Hospitality Management and organization management

A critical review of literature on the importance of social media in branding The WritePass Journal

A critical review of literature on the importance of social media in branding 1.0 Introduction A critical review of literature on the importance of social media in branding ). On the contrary it can be said that more and more retailers and business are becoming increasingly aware of the social media and are waiting to exploit the potential that social marketing offers (Olivas-lujan, 2013) 1.1 Background Spend on social media by the businesses are on the rise. Recent study by the IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) shows that in the first half of 2014 in the UK alone, there has been a rise of 53% in the spend on social media by businesses with a total contribution of  £242.5 million (Somerville, 2014). Another study by IAB on FMGC sector consisting of more than 4500 survey responses and 800 interviews showed that 90% of the customers would use social media to refer the brands to peers, 4 in 5 customers would buy products that have good social media coverage and 83% would be willing to try products that are popular in social media (Anon, 2013). Similarly, a research conducted by Mass Relevance that provides social media curation platform to clients found that 59% of the consumers will more likely trust a brand that has presence in the social media and 64% of the consumers interviewed have already made purchases based on social media presence and reviews (Chaney, 2012). Appendix 1 shows the social media advertising effects on consumers (Source: Neilsen Survey: Anon, 2012) 1.2 Motivation From the above, it can be understood that social media has a profound impact on the consumers’ choice of brands and that it is key to engage effectively with customers. There is a lot of literature that discusses about the social media impact on consumers, why businesses should engage with customers, exploiting social media to provide value add etc. The main aim of this research is to look into various key researches in this area and to provide a critical review on the literature. The critical review aims to see if: The problems are identified clearly The literature provides a balanced view There are gaps in the literature 1.3 Research Process The success of the research is admittedly determined by measuring the extent to which each of the research objectives is met. The following steps are followed during this research to ensure its success. These steps are as follows: Firstly, a background into the research and its motivations is given. Following this, the key literature in this area is thoroughly investigated. This is intended to ensure that all aspects of the research are identified and that the challenges or gaps in the current literature are clearly understood. Next, the literature is critically analysed to see if the problems are identified and if it provides a balanced view of the topic. It also looks into the research methodology to see if the methods used are consistent with the qualitative and quantitative methods and also checks for what has not been provided. Finally, this research concludes by providing a conclusion that is supported by evidence presented in the literature. It also makes recommendations where appropriate. In summary, this chapter has provided a brief overview of the research, addressed the key challenges or gaps in the literature and justified the need to conduct this research. This chapter has also set the background and motivations for the research in order to enable the reader to better understand the subsequent chapters. The central question for the research has addressed here, and the reader now also understands the problem statements that have led to this research. 2.0 Literature Review This research discusses about social media and its effect on branding and consumers. But what is social media? The term social media can be defined as â€Å" Many online tools that allow people with similar interests to share information, learn from others, or network in an open process. The information found on these sites is commonly referred to as ‘user-generated content’, which means anyone is able to post with minimal restrictions or oversight.†(Wilson, 2010) Drury (2007) discusses how marketers of various businesses can effectively engage in social media marketing. The paper gives a fairly comprehensive view on what social media is and the role of marketing in social media. It discusses about how social media can be monetised by the marketers. The paper lists out opportunities that can be tapped for commercial benefits and also emphasises on the mobile marketing strategy and describes the success criteria for measuring success. The paper however has the following drawbacks: It is very much general and has no qualitative or quantitative measures to define the success criteria. It gives a good overall picture but it would have been better if the context of the paper was more towards assessing the impact or the Return on Investment (ROI) of a specific sector or business. It lacks specific examples and also does not mention any strategy for implementation or even list challenges that organisations face while implementing good strategies for social media marketing. Michaelidou et al (2011) in their research discuss about social media marketing’s impact on small and medium B2B brands. They discuss in detail the adaption of social media networking as a marketing platform to be able to achieve the brand objectives and also the perceptions around the barriers of using social marketing networks. The research paper makes use of email surveys to understand the usage of social media by small and medium scale businesses that operate in the UK and the main drivers that motivate SMEs to adapt to the new channel of marketing. It clearly states the motivation of the research, giving appropriate background to the research and the method used for the research is depicted concisely. The research analyses the findings from the email survey and discusses the methods used for analysis. It provides a broad range of information and also clearly identifies the shortcomings in the business implementation of social media networking practices. It discusses how t hese pitfalls can be overcome and provides details for further improvement areas and scope for additional research in the future. The drawbacks of the paper are: Sample size: The sample size of the survey could have been more and also various other methods for obtaining the review could have been used. This would have ensured that the B2B base was thoroughly