Marketing Research

Group Project

On

The effect of
Social-Media Communication
On
Consumer Perceptions of Brands

Under the Guidance of

Prof. Ritu Sinha

Submitted By:
Mr. Prasad Bhat MM-12-02
Mr. Onkar Sawant MM-12-14
Mr. Amey Gangoli MM-12-05

IES MCRC
Bandra Reclamation, Mumbai

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 AKNOWLEDGEMENT

Every Single moment where success or failure faced during this project work
is shared among many people who helped us through this project work. We would
thus like to express our sincere gratitude towards all those people.

It gives us immense pleasure to submit the project report of ― The Impact of

Social Media Marketing Communications on Consumers' Perception of Brands‖

We as a group members take this opportunity to thank our lecturer, Prof. Ritu
Sinha, who was a constant source of inspiration and also took keen interest in each
and every step of the project development.

We are grateful to our Director, Prof. (Dr.) Dinesh D. Harsolekar and HOD,
Prof. Ms. Devaki Nadkarni for their encouragement in shaping the idea and
valuable suggestions in making it a reality.

We would also like to thank our all of IES Management Team, Staff members
and assistants for their support.

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 INDEX

Page
Chapter No. Topic
No.
Introduction
1

Background of the Study

2

Statement of Problem
3

Research Objectives
4

Research Questions/ Hypothesis

5

Significance of the study

6

Literature review
7

Research Methodology
8

Questionnaires
9

Conclusion and Recommendation

10

References
11

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4
 Chapter 1
Introduction

Social media has been around since humans began to talk. One of the first
signs of human social media was cave wall paintings. Some of the earliest forms of
social media were not digital.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the word social is "of or relating to

human society, the interaction of the individual and the group, or the welfare of
human beings as members of society. The word media means a medium of
cultivation, conveyance, or expression. Media is also a plural form of medium and a
medium is a particular form or system of communication.

Social media refers to interaction among people in which they create, share,
and/or exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. Social
media depend on mobile and web-based technologies to create highly interactive
platforms through which individuals and communities share, co-create, discuss, and
modify user-generated content.

As marketers struggle to define the value of social media to their brands, new
Knowledge Networks findings demonstrate that consumers are much more likely to
discover new products and brands or refer to social media before making purchase
decisions than they were just a year ago

Consumers are also integrating social media usage with their mobile phone
activity. In 2011, 40% of teens and adults who have ever used social media are
accessing it through their mobile device – up from 28% versus 6 months ago. This
means that roughly 80 million people check social media from a mobile device.

As a result, social media is now a 'wherever I am' option, integrated into the
mobile-plus social media users' shopping experience and habits; 27% compare or
check prices via SoMe, 24% refer to reviews for brands/places/services, and 16%
(23% of Boomers) use social media to find coupons or other discounts for local
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businesses.

What Is Customer Perception?

Customer perception is defined as the way that customers usually view or feel about
certain services and products. It can also be related to customer satisfaction which is
the expectation of the customer towards the products.

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 Chapter 2
Background of the Study

The convergence of technology and Social Media have changed the

way people interact with one another and businesses can no more ignore
these digital communities.

The Internet has simplified business communication thereby

improving the way companies sell, promote products and services.
Product distribution has been made global and communication
instantaneous; news travel within seconds making today‗s newspapers good
only for yesterday‗s information. The effect on brands can be either
extremely positive or negative depending on the perception of consumers.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of Social Media

and how they have influenced consumer's perception of brands.

Social Media C ommunications typically centres on efforts by an

individual or organisation to create media content (music, article, video) that
communicates marketing messages that attract attention and encourage its
target audience to experience, interact and share information with their social
networks (either online or offline) to meet a business objective.

A corporate message on social media spreads from user to user

and presumably resonates because it appears to come from a trusted, third-
party source, as opposed to the brand or company itself . This form of paid
marketing is therefore an earned media rather than paid media because of
the degree of trust earned by those who share it.

Social Media Advertising is gaining the attention of businesses and

brands because of basic advantages which include; it's relatively lower
costs, targeted advertising, measurement, personalised messages, and a
great opportunity to drive traffic from leading social networking sites to
business and brand's personalised platforms (or business websites).
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 Chapter 3
Statement of Problem

As with other countries around the world; social networks and blogs
continue to dominate times spent online by users. In the United States, social
networking accounts for nearly a quarter of total time spent on the Internet
with nearly 4 in 5 active Internet users visiting social networks than they do
on any other U.S. website.

With more and more people accessing the Web through mobile phones, the Internet
user base in the country is projected to touch 243 million by June 2014, a year-on-
year growth of 28 per cent. According to the Internet And Mobile Association of
India(IAMAI), the Internet user base in the country stood at 190 million at the end of
June, 2013.

The growth of Internet users has also led to a substantial growth of

other digital industries such as e-commerce and digital advertising, it added.
Digital commerce market stood at Rs 8,146 crore in December 2007 and it grew to
Rs 47,349 crore by the end of 2012.

At the end of December 2013, digital commerce in India grew to Rs 62,967

crore. Digital Advertising has also been witnessing a steady growth. The study
projects the online advertising market in India to touch Rs 2,938 crore by March
2014.

While most businesses and top-level executives agree to the rise and
rapid adoption of social media as a platform for communication and digital
conversations in India, there's the usual reluctance of testing new ideas and
understanding the impact of these platforms on brands.

Some have adopted the basic online strategies of setting up adverts

through mobile phones and major websites.

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 But beyond the ideas of push advertising, the online environment
includes several distinct factors that engender brand loyalty. As consumers
become more savvy about the Internet, the impact of their behaviour,
perception and interactions will influence brand loyalty.

Social Media Marketing communication is beyond advertising on

Facebook and Yahoo, it involves a lot more. People can instantaneously
respond to businesses' offline tactics, online adverts, marketing policies and
even rumors. The implications is not about when brands willl adopt online
platforms, it is about how.

The development, nurturing and maintenance of consumer brand trust

on the internet needs to be integrated into companies‗ marketing plans and
promotion mix, Fournier, S. and Yao, J. (1997) proposes it will become very
important especially in the face of highly competitive markets with
increasing unpredictability and decreasing product differentiation.

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 Chapter 4
Research Objectives

Because of the wide acceptance of Social Media platforms and its

ability to enhance communication and interaction both between brands and
consumers on one hand, and among consumers, it has become imperative
that today‗s brands especially in India take advantage of the opportunities
that exist for constant communication, targeted advertising, low cost per
lead, customer engagement and interaction across these platforms.
Constant and consistent two-way communication will help brands not only
create superior products or services but build long-term relationships with
consumers.

This increases brand equity and loyalty, which ultimately positively

impacts the bottom line and the competitive edge and sustainability of the
brand.

In the light of the foregoing, the objectives of this Project include the following;

i. To ascertain the online social media habits of prospective media content

consumers

ii. To measure how their online activities influence brand perception

iii. To measure the impact of their response to Social Media messages

iv. To measure the effectiveness of Social Media and engagement campaigns on

consumer perception

v. To explore how Indian agencies are engaging their target audience

vi. To examine their attitude towards messages received through Social Media

vii. To measure the degree of reliability of Social Media

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 Chapter 5
Research Questions/ Hypothesis

The research is designed to test the following hypothesis which

tends to propose the following concepts;

H1 – People find social media advertising as a very useful channel in

getting information about products and services.

Social Media and online advertising is supported by strong analytic and

targeted metrics such that adverts are seen by people who see the adverts
as relevant to them. While it may be intrusive, it is expected that people who
see online adverts should see them as relevant.

H2 – It is opined that social media is a real tool to nurture Brand Loyalty

With Social Media being unique through User-generated content

(UGC) and two-way communication, it is a veritable tool for building Brand
Loyalty.

