Introduction to the special issue on social media and mobile marketing

Citation

Dix, S. (2012), "Introduction to the special issue on social media and mobile marketing", Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, Vol. 6 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/jrim.2012.32506caa.001

Introduction to the special issue on social media and mobile marketing

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, Volume 6, Issue 3

This JRIM special issue focuses on marketing via social media and mobile platforms. Current and potential customers increasingly use social media to interact with one another and to engage with organizations. Moreover, consumers are increasingly reliant on mobile applications to access information, to purchase and to consume products and services. Rampant technology drives social and mobile media environments and offers rich opportunities for researchers to advance the understanding of these platforms. In this spirit, we are delighted to introduce the papers showcased in this edition.

Marketing decision makers seek to profit from interactive social media applications such as YouTube and Facebook, Second Life, Flickr and Twitter. These dynamic applications place extraordinary power in the hands of the consumer. One person can engage, interact and influence hundreds or even thousands of others. Astute brand managers strive to embrace social media to help shape those conversations in a manner that promotes the organization’s mission and goals. In essence, companies seek to leverage social media to engage users in relationships, dialogue and co-creation. However, understanding consumer acceptance of and response to social and mobile marketing initiatives is pivotal to the future growth of this sector.

The papers selected to appear in this issue add their voices to advancing our knowledge and understanding of social and mobile marketing platforms. Kelty Logan, Laura Bright and Harsha Gangadharbatla explore the perceived value of advertising on social networks relative to advertising on television. Although marketers are understandably upbeat about the potential of leveraging social media, it is imperative that user perceptions of advertising on social networks continue to be explored. These researchers report that Ducoffe’s Ad Value model cannot effectively assess advertising value within social and mobile media contexts. Moreover, respondents tend to assess value on the basis of entertainment and the level of information. The level of entertainment emerged as the primary predictor of perceived advertising value for social media while informativeness was the primary determinant of value for advertising on television. These results suggest that, in social media environments, consumers view advertising differently.

Jihyeong Son, Amrut Sadachar, Srikant Manchiraju, Ann Marie Fiore and Linda Niehm, explore the benefits and risks of customers using online collaborative web sites to co-design new products. This paper provides an interesting application of the use of social media to encourage customer engagement and collaboration. Collaborative web sites present an emerging tool that incorporates elements of social media to enable customers to co-design products. The authors report that customers are more inclined to use these web sites if they like the “playfulness” of the site, but less inclined if they are they are “exposed” to social risk.

With the recent development of wireless technology and the rapid diffusion of the mobile phone, mobile advertising has ignited the potential for marketing communicators. Since the mobile phone is now a personal accessory for many consumers, this has the potential for getting the right message to the right person at the right time. Mobile advertising encompasses internet browsing, media downloads, MMS and SMS advertising. SMS advertising is the most popular and profitable form of mobile advertising. However, this medium is shrouded in issues of privacy and trust which demands that mobile marketing initiatives should be highly relevant to the mobile user.

Sy Banerjee and Ruby Dholakia present a paper on location-based mobile advertisements and focus on whether the gender of the recipient affects his or her response to the advertisement. Although several authors argue that males respond more positively to this type of advertising, this paper supports the notion that females present more positive responses in some locations and situations.

Hyunjoo Im and Young Ha’s paper classifies US consumers according to their level of innovativeness and assesses each group’s perceptions of mobile coupons. The research identifies four adopter categories that exhibited different levels of perceived usefulness, attitudes and behavioural intentions toward mobile coupons. The factors that lead one group to use mobile coupons and another not to use them are important for marketers seeking to build mobile coupons into their campaigns.

This special issue aims to provoke discussion about the application of social media and mobile tools from a marketing perspective. Two papers focus on opportunities for marketers to engage and leverage social conversations while two papers report on how to connect with and engage consumers on mobile platforms. These contributions streamline our understanding of these relatively new engagement platforms and advance their relevance for marketing professionals.

Steve Dix, Graham FergusonGuest Editors