covered. Focus: The focus is on B2B businesses alone. It would have been interesting to see the results if the research was extended to B2C as well for small and medium scale enterprises. Some researches focus specifically on skills gap in digital marketing within specific industries. One such research concentrates on the communications industry (Royle and Laing, 2014). The research discusses the need for having the necessary skills in digital marketing arena and stresses on the growth and popularity of digital/social media marketing. The research explores the various gaps in the industry for digital marketing with a specific emphasis to communications sector and provides a best practice guide for the industry. It details the challenges that organisations face while implementing social media marketing and discusses the need to have evaluation criteria and metrics to critically analyse the success of social marketing strategies and campaigns within organisations. The paper talks about the key challenges that businesses face while trying to merge traditional marketing practices with that of social marketing. The rationale for the research is clearly mentioned and the li terature review is comprehensive. The conceptual framework is clearly detailed and the methodology used for developing the framework is precise. The research makes use of focus groups and interviews to be able to gauge the skill gap in the industry. The drawbacks of this research are: Limited sample size: The research could have used more samples to be able to analyse effectively the findings. Given that the research has already narrowed down by industry, it would have been good to get a more detailed view of the industry and a larger sample would have facilitated this. A study by Harvard Business Review (Edelman, 2010) discusses how the internet and the social marketing has changed not only the way businesses operate but also how consumers choose their products. It takes the reader through the funnel metaphor which was earlier being used by marketers to understand how consumers choose their products and how this has moved to a more open-ended approach whereby consumers no longer follow a methodical approach of selecting products. It stresses how important it is for brands to be able to connect with the consumers and studied the consumers’ decisions across five different industries namely automobiles, skincare, insurance, mobile telecommunications and electronics in three different continents. Based on the results of the study, it proposed a four-stage model that focuses on today’s consumers using social media for advocating products and also purchasing based on the reviews and advocacy received. The research takes the reader through t he entire customer journey and tells the businesses what it should not focus its energy and resources on. Providing statistical information about various surveys enables the businesses to identify the key areas that it should concentrate on to be able to build a good brand image online. Though the research is comprehensive it lacks in the following: Framework: It does not suggest what needs to be done and a framework for implementing those. The key focus is on what not to be done and it leaves it to the businesses to work on the best strategy. Sample size and analysis: The research does not disclose the sample size or indicate clearly the analysis method used to come to the conclusion. This section worked on identifying key research in the literature and also provided a critical review of each of the researches identified. 3.0 Conclusion Though there is a lot of literature on various aspects including but not limited to effects of social media on small and medium scale enterprises, identification of skill gaps in social media with specific emphasis to certain industries, general study on implementation challenges, perception of social media on businesses, barriers to adaptation of social media by businesses etc. it can be found that there is not much literature that specifically talks about a common framework for adapting to social media marketing along with the challenges that businesses might face and the evaluation criteria. Similarly while most of these researches make use of one or more methods for data collection, it is not very comprehensive. There is a gap in the current literature in terms of data collected from a wide range of sources using a bigger sample set. Given that technology has enabled a higher reach to customers, it would be good to get a larger sample to be able to effectively analyse the results . In many cases, the limitations of the research scope could be worked on to be able to get more information on the above mentioned areas. In short, it can be said that the social media marketing and the research around it are yet to attain the maturity level and there is a lot of scope for research that would aid businesses to effectively handle and manage social media marketing concerns and overcome challenges in a seamless and stress-free manner. 4.0 References Tuten, 2008: Advertising 2.0: Social Media Marketing in a Web 2.0 world, Greenwood publishing group. Qualman, 2012: Socialnomics: How social media transforms the way we live and do business, John Wiley Sons Livas-Lujan, 2013: Social Media in Strategic Marketing, Emerald Group publishing limited Somerville, 2014: 18 Digital Marketing Trends you may not have heard about, The Fresh Egg blog accessed at: freshegg.co.uk/blog/18-digital-marketing-trends-for-2014 Anon, 2013: IAB Social Media Effectiveness Research, IAB UK accessed at: iabuk.net/research/library/iab-social-media-effectiveness-research Chaney, 2012: Brands should use social media to engage consumers, amplify messages and promote trust, Digital intelligence today accessed at: http://digitalintelligencetoday.com/brands-should-use-social-media-to-engage-consumers-amplify-messages-and-promote-trust-survey-says/ Anon, 2012: State of the Media, The social media report, Neilsen Wilson, 2010: Social Media and Small Business Marketing, University Business Printing and press, USA Drury, 2007: Opinion Piece: Social Media: Should marketers engage and how can it be done effectively?, Journal of Direct, Data and Digital Marketing Practice Michaelidou et al, 2011: Usage, Barriers and measurement of social media marketing: An exploratory investigation of small and medium B2B brands, Elsevier Royle and Liang, 2014: The digital marketing skills gap: Developing a digital marketer model for communication industries, Elsevier Edelman, 2010: Branding in the digital age: You’re spending your money in all the wrong places, Harvard Business Review