The 2012 Cone Business in Social Media Study found that of the 60
percent of Americans who use social media, 93 percent believe companies
should have a presence in social media. 85 percent of this population also
believe a company should not only be present but also interact with its
consumers via social media and 56 percent of users feel both a stronger
connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with
them in a social media environment. Steve Outing in his own book, Enabling
Social Company opines that when companies listen to what the audience is
saying—and build online venues that encourage consumers to express themselves,
they can innovate faster and more intelligently.

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when companies listen to what the audience is saying—and build online
venues that encourage consumers to express themselves, they can
innovate faster and more intelligently.

H3 - Conversations going on in social media platforms have a

great influence on consumer perception and buying behaviour

With technology is now aiding Word-of-Mouth Marketing, digital

conversations, peer comments, tweets, blog posts, and product reviews will
have a huge impact on consumer behaviour. According to Heinze and Hu and
the theory of impression management, individuals can form impressions of
organizations based on interactions with organizations‗ websites. While
examining customers‗ attitudes toward company Web sites, Heinze and Hu
evaluated the importance of competition and said that a company must
maintain pace with its industry. It should incorporate features and technology
that consumers deem important. Managers should focus on using the
features that have the greatest effects on customer perceptions.

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 Chapter 6
Significance of the study

The significance of the study has various implications for different

fields, analytics and marketing communication strategy employed by
organisations. The study aims to determine the effectiveness for
organisations and businesses using social media tools in reaching their
target audience and to increase their bottom-line. It will also examine the
importance of online reputation and the need for organisations to develop
innovative approaches in reaching their target audience. This study will also
ultimately conclude if social media helps organisations differentiate
themselves in the market place.

The significance of the study will have implications in the following areas;

1. Spread

The survey will assess the involvement of social media in the lives of different
categories of the Indian populace. It will also affirm the rapid involvement of
brands within the marketplace. The study will also highlight the disposition of
people to social media marketing messages and the response of the sample
population to advertising messages.

2. Traffic

This is one of the more obvious ways of measuring social media benefits for
brands. While social media evokes a community for conversations, it has
tremendous potential for driving traffic for businesses with online portals, pages
and website. Once businesses have official pages online, marketing helps drive
traffic to their official website for further communication, marketing, they can
also serve as platforms to promote sales and promotional campaigns.

3. Interaction 13
The differentiating factor for social media platforms is the instantaneousness and
the opportunity for brands to participate in social media two-way conversations.
So many challenges can be solved through these means. It is also a valuable
indicator of public perception and the impact of the product and marketing
policies on the target market. Negative and de-marketing information can be
corrected and influenced through these means. An engaged customer is a highly
valuable one since interaction will reveal a lot more similitude of a market
research. Interaction can be anything from leaving comments, to participating in
support forums, to leaving customer reviews and ratings.

4. Sales

As India gradually shifts toward e-commerce solutions, online payment and non-
contact transactions, the study will reveal the perception of the population to
online transactions, how the new cashless policy being proposed is affecting them
and the prospects of whether the target audience can respond to marketing
messages of products and services presented on social media platforms.

5. Lead Generation

While most companies in India are not fully engaging in online transactions,
marketing communication can be used to drive Leads/footprints for sales or
events promotion. If peer-to-peer interaction on these platforms have a high
degree of reliability or perceived to be respected, social media platforms serve as
a potent platform to drive entry of new projects, advert campaigns with a resultant
impact on the number of people eventually coming for the products, product
sampling and event attendance.

6. Search Marketing

As most search engines favour content from social media, the Search Engine
Optimisation factor cannot be understated. Social media can be far more
powerful in this regard than can be easily realised. With Google introducing new14
changes to its search algorithm to include social media and personalised history
[14], Blog entries, product reviews and consumer experiences may outrank
original company websites. A well written and optimised story / video / image on
a site like Digg will generate a lot of traffic.

7. Brand metrics/Analytics

One angle with which the significance of the study will bear on is the
measurement of marketing efforts or marketing analytics. Unlike traditional
media, social media and other digital media platforms are concise and precise on
measurement. The direct measurement of digital marketing efforts is available on
so many digital platforms and offer insight into consumers' response to social
media marketing communication messages.

8. PR

The nature of public relations and reputation has changed, forever with the advent
of social media. With the advent of social networking sites (MySpace,
Facebook, Twitter e.t.c.) giving people and organisations the power to respond to
branding and marketing propositions and the attendant impact of blogs and other
user-generated media. Since Search Engines have a powerful control on
influencing consumer perception and opinions about products and services, what
Search Engines tell them has a lot of impact on the brands.

This study will have important implications for the distinct worlds of PR,
Customer Service, and Marketing.

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 Chapter 7
Literature review

Social media will include all web-based and mobile

technologies used to turn communication into interactive dialogue.
Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as "a group of
Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological
foundations of Web 2.0 and that allow the creation and exchange of user-
generated content. Social media is media for social interaction as a super-set
beyond social communication. Enabled by ubiquitously accessible and
scalable communication techniques, social media has substantially changed
the way organizations, communities, and individuals communicate. The
strength of these platforms is owing to the fact that it enhances the
consumers‗ ability to communicate with one another and subsequently
limits the amount of control companies have over the content and
dissemination of information about their brands.

Social Media Platforms

Social Media platforms are online portals driven by technology and

enhance the use, streaming and sharing of multimedia content (data, voice,
and video). These platforms have become the fast growing 'virtual
communities' in the emerging global village. The easy accessibility to
anyone anywhere across the world with internet access makes it a potential
marketplace where brands also come to promote their products and engage
the target audience. Increased communication on social media platforms
for organizations fosters brand awareness and often, improved customer
service. Additionally, social media serves as a relatively inexpensive
platform for organizations to implement marketing campaigns.

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Social Media platforms include Blogs, Social Networks, Newsgroups, Photo-
sharing, Blog Aggregators, Micro-communities and Wikis. Some examples of
these include;

Blogs
Perhaps the best known form of social media, blogs are web applications
built as shared online journals where people can post daily entries of
information: personal experiences,
business, hobbies or pleasure.
i. WordPress iii. Typepad
ii. Blogger/BlogSpot iv. Movable Type

Social Networks
These sites allow people to build personal web pages and then
connect with friends to share content and communication.
i. Facebook
ii. Google Plus iii. MySpace
iv. Hi5

Newsgroups/ Forums
These are web applications built for online communities and promote discussion.
They are built around specific topics, interests or location. Forums came about
before the term
―social media‖ and are a powerful and popular element of online communities.
i. Times

Content communities (multimedia)

These are online communities which organise and share particular kinds of content.
Most of them allow for people to upload, download and share different kind of
content; music, video and photos.
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 i. Facebook ii. Twitter
iii. Orkut iv. Linkedn

Instant Messengers
i. Black BerryMessenger ii. Skype
iii. Whatsapp iv. Yahoo Messenger
v. Google Chat

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The top three social media platforms include the following;

Facebook

Facebook, an online social networking service is the world's largest and most
used online community and website was launched in February 2004. The
company is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. and was
founded by Mark Zuckerberg alongside his college roommates and fellow
students; Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes. The Web
site's membership was initially limited by the founders to Harvard students, but
was expanded to other colleges in the Boston area, the Ivy League, and
Stanford University. It gradually added support for students at various other
universities before opening the platform up to high school students, and
eventually anyone aged 13 and above.

The Facebook online platform allows users to create personal profiles,

own their own virtual spaces, invite and add others as friends, exchange
messages, receive automatic notification of friends' activities. These
boutiques of technical functionalities were expansive enough to attract a wide
variety of early adopters which later extended into friends, acquaintances and
associates regardless of race, colour and gender. This online community has
resulted in creating the largest online community with more than 800 million
active users making it; if it were a country, the third largest in the world.

Social Media Marketing Communications is a major channel through which

Facebook makes its money. This source of revenue for Facebook evolved when
businesses and brands found a place within this online communities; creating
pages, pushing messages, pictures and videos to pre-defined target audience. It
also allowed individuals to offer their products and services to the online
community through social media advertising campaigns to sell their offerings
through display, word and banner advertising.

Microsoft which owns 1.3 % of Facebook ownership structure is responsible for

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serving banner advertising, It is reported that Facebook makes over $9 million per
day from advertising.

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, founded by three former employees of PayPal

(Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim) in February 2005[12]. It is built
on a technology that allows users (individuals and organisations) to view, display
and share a wide variety of user-generated video content, including movie clips,
TV clips, and music videos, as well as amateur content such as video blogging
and short original videos which users can upload, view and share videos.

As a result of this explosive growth, media corporations now use the platform in
sharing content through a partnership programme; CBS, the BBC, VEVO, Hulu
including India's Channels TV. The site grew rapidly, and in July 2006 the
company announced that more than 65,000 new videos were being uploaded
every day, and that the site was receiving 100 million video views per day.
Google Inc. bought YouTube for US$1.65 billion the same year and started
operations as a subsidiary of Google in November 2006.

Social Media through YouTube can either make use of the user-generated
videos or through YouTube's Advertising platform. This advertising platform is
managed by Google through its AdSense. An example of user generated videos
was used for building awareness for D'Banj's 'Oliver Twist' album.

LinkedIn

This is a business-related social networking site. Founded in December 2002

and launched in May 2003. It is mainly used for professional networking and
extending into a recruitment platform. With LinkedIn reporting more than 135
million registered users in more than 200 countries and territories.. The site is
available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Romanian,
Russian, Turkish and Japanese and has over 21.4 million monthly unique U.S.
visitors and 47.6 million globally. Users use it to connect with friends and 20
professional colleagues, to find jobs, business opportunities, employers now use
it to find prospective employers and prospective employees can establish their
profiles, Curriculum Vitae, experience and competence on the website. Web
applications are increasingly being used to develop platforms that use
LinkedIn for recruitment and selection for employment by organisations and are
gaining wide adoption.

The impacts of communication on these platforms have huge impact on brands

and consumer perception. In Gillin's Book, The New Influencers, he opined that
‗‗Conventional marketing wisdom has long held that a dis-satisfied customer tells
ten people. But that is out of date. In the new age of social media, he or she has
the tools to tell 10 million‗‗ (p. 4) consumers virtually overnight. Social media is
increasingly playing an important role in how consumers search, research, and
share information about brands and products. In fact 60 percent of consumers
researching products through multiple online sources learned about a specific
brand or retailer through social networking sites. Active social media users are
more likely to read product reviews online, and 3 out of 5 create their own
reviews of products and services. Women are more likely than men to tell
others about products that they like (81% of females vs. 72% of males).
Overall, consumer- generated reviews and product ratings are the most
preferred sources of product information among social media users.
According to a research conducted by Nielsen, a global research firm, it gave
empirical evidence that social media is increasingly a platform consumers use to
express their loyalty to their favourite brands and products, and many seek to
reap benefits from brands for helping promote their products. Among those who
share their brand experiences through social media, at least 41 percent say they
do so to receive discounts.

It is not whether businesses and organisations will evolve to meet these

challenges, it is how. This is because the primary customers of their
businesses, the customers are already evolving in their habits and attitudes and
it will affect businesses. In the United States, most people rely on various types of
social media websites as much as company websites for product and brand
information. Seven out of ten (70%) consumers have visited social media
websites such as message boards, social networking sites, and blogs to get 21
information. Further, nearly half (49%) of these consumers made a purchase
decision based on what they gathered.

