Impact Of Social Media On Customer Loyalty: A Case Study Of Walmart Essay.

In the recent business scenario, social media marketing is used by different businesses because it is beneficial to deal with the global market. Social media platforms enable the different corporation to channelize their way with respect to customers and act as a perfect way to create a distinct image in the customer’s mind towards their products and services. It can be evaluated that awareness of the brand is a centralized process for creating the loyalty among customer. Although, social media marketing is beneficial for each corporation to increase their brand popularity with less time and efforts yet there are different challenges faced by the company to create uniqueness as well as create a trend which is to be omnipresent with advantages (Babin and Zikmund, 2015). Along with this, word of mouth can be beneficial and disadvantageous for the organization because it plays a vital role to encourage and discourage the purchasing decision of people.

This research proposal emphasizes on the impact of social media on the customer’s loyalty. For this research, an admired retail company named Wal-Mart is selected in order to assess its social media marketing approaches and their primary flows.

Social media marketing approaches require appropriate use of content, slang, and ellipsis to persuade the high amount of customers towards the brand. It is identified that those companies use social media practices can get benefits however this strategy is high receptive because one small word can change the people’s thought. Walmart faces certain challenges with respect to making content in social media. It is analyzed that this company made a large number of fault by encouraging its brand awareness from the year of 2014-16 such as using controversial way. For instance, this corporation had encouraged its strength products and services on the social media websites by using the slogan ‘fat girl costumes’. However, it got negative feedback of customers hence this initiative of Walmart Company is prone to using significant social media advertisement (Einwiller and Steilen, 2015). Consequently, the company has lost its large number of users who follow it on the social media websites which have ultimately effect on the sales. 

From the above chart, it can be stated that online sales in higher than the offline sales in the retail industry. Hence, it is a key issue for those companies that are unable to use the social media websites. 

H1- This research can be able to deliver beneficial suggestion by using social media marketing theories and strategies

Hypothesis

H0- This research cannot be able to assess the beneficial strategies for companies due to inadequate information regarding existing theories.

Social media marketing issue is a key issue which tends to exist in the recent business scenario. But, at the same time, it facilitates the number of digital opportunities. It is analyzed that if this social media issue will not be identified with time then it can create massive disaster and financial issues in the future. The research of the link between social media marketing and customer loyalty is a beneficial marketing tool that is required in current scenario (France, et. al., 2015). Thus, it might be effective for companies to create effective management practices in upcoming years.

Social media marketing issues arise from earlier 20’s century. This issue has been seen in each marketing disaster which is a serious threat for companies. For instance, Walmart has blocked out to Germany in 2002 for exploiting the data through social media sites (Grant, 2016).

• To explore the role of social media practices used by Walmart for increasing the customer’s loyalty
• To identify the strategies by which social media marketing is used for persuading customer base with respect to Walmart
• To illustrate the awareness of Walmart by using social media practices so as buying behavior can be influenced
• To recommend the effective strategies to improve social media practices by the company

A literature review is an effective part of research which develops an understanding regarding substantial findings. This information is gathered from different journal articles, textbook, online articles and company’s websites. This chapter emphasizes on the assessment of research issue and develops critical analysis regarding research topic.  

According to the He et al. (2015), Social media marketing is the term which is used to the advertisement of the products and services by using the digital communication and social media practices. There are certain aspects which are related to marketing tools like maintaining patience, attractive content, and creating a loyal base to a customer who actually reacts towards the message posted on the digital websites.  It also generates a connection amid accessibility and advertisement of products and services on social websites. Consequently, these aspects grow the business by leveraging the customer response with respect to specific advertisements.

In contrast to this, Kim et al. (2014) opined that these aspects such as attractive tagline and engaging content can unfavorable impact on the marketing procedure hence company should emphasize on these aspects during the marketing. Moreover, taglines, eye catchy slogan, and product’s detail can also injure the emotional sentiments while inappropriate contents are exercised.

