Effectiveness on Social Media Marketing to Small Businesses - Research Proposal Example

Research Methods for Managers Research Proposal Template for N1054 Your ID: of Research: Effectiveness on Social Media Marketing to Small Businesses Introduction Social media marketing is the process in which a business gains traffic (customers and prospective customers) through social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter (Blick, 2011). Social media marketing is always centred towards the creation of striking content which encourages the readers to share on social networks. The resultant action is known as electronic word of mouth (eWoM) and refers to the statement that consumers share via the internet concerning brands, products, services and businesses (Bodnar & Cohen, 2012). The explosion of the social media platforms in the recent years has encouraged both small and big businesses to use the tools of social media to advertise and market their products. With globalization, individuals from different parts of the globe share experiences, information and data in social media websites. The spread and popularity of the social media may be credited to the availability of the internet at low costs. Small businesses, however, stand to benefit a lot from these avenues due to the reduced advertisement costs associated with social media marketing. For example, tweeting or posting a message on Facebook is dramatically cost effective as compared to mailing thousands of marketing pieces or running a paid advertisement (Ray, 2013). In the study, the researcher will focus on evaluating the effectiveness on social media marketing to small businesses. Literature review The advent of social media marketing has given small businesses endless tools and possibilities far beyond reach in conventional marketing (Diamond, 2008). Through social media marketing, businesses are able to connect to their users in a personalized way. The social media provides businesses with tools that are invaluable in advertising and marketing their products (Gillin, 2011). Small businesses thus strive to create an online presence in social media websites that will enable them to harness the benefits of this form of advertisement. The effectiveness of social media marketing to small businesses is best depicted by the benefits that a small business accrues from using the platform in marketing. Social media can impact the organic search results of a website in a search engine (Langton & Campbell, 2011). A small business can therefore improve its rank in search engines by using social media platforms in marketing and advertisement. Optimization and creating compelling content helps in search engines, but social media marketing is perhaps the best method a small business can use to improve its rank in search engines. Search engines such as Yahoo, Bing and Google pay attention to social signals from social media websites when ranking links on the search results page. The social media enables small businesses create a personalized online identity (Macy & Thompson, 2011). The idea according to YP (2014) is that the social media is more of a cocktail party rather than a business meeting. A small business will always perform better in a social situation if it is more humanized and less like a corporate robot. Social media is a great way of a business owner displaying their personality as well as other behind the scenes information such as the business workspace, employees, core values and business objectives. When a business creates an online personality, it makes it easier for consumers to connect with this humanized form of the business and develop brand loyalty. Social media enables a small business associate with other businesses (Singh & Diamond, 2012). The direct connection of a business to customers, by extension, means that the small business can also connect to other entrepreneurs. These individuals may be possible strategic partners or even new distributors. The best bit about social media marketing is that an entrepreneur running a small business may be able to engage in real conversations with actual individuals who might otherwise be geographically or socially unavailable in a real world setting. Customer can validate businesses that are on social media platforms (Zarrella, 2010). The main notion behind enabling customers to communicate with a business owner is to allow the best service delivery to the customer. When communication occurs in a social media website, it happens in a public forum which can be witnessed by other prospects. Eventually, when customers sing the praises of a business to their friends, it not only validates the business, but also increases the probability that someone else referred to the business will give it a shot in future if they may need the products or services being offered by the business. Through marketing in social media websites, small businesses offer better customer services by providing value. Customers are able to comment, share concerns and post questions in the pages owned by small businesses in social media websites. This public communication with customers enables other customers see the responsiveness of a particular business to customer concerns. Customers usually have greater confidence in businesses which the owners and employees tender to their needs and concerns and this will be a boost to a small business marketing on social media platforms. Research questions/Hypotheses and/or Research objectives The main objective of the study is to evaluate the effectiveness on social media marketing to small businesses. The other objectives of the study include; a) To find out if marketing on social media is cost effective b) To establish the impact of social media marketing to a business’ website rank in search engines c) To investigate the relationship of small businesses with other businesses on social media platforms d) To evaluate the effect of social media marketing on customer loyalty e) To assess the impact of social media marketing to service delivery Research Questions From the objectives, the following research questions were formulated; a) Is marketing on social media cost effective to small businesses? b) How does social media marketing affect a business’ website rank in search engines? c) What relationship exists between small businesses and other businesses using social media marketing? d) Hoe does social media marketing of small businesses affect customer loyalty? e) How does marketing on social media platforms impact the service delivery of a business? Research Method The researcher will conduct both qualitative and quantitative research in the study. Quantitative research will enable the researcher present statistical information in graphs for analysis. The qualitative research on the other hand will enable the descriptive presentation of answers to the research questions. The research paradigm adopted for the study will be the positivism approach. This is the most suitable