looked for quite a while (Herhausen et al., 2020).
The next point is that entrepreneurs have failed to use social media marketing with other activities. They have neglected the fact that online marketing involves combining advertisement efforts in search engines, social platforms, and mail (Onețiu, 2020). In this scenario, when signing off, it is useful to place a twitter account at the end of a personalized letter. Succinctly, they have made inconsistent branding on different sites of social media. Many entrepreneurs explicitly have one look, feel, and message regarding their web site. However, these are different on their Twitter, Facebook, as well as LinkedIn profiles (Onețiu, 2020). Therefore, these lead to criticality concerning the presentation of one consistent brand logo, look, and message. Also, they think that social media is free. In this case, several customers believed that they could just start surfing on the Facebook or twitter page and not having the ability to pay for marketing, which is not correct (Dwivedi et al., 2020). For effectiveness, social media needs strategic planning and dedicated resources to run a business.
Therefore, the study examines the ultimate relationship between innovation, market orientation, and organizational performance.
Research questions
- How can online entrepreneurs improve firm performance?
- How can digital traders improve their social media marketing?
- How can online entrepreneurs improve market orientation?
- What is the relationship between customer orientation and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between competitor orientation and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between inter-functional coordination and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between customer orientation and innovation?
- What is the relationship between competitor orientation and innovation?
- What is the relationship between inter-functional coordination and innovation?
- What is the relationship between innovation and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between customer orientation, innovation, and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between competitor orientation, innovation, and firm performance?
- What is the relationship between inter-functional coordination, innovation, and firm performance?
Conceptual Framework:
Figure 1. Shows the relationship between social media marketing and market orientation and firm performance.
Nevertheless, market orientation comprises of customer orientation, competitor orientation, as well as inter-functional orientation. However, the relationship between firm performance and customer orientation is positive. Also, the relationship between competitor orientation and firm performance is positive. On the other hand, the relationship between inter-functional coordination and firm performance is positive. Succinctly, the relationship between customer orientation and technology is positive. The relationship between competitor orientation and organizational innovation is positive. Besides, the relationship between firm performance and innovation is positive (Adeola et al., 2020). The relationship between customer orientation, change, and firm performance is positive. Again, the relationship between competitor orientation and firm performance is positive. Moreover, the relationship between inter-functional
coordination, innovation and firm performance are positive.
Theoretical perception regarding digital social media marketing
R-A approach stipulates that the tastes and preferences of consumers often change. Therefore,
de Oliveira confirmed innovation in retailing through social media to be explicitly centered on financial performance. One should engage significant innovations as a new resource in a bid to become a competitive advantage compared to the competitors (Octavia et al., 2020). In the R-A approach framework, market orientation explicitly serves as intangible resources offered value for the segments of a market in a bid to increase efficiency and effectiveness in production (Adeola et al., 2020).
Table 1. Shows Dimension of Variables.
| Serial Number | Variable | Source | Cronbach Alpha |
| 1. | Innovation | de Oliveira et al., 2020, Dwivedi et al., 2020, Heinze et al., 2020- 40 items | 0.971 |
| 2. | Market Orientation | Octavia et al., 2020, Sriayudha et al., 2020- 17 items | 0.688 |
| 3. | Customer Orientation | Harryhausen et al., 2020, Jacobson et al., 2020- 7 items | 0.923 |
| 4. | Competitor Orientation | Adeola et al., 2020, Drummond et al., 2020- 9 items | 0.757 |
| 5. | Inter-functional Orientation | Mpandare & Li, 2020, Onețiu, 2020- 2 items | 0.816 |
| 6. | Firm Performance | Dwivedi et al., 2020, Lin et al., 2020- 15 items | 0.91 |
Research Methodology
Ultimately, a research design will be used as the chief source of primary data. A structured set of questionnaires will be used for asking participants queries—besides, the target population of the study comprises the firm’s operations. Succinctly, the library search for online databases and books will undergo optimization. Nevertheless, for my research, the examination shall consist of 4 sections, whereby the first part will measure the performance of the firm. The second part will measure the components of market orientation, including client orientation, competitor orientation, and inter-functional coordination. The third section will measure a firm’s innovation while the last part will gather data concerning the respondents’ demographic profile and their respective organizations. However, factor analysis, reliability analysis, correlation analysis, regression analysis, and descriptive analysis will serve as the primary statistical approaches.
Conclusion
The research examines the ultimate relationship between innovation, market orientation, as well as organizational performances. Besides, the study results will be used by the management and decision-makers in enhancing and upgrading marketing strategy through gaining return and increasing penetration of the global market. Also, the research highly expects a positive relationship between organizational performance, market orientation, and innovation. Moreover, the study expects innovation to mediate the relationship between organizational performance and market orientation.
References
Adeola, O., Hinson, R. E., & Evans, O. (2020). Social media in marketing communications: A synthesis of successful strategies for the digital generation. In Digital Transformation in Business and Society (pp. 61-81). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
De Oliveira, R. T., Indulska, M., Steen, J., & Verreynne, M. L. (2020). Towards a framework for innovation in retailing through social media. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 54.
Dwivedi, Y. K., Ismagilova, E., Hughes, D. L., Carlson, J., Filieri, R., Jacobson, J., … & Kumar, V. (2020). Setting the future of digital and social media marketing research: Perspectives and research propositions. International Journal of Information Management, 102168.
Dwivedi, Y. K., Rana, N. P., Slade, E. L., Singh, N., & Kizgin, H. (2020). Editorial introduction: Advances in theory and practice of digital marketing.
Drummond, C., O’Toole, T., & McGrath, H. (2020). Digital engagement strategies and tactics in social media marketing. European Journal of Marketing.
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Jacobson, J., Gruzd, A., & Hernández-García, Á. (2020). Social media marketing: Who is watching the watchers?. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 53.
Lin, W. L., Yip, N., Ho, J. A., & Sambasivan, M. (2020). The adoption of technological innovations in a B2B context and its impact on firm performance: An ethical leadership perspective. Industrial Marketing Management.
Mpandare, M., & Li, G. (2020). Utilizing Enterprise Social Media for Product Innovation: The Role of Market Orientation. Sustainability, 12(9), 3913.
Octavia, A., Indrawijaya, S., Sriayudha, Y., & Hasbullah, H. (2020). Impact on E-Commerce Adoption on Entrepreneurial Orientation and Market Orientation in Business Performance of SMEs. Asian Economic and Financial Review, 10(5), 516.
Onețiu, D. D. (2020). The impact of social media adoption by companies. Digital transformation. Studia Universitatis Vasile Goldiş, Arad-Seria Ştiinţe Economice, 30(2), 83-96.
Sriayudha, Y., Octavia, A., & Indrawijaya, S. (2020, June). Entrepreneurial Orientation and Market Orientation in Business Performance of SMEs: An Exploration of the Impact on E-Commerce Adoption. In 8th International Conference of Entrepreneurship and Business Management Untar (ICEBM 2019) (pp. 158-163). Atlantis Press.