Walmart is using social media assimilation theory for marketing its products and services. This structure is known for its expensive environment and has a disability to keep the confidential data. Hence, it can be stated that if the corporation uses this theoretical structure then they may face issues in an upcoming year (Wal-Mart, 2017).

Background

In the view of Kim and Park (2013), Walmart primarily uses a strategy to acquire business companies for penetrating into a new market and also keep certain components in its marketing process. Moreover, marketing tool is mostly expensive hence company should adopt the cost-effective tool such as social media in its business procedure. 

According to the Kumar et al. (2016), consumer behavior extensively relies on word of mouth and a large amount of influential act is done by the social media. For example, feedback about any products and services can modify the people’s perception. Moreover, in the current business scenario, the customer goes through different ways while taking the purchasing decision because there are different factors which may affect the customer’s decision-making. In the initial level, the customer generates a plan to buy products by analyzing the negative and positive reviews of products on social media. Hence, it is analyzed that customer takes completely differ decision as compared to the initial plan. 

There is a large number of company which makes page on social media websites but it is non-existed and outdated to engage with the customers. Further, customers do not demonstrate their interest towards those companies which do not try to interact with them. Together with, they moved towards the other companies which regularly interact with the customers (Oberoi, et. al., 2017).

It is a hard thing to keep the relation on public pages in order to pool large number of new followers frequently. Further, due to the outdated public page on the social sites, new followers show their less interest towards the company as compared to others (Ramanathan, et al., 2017).

Content makes the link with customers and their perception because it is a prime component to pull the attention of customers towards the products and services. Large number of corporation is unable to generate eye catchy content and unable to maintain the value of sentiment for customers which lead the customers to go towards another brand (Rapp, et al., 2013). 

It is analyzed that sharing the information through social media enables the company to pull the attention of customers and helps to attract organic customers. In this way, the company should create worth sharing content and also look beyond the product’s advertisement (Schramm-Klein, et al., 2015).

There is different theoretical concept regarding social media marketing which is considered by large number of organization to get competitive benefits. In this way, AIDA model is exercised by dynamic corporations to build product and brand awareness among people. This model is related to data analysis tool because it enables the company to enlarge awareness about products and generates logic of interest and aspiration among the people (Sheth and Sheth, 2017).    

Historical

It is analyzed that company should be competent to influence the customer’s desire which can create favorable responses of customers with respect to products and services. This model is effective to meet the customer’s needs and generate product strategy according to the customer’s need and consumer behavior analysis (Sheu, and Chu, 2017). 

According to the Valentini (2015), purchasing behavior of customer can be based on both aspects i.e. favorable and unfavorable. For instance, favorable feedback of customers regarding any products may generate favorable impact on sales growth and negative feedback generates adverse impact on the sales growth. 

In support to this, Sheu and Chu (2017) recommended that company should exercise this theory to assess feedbacks with respect to certain products and services on community’s page. As a result, it makes enhancement to enlarge awareness about products and services in upcoming years.

For this research, mix research design will be used by the researcher to accomplish the research objective because this design entails the characteristics of both designs. In this way, quantitative research design will be used to measure the participant’s responses. Besides this, qualitative research design will be used to get theoretical information regarding critically analyze the impact of social media marketing on consumer loyalty in the context of Walmart (Sheth and Sheth, 2017).

For this research, both data collection method will be used by research because it will enable the researcher to overcome the issues between potential information and actual required information. In this, secondary information is gathered by using second-hand information like journal article, government and annual reports, online and offline sites, academic publications, and authentic websites. In contrast, primary data will be gathered by conducting the survey through questionnaire with the targeted respondents because, it provides the accurate and reliable information regarding research topic (Oberoi, et. al., 2017).

For conducting this research, a researcher will use the probability sampling technique. In this way, it will use simple random sampling method by using participants are selected on the random basis. This sampling method gives equal chances to each participant to give their response hence it declines the possibility of biases from survey through questionnaire (Kumar, et. al., 2016). For conducting the survey through questionnaire, 50 customers are selected from different geographical areas of Australia who purchase the products of Walmart and other retail stores through social media.

After gathering the data, a researcher will use statistical data analysis method to assess the collected information and interpret it in a meaningful manner. For this research, the researcher will use MS-Excel software to demonstrate the information through pie chart, bar diagram and column chart (Kim and Park, 2013). Consequently, it will enable the readers to develop a comprehensive understanding of research topic.

Aims and Objectives of the Research

The researcher will follow the data protection act 1988 in which they have no right to disclose the personal data to anyone earlier of research completion. The researcher will also not force to any participants to provide personal data and cannot present it by manipulation. In addition, a researcher will inform about the intention of research to the manager before gathering the information. Consequently, research would be able to engage the participants (France, et. al., 2015).

References

Babin, B. J., and Zikmund, W. G. (2015) Exploring marketing research. USA: Cengage Learning.

Einwiller, S. A., and Steilen, S. (2015) ‘Handling complaints on social network sites–An analysis of complaints and complaint responses on Facebook and Twitter pages of large US companies’, Public Relations Review, 41(2), pp. 195-204.

Ferrell, O. C., and Fraedrich, J. (2015) Business ethics: Ethical decision making and cases. UK: Nelson Education.

France, C., Merrilees, B., and Miller, D. (2015) ‘Customer brand co-creation: a conceptual model’, Marketing Intelligence and Planning, 33(6), pp. 848-864.

Grant, R. M. (2016) Contemporary Strategy Analysis Text Only. USA: John Wiley and Sons.

He, W., Shen, J., Tian, X., Li, Y., Akula, V., Yan, G., and Tao, R. (2015) ‘Gaining competitive intelligence from social media data: Evidence from two largest retail chains in the world’, Industrial Management and Data Systems, 115(9), pp. 1622-1636.

Kim, J., Ha, S., and Fong, C. (2014) ‘Retailers' CSR: the effects of legitimacy and social capital’, International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management, 42(2), pp. 131-150.

Kim, S., and Park, H. (2013) ‘Effects of various characteristics of social commerce (s-commerce) on consumers trust and trust performance’, International Journal of Information Management, 33(2), pp. 318-332.

Kumar, A., Bezawada, R., Rishika, R., Janakiraman, R., and Kannan, P. K. (2016) ‘From social to sale: The effects of firm-generated content in social media on customer behavior’, American Marketing Association. [Online].  Available at: https://www.rhsmith.umd.edu/files/Documents/Departments/Marketing/social-to-sale-jm-2016.pdf (Accessed: 17 September 2017).

Oberoi, P., Patel, C., and Haon, C. (2017) ‘Technology sourcing for website personalization and social media marketing: A study of e-retailing industry’, Journal of Business Research, 80, pp. 10-23.

Ramanathan, U., Subramanian, N., Yu, W., and Vijaygopal, R. (2017) ‘Impact of customer loyalty and service operations on customer behavior and firm performance: empirical evidence from UK retail sector’, Production Planning and Control, 28(6-8), pp. 478-488.

Rapp, A., Beitelspacher, L. S., Grewal, D., and Hughes, D. E. (2013) ‘Understanding social media effects across seller, retailer, and consumer interactions’, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 41(5), pp. 547-566.

Schramm-Klein, H., Morschett, D., and Swoboda, B. (2015) ‘Retailer corporate social responsibility: Shedding light on CSR’s impact on profit of intermediaries in marketing channels’, International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management, 43(4/5), pp. 403-431.

Sheth, J., and Sheth, J. (2017) ‘Revitalizing relationship marketing’, Journal of Services Marketing, 31(1), pp. 6-10.

Sheu, J. J., and Chu, K. T. (2017) ‘Mining association rules between positive word-of-mouth on social network sites and consumer acceptance: A study for derivative product of animations, comics, and games’, Telematics and Informatics, 34(4), pp. 22-33.

Valentini, C. (2015) ‘Is using social media “good” for the public relations profession? A critical reflection’, Public Relations Review, 41(2), pp. 170-177.

Wal-Mart (2017) About us. [Online]. Available at:

 https://corporate.walmart.com/our-story (Accessed: 19 September 2017).