US politics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

US politics - Essay Example The United States still pollutes more than any other nation, and still represents the epitome of a consumerist society: producing little more than nothing, and consuming a large quantity of the world’s goods. The Environmentalist movement, even though it has achieved mainstream status, remains unable to show progress in curbing these trends. In fact, the mainstream status of the movement puts the movement itself in some jeopardy. That is, the Environmentalist movement in the United States has been quite â€Å"successful†, but not successful in the way many of the original environmentalists and conservationists had hoped: commercially successful, which many believe has corrupted the movement beyond repair. American Environmentalism took root in the open frontiers of the untamed West in the 19th century when principles of conservation ran contrary to abusive practices in mining and railroad construction. The role of the environment in American politics changed in 1901 when President Roosevelt instituted practices, like the Reclamation Act, to conserve land and resources across the country (Silveira, 2003). The split between conservation (using resources efficiently) and preservation (not using resources at all) fragmented the environmentalist movement in the 20th century, which provided a source of diversity among these groups. Early environmentalism was an upper-class movement to preserve resources for recreation (Silveira, 2003). Modern Environmentalism primarily began in 1962 with the publication of Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, which detailed the devastation of industry on nature. Taken with other social movements in the 1960s, the Environmentalist movement became one more means to infuse particular values into society as a whole. However, rather than attempting social change during this time, Environmentalists sought government intervention to protect the

Social Network as Facebook is Not Safe from Hackers Essay

Social Network as Facebook is Not Safe from Hackers - Essay Example Social networks such as Facebook result to the interconnection of millions of people from all over the world thus bringing diversities and similarities in close interactions. In this regard, Facebook offers an effective opportunity for people from different backgrounds to identify their similarity and therefore converge through chart rooms and groups or pages; for instance, the Facebook group of people opposed to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia is one such example of how people of similar interests converge on social media. However, this joining of different people with similar interests makes such individuals in those groups vulnerable to different forms of abuses at the same time. Hackers with ill intentions of compromising and sabotaging information communication systems have emerged and greatly undermined the reliability and security of information, and Facebook, like other communication systems, is not safe from hacker activities. Hacking refers to the unwarranted acc ess of other people’s online databases and directories; hackers are targeting personal information in personal Facebook accounts such as passwords, confidential data, secrets, among other things, with malicious intentions whose sole purpose is to harm the victims, thus breaching individual privacy on social networks. With the growing number of internet users, the highly porous nature of information systems, and features of service providers including the social networking sites that make it possible for unwanted users to access other peoples’ databases, social networks as Facebook are not safe from hackers. There are numerous reasons and explanations why Facebook is not safe from hackers; for instance, nowadays there is increasing use of social network for business transactions and advertising, even though the platform is strictly meant for personal relationships (Lu?sted 10). In this case, hackers abuse social network as businesses by stealing vital information such a s company trade secrets or operational blue prints thereby compromising the businesses. Investigations into cybercrimes are curtailed by the mere fact that the internet has transformed the world into a global village thus allowing hackers to commit crimes from any location of the world and go scot-free. Cyberspace security has also been largely compromised by the increasing internet population in addition to the aspect of anonymity that allows users to disguise themselves on social networks such as Facebook using fake account details while seeking to commit cybercrimes. New inexperienced Facebook users are particularly vulnerable to hacker attacks because they are yet to learn how to utilize the complex security features of the internet on the platform. Hackers can take advantage of the privileged personal information stolen from private accounts on Facebook to cause untold havoc and damage to personal and business relations; for instance, hackers may impersonate individuals to comm it cybercrimes or damage reputations of individuals. Perhaps the most serious consequence suffered by victims of hacking activities is the loss or destruction of vital information thereby compromising the entire systems network. Research Statistics provide evidence of the hackers and hacker activities, for instance, a recent research by the Privacy Clearing House reports indicate that over 1oo million records have been compromised since February 2005, and over 80 million cases were due to web hacking attacks. A similar research at Acunetix reports findings that about 75% of cyberspace attacks occur at the web

How are the principles that underlie the process of motivational Essay

How are the principles that underlie the process of motivational interviewing relate to social change and community development - Essay Example ient that the interviewer is attentive, empathetic and genuinely desires to be a facilitator of attitudinal and behavioural change to improve the socio-psychological adjustment of the client and improve their general lifestyle. Hence, the interviewer becomes, essentially, a positive change agent for the client (Miller, Yahne and Tonigan 2003). Individuals, within a social context, that have maladaptive or unhealthy behaviours detract from the development of a cohesive and well-functioning community. This is why enacting long-term behaviour change and improving socio-psychological adjustment is so critical, as deviant behaviours, anti-social attitude, or other negative behaviours can pose risk or danger to a broader community population. In an idealistic society, the goal is to ensure that all society members within a community have an attitude that promotes teamwork, alliance and partnership, though this is not a tangible reality in many societies throughout the world. This essay explores the processes of motivational interviewing and its potential benefits or contributions to achieving social change and developing positive communities with an emphasis on how MI is properly facilitated to achieve these desirable and encouraging advantages. The main premise of MI is to maintain a non-adversarial attitude with the client, be completely without confrontational stance and illustrate complete non-judgmental behaviours (Miller and Rollnick 2002). The premise of MI is to break-down the barriers which are driving client uncertainty and ambivalence that allow for continuation of unhealthy or maladapted behaviours. In motivational interviewing, the mentor serves as a resource for assisting the client in resolving the factors that drive ambivalence without being directly persuasive. The interviewer serves only as a director that facilitates discussion about what is revealed within the client’s inner world and provides therapeutic discourse to nurture the client’s

Development Of A Digital Diary Project

Development Of A Digital Diary Project Maintaining information about the person has been troublesome business for mankind lately as he was being introduced to hundred of new persons in his day to day life. Compiling information about the students in a school and college might be really a rarely willing job. Our project aims to those jobs for maintaining information of the people so we named it as a Digital Diary project. As soon as the program is being executed user just need to follow the instruction and have the information entered to the software then software manage the information being entered and save them for the future reference of the user. Though lots of information management software is presently available in market, this is the initial step and would be updated in the days to come. Introduction: Computer is an advanced/modern electronic device, which takes raw data as input then processes these data as per given instruction then gives output (result) and store in for the future references. It is also a problem-solving machine, which can processes both numerical and non numerical information. It is a totally user dependent device. It has no its own brain. So it cannot think its own. C is the general purpose, structured programming language of computer consisting of terms that resemble algebraic expressions. Designed as other high level structured programming languages such as Pascal and Fortran, C has got additional features that allows it to be used at a lower level computer languages. This flexibility let the C be featured as system programmer or applications programmer. C is characterized by the ability to write very concise source programs which are virus free in nature so the programmed designed in C language has got purity and perfection. Though with the help of small instruction and extensive library functions enhance the basic instruction and encourage its user to write additional library function on their own. Such A programming language code has been adapted for the effectual running of our program, Digital Diary. Digital Diary aims for the storage of the personnel details. This Diary helps as the remainder of person name his/her home address, phone number, email address etc. People gives propriety to looks now a days so a bit of graphics has been added to the content rather than making old fashioned black n white look. Every single effort has been done to add aura to the program and to attract lots of users as possible. As been discussed this program is being build in C laboratory or C program so it doesnt consist of any viruses that may effect the computer but is 100% free from those harming worms and bugs. With the help of this program people can save all his/her friends group and contact for the future references. Objectives and Scopes The few objectives of this program are listed as follows: Main objectives of this program is to aid users from memorizing all those names of owns contact address. Users can easily add the contact detail in the program so have increase efficiency in the user working procedure. To minimize the work loads of office personnel in school, colleges and offices by letting them get rid of the problem of memorizing the piles name of students or coustomers. To convey message to software developing companies about the potential of software developers in Nepal. As Loads of software are present currently for managing the database system but those software are bulky and occupies large amount of storage disk size and are tedious and need trained man power for effective use but the Digital Dairy designed by us is very much simple and cost low disk space and unskilled man power with nominal knowledge of English can accomplish thorough the program. So the office needing customized type software can easily have these software installed for their management. Methodology: Preliminarily we have done survey through out the Kathmandu valley to know about the colleges and schools who might required our software being installed and found lots of colleges having their own MS Access designed management software and for the database management. But some school near remote areas till this date have been using the old fashioned database management so we aim our project to those remote schools and have planned to develop this software. Then we started making basic workflow plan for effective completion of the project. We made the system analysis and designed basic framework to aid in our work. We then started the job of coding of the program for overall management of database of persons which include name of the person, address of the person, his/her email id and telephone number, roll no or reference number. Options like searching the required database by strings were made into effect in the program for easy location of the database of the person. Option like adding and deleting record along with modification option were present in the program for effective availability. Though the coding was done, there were lots of errors in the program, so for the tracking of the bugs in the program debugging were done and then tested for multiple times till the desired output is obtained. When testing and debugging were done the program was finally ready to be used or being distributed. Task to be completed Duration System Analysis 2 days Designing 1 week Coding 1 week Testing and Debugging 3 days Expected Output As for the title suggest, this Digital Diary supports for the proper maintaining of the database. It helps the user to have full record of the people he has been with along with their contact address, phone numbers, email id and reference number. This program also helps in inbuilt search for the required data base. The expected output here is being discussed along with some screenshots of the program. Initially after the program is being executed it shows the name of the institution using it along with the address of the institution. Below the Name of the institution it publishes the name of the publishers followed by list of software developers. When we enter any key the page would be executed to the second page where option are being given using switch system. Option for add remove, modify, search, list are being executed here. The database management page would appear as follows. Here name, roll no, Faculty, telephone number, address email id would be printed. Through which we have to pass the value. Every time after adding contact the confirmation dialogue will be appeared asking for continuing or else. Conclusion This project is based upon C programming so we had add our best effort to implement all the knowledge we have gained so far in C programming. Working on this project had enhanced our knowledge and skills in C and will surely help us in future. Thus, we hope Digital Diary be a great success.

Computers in Homeland Security :: Department of Homeland Security Technology

Computers in Homeland Security The DHS, Department of Homeland Security, uses a color coded system for informing the general public of what state of readiness the country should be in, in case of a terrorists threat. The system they use is a five color system, with each color representing a different step in readiness. Green means low risk of terrorist attacks, blue is Guarded, or general risk of a terrorist attack, yellow means elevated, or significant risk of a terrorist attack. Orange means high risk of an attack, while red means severe risk of an attack. Today the country is always on either orange or red. Since President Bush has been in office the country itself, has been on high alert of an attack (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/03/20020312-5.html). As part of this paper I took a poll of how many people know about the use of homeland securities and to also see if they knew the meaning of the colors of our alert system. -Question 1 was if a person knew if computers were used in homeland security. -Question 2 was if they knew what the colors used in homeland security meant. Names Question #1 Question # 2 Jack yes yes Jill no no Tom no no Andrew yes yes Edrick yes yes Mike yes yes Dustin no no Jorge yes yes Shayla no no Malika no no Cheriene no no Martha yes yes Chris no no Tim no no Tomas no no Jude no no Jimmy yes yes Kristina yes yes Jackie no no Tosin yes yes Warren yes yes Sam yes yes Cory no no Marshall no no As technology has increased the importance of computers being involved with homeland security has increased significantly. They have started to use computers for ways to check passenger baggage. Notice how when someone goes through an airport they have to walk through several metal detectors. These detectors are run by computers in order to check what people have on them. Another way computers are used is a complex system of watch lists and security triggers. These lists are what the airport security uses to decide who to take under heavy watch. Since more that 600 million people fly a year. They hope that a computer system called CAPPS 2 can help to check about 5% of the people who fly each year. Another thing that Homeland security uses computers for is surveillance. This is probably the most used place for computers in Homeland Security. With surveillance, there has been a big discovery in cyber optics.