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23
 Chapter 8
Research Methodology

A quantitative and qualitative research is designed to determine Indian

consumer's perception towards organizations that use social media.
Through this study a safe conclusion can be arrived at on the involvement
of brands on social media. This research will also help organizations
determine the potency of their social media campaigns and to anticipate the
response of their target audience.

Sample Selection

The research will be conducted using an online survey. The survey will be
designed using an online survey platform, Google Docs. Promotion and
Publicity for the survey will be through online influencers and other social
media platforms. Everyone receiving the information will be asked to fill the
survey and also broadcast the message. i.e. take the survey, pass it along
and ask others to complete it.

This will result in a non-random, convenient, self-selected sample population.

Data Collection Method

The survey instrument itself will include 20 close-ended questions. The

instrument will probe consumers‗ awareness, behaviour, opinions and
perception toward social media platforms and how they want organizations to
interact with them.

The Questioners for this survey are available on Google

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1qvmqoAoMbJBrmiGM_pqQTle8AuAIc5Re
1QSE1i2eqho/viewform
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 Chapter 9
Questionnaires

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 Chapter 10
Conclusion and Recommendation

Social Media has created a powerful platform for consumer

engagement. It has become a platform to turn a prospective consumer
into a volunteer marketing army. It is also however a nightmare for
cognitive dissonace, an unsatisfied customer can do more harm to a brand in
seconds than it was ever possible before. This report tells us how much more
power the consumers have in influencing a brand/prduct perception.
Businesses will need to stay at the top of their game and improve the quality
of products and services or their consumers will fight back.

The social media space also presents a basket of customer opinions,

perceptions and customer feedback. Businesses can reap a lot of user
opinions or preliminary research for products/services in order to find
suggestions, core values and propositions that can satisfy the cutomers'
needs. Some businesses are still hesitating and some others are not sure
how to aproach the ever dnamic worls of social media. If your business isn't
creating dedicated online experiences for mobile devices and social network
integration, you might be looking over a tremendous opportunity to connect
with consumers.

Social Media as a form of marketing will present a whole new phase

challenges. It will require businesses to develop their marketing strategy
genuine relationship building. Some businesses have jumped into the
uncharted world and they are raising ambassadors and advocates for
brands through social media. They are increasingly recruiting their fans and
followers to spread word-of-mouth recommendations about their products and
services, and they are tapping into the large youth market.

It wil be great to see how things pan out. The marriage between
social media and technology is fundamentally shifting the way business is
done and businesses that plan to stay for a long time need to move - very fast
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and strategically too.

Twenty years ago, it was the age of mass media; one-way massive
broadcast, massive budgets, and not so massive ROI analysis. If you
happen to be dissatisfied with a company's product or business
practices, you'd probably stop buying from them. You might write an angry
letter. You might even tell your friends and family not to patronize that
business. But that was then; the game has changed, media is becoming
more personal and the ROI is noew a common requisition in advertising
budgets. If you are angry with a company, product or personality, the tools
are there an the world is waiting to listen. The only limit is our creativiy and
how far we want to go.

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 Chapter 11
References

1. http://www.google.com

2. "What is Social Media Marketing" http://searchengineland.com/guide/what-is-

social-media-marketing

3. Fournier, S. and Yao, J. (1997), ―Reviving brand loyalty: a re-

conceptualization within the framework of consumer brand relationships‖,
International Journal of Research in Marketing, Vol. 14, pp. 451-72.

4. Kaplan, Andreas M.; Michael Haenlein (2010). "Users of the world,

unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media". Business
Horizons 53 (1): 59–68.
5. http://www.thesocialmediatoday.com/how-much-revenue-does-facebook-make-
per- day/

6. http://en.wikipedia.org

7. How Social Media Impacts Brand Marketing October 14, 2011, Nielsenwire

8. The Impact of Social Media on Purchasing Behaviour, United States 2008

Volume
One: Initial Findings, United States 2008

9. The End of Business as Usual, Brian Solis

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