paradigm for the study as the researcher will be able to perform experiments and make empirical observations of business behaviour associated with social media marketing. With this approach, the researcher may discover probabilistic casual laws which may be used to predict the general patterns of social media marketing for small businesses. The researcher also settled for this approach as it is the most widely practiced paradigm in social science. The researcher will use interviews and questionnaire to conduct the primary research and collect primary data for analysis. The analysed data will be used to establish trends and patterns among the participants of the study. The researcher will then draw conclusions based on the analysed. When making the conclusions, the researcher will revisit the study objectives to reconcile these objectives to the analysed data. Recommendations from the study will then be made and research gaps stated to enable scholars perform further research on the topic in the future. Secondary research will be done through collection information about the subject of the study in book, journals and credible websites to mention but a few. The secondary data collected will be documented in the second chapter of the study (literature review). The information collected from the secondary sources will enable the researcher gain in-depth knowledge of the topic. Furthermore, data collected from the secondary research will be used to validate the data collected from the primary research by comparing the two sets of data. Timetable Figure 1: Gantt chart Activity April May June July Proposal Writing Preparation of Instruments Data Collection Data Analysis and Interpretation Report Writing Submission of Final Report Source: Researcher Practical issues relating to the operationalization of the research programme The primary research study will be done on two groups of small businesses. The first group of the study will be comprised of small businesses using social media platforms to market their businesses while the second group of businesses will be made up of small businesses that do not use social media platforms to market their businesses. The researcher will then conduct the research study in both groups independently after which he will analyse the information from the study by comparison of the two groups of businesses to establish the effectiveness of social media marketing to small businesses. References Beasla, S. (2014). Social Media Marketing Strategies for Small Business. Retrieved from: Blick, D. (2011). The ultimate small business marketing book. Surrey, Filament Publishing. Bodnar, K., & Cohen, J. L. (2012). The B2B social media book: become a marketing superstar by generating leads with blogging, Linkedln, Twitter, Facebook, e-mail, and more. Hoboken, N.J., Wiley. Diamond, S. (2008). Web marketing for small businesses 7 steps to explosive business growth. Naperville, Ill, Sourcebooks, Inc. retrieved from: < http://www.contentreserve.com/TitleInfo.asp?ID={25B4D756-9C96-43C5-A5A1-2AE4038EA77E}&Format=50.> Gillin, P. (2011). Social marketing to the business customer: listen to your B2B market, generate major account leads, and build client relationships. Social Marketing to the Business Customer. Hoboken, N.J., Wiley. Langton, D., & Campbell, A. (2011). Visual marketing 99 proven ways for small businesses to market with images and design. Hoboken, N.J., Wiley. Retrieved from: Macy, B., & Thompson, T. (2011). The power of real-time social media marketing how to attract and retain customers and grow the bottom line in the globally connected world. New York, McGraw-Hill. Martin, G. (2010). 30 days to social media success: the 30 day results guide to making the most of Twitter, blogging, LinkedIn, and Facebook. Pompton Plains, NJ, Career Press. Ray, R. (2013). The Facebook guide to small business marketing. Hoboken, N.J., John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Retrieved from: Singh, S., & Diamond, S. (2012). Social media marketing for dummies. Hoboken, NJ, Wiley. Vision Spark. (2014). Social Media Marketing. Retrieved from: YP. (2014). 8 Benefits of Social Media Marketing. Retrieved from: Zarrella, D. (2010). The social media marketing book. Beijing, OReilly. Retrieved from: Appendix The Concept of Social Media Marketing Social media marketing is a powerful marketing and advertisement tool that is being used by small and big businesses to market and advertise their products online in an increasingly growing and popular online market place. Through social media marketing, businesses are using the various tools and technologies from several social networking websites such as Facebook, Vine, Instagram, Linkedin, Twitter and Pinterest to market themselves. While marketing on social media, Zarrella (2010) advices that small businesses should not spread themselves thin in a bid to master all social networks under the sun. The businesses should, however, use and integrate tools that will help them publish their content online to relevant social sites which have the target audience (Martin, 2010). The business owner, thus determines the best social network that has the prospective audience and customers to their form of business. The popularity of the social media, coupled by the advancement of Information Technology in telephony is what makes the social media websites a hot spot for businesses. This results from the fact that social media platforms house large audiences of individuals who use the various platforms frequently thus creating communities (Martin, 2010). This ready audience provides a customer base for businesses and thus elicits the hype to advertise on these sites. The concept in social media marketing is the electronic word of mouth to popularize events, products and businesses. In this regard, individuals in social communities usually communicate to their friends who communicate to other friends creating an endless and growing chain of communication as illustrated in figure 1 below. Figure 1: Growth on Social Media Source: https://www.viralheat.com/blog/ When marketing on social media, it is important that a business remains focuses to the overall objective and business strategy. The businesses’ strategy, objectives and mission are to remain solidified in the marketing of the business on social media platforms so that the business brand identity and online personality is maintained throughout the entire business profile which is expected to create invaluable connections in the online presence (Martin, 2010). This relationship is presented in figure 2 below. Figure 2: Keys to Social Media Marketing Source:http://www.archivesofdevelopment.org/7-hottest-social-media-marketing-trends-rule-2014/ The figure below (figure 3) highlights some of the benefits accrued to a business using the social media platform to market and advertise their businesses. Figure 3: Benefits of Social Media Marketing Source: http://thevisionspark.com/social-media-marketing/ Read More