Marketing Communications Tool Evaluation Report: Social Media

Marketing Communications Tool Evaluation Report: Social Media
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Abstract
Sheffield Council's efforts to develop skiing in the city are reflected in the integrated marketing communication (IMC) strategy, which highlights the importance of engaging internal and external stakeholders. Social media marketing is one of the tools adopted in the IMC. Social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook have become integral to marketing across all sectors. This report presents an evaluation of public social media marketing by highlighting its advantages and disadvantages, how the success of social media can be measured, and the importance of the controls that have been put in place. The advantages of social media marketing substantially outweigh the disadvantages. Social media is cost-effective and facilitates access to a large audience. The challenges in social media are linked to the loss of control because other users can influence the information shared with others. The success of social media can be achieved by observing the reactions, comments, likes, and number of followers. The controls that include budgets and scheduling are critical to ensure that the IMC objectives are pursued economically.
Keywords: Sheffield, IMC, social media, cost
Table of contents Introduction. 4 Evaluation of Public Social Media Marketing. 6 Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Media Marketing. 6 Advantages of Social Media. 6 Disadvantages of Social Media. 7 Measuring the Use of Social Media. 9 Controls. 10 Conclusion. 11 Recommendations. 12 References. 13
Marketing Communications Tool Evaluation Report: Social Media
Introduction
The situational analysis demonstrated that Sheffield City has substantial opportunities and conditions that can be exploited to create an impression of a 'Ski Sports Resort' city. The integrated marketing communication (IMC) was designed to position the city as a destination for winter sports and related outdoor activities in the United Kingdom (UK) and promote the unique features and experiences that attract new tourists. Additionally, the IMC aimed at fostering cooperation with stakeholders such as ski equipment manufacturers, sponsors, ski instructors, merchants, and other businesses that can enhance the benefits to the city and the people visiting the city. One of the tools adopted in the IMC is using public social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook. Social media marketing has become a critical aspect of IMCs across all businesses and industries with technological advancements and the engagement of many people in the platforms. Effective social media marketing can create conditions for effective internal and external communication with IMC objectives. It also fosters coordination of the different channels to develop an appealing organizational image and reputation through a unified and comprehensive flow of information (Bruhn & Schnebelen, 2017). Therefore, adopting public social media in marketing offers an opportunity for the Sheffield administration to engage with internal and external stakeholders in a strategic, efficient, and cost-effective approach. Furthermore, social media facilitates access to a broad and diverse population, which implies that marketing can be used to target potential customers and partners from across the world.
In the IMC, public social media is perceived as customer-centric, enabling organizations to integrate customers into the communication process by establishing direct relationships (Jackson & Ahuja, 2016). According to Varadarajan (2020), social media marketing is characterized by an inside-out orientation, which entails adopting a strategic approach to achieve superior performance using specific resources that are considered scarce, valuable, inimitable, and non-substitutable. For instance, Sheffield's social media presence can be a strategic strength that fosters interaction with different stakeholders and allows sharing of information about the ski sports initiative cost-effectively and interactively. From another perspective, Rehman et al. (2022) suggest that social media implementation in the IMC takes an outside-in orientation whereby the organization deploys communication strategies in a customer-centric approach allowing the customer to initiate interactions. Bruhn and Schnebelen (2017) support the outside-in conceptualization, suggesting that the large volumes of information that emerge among social media users allow potential customers to search for details of interest actively. Therefore, they can decide when and where to engage or receive information from the company directly or through third parties. According to Bruhn and Schnebelen (2017), large volumes of user-generated content on social media transform the IMC from telling and selling to more listening and learning to make informed decisions and achieve customer satisfaction with the products or services offered. Williams and Chinn (2010) demonstrated that the feedback gathered from social media could improve the IMC by setting the basis for planning and implementing communication strategies. These insights show that intensive engagement using public social media can enhance the consistency in how the organization engages in communication by improving the outgoing messages using the insights from the incoming messages.
Evaluation of Public Social Media Marketing
The section presents an evaluation of public social media marketing in Sheffield City's IMC by addressing the advantages and disadvantages of the tool, describing how success can be measured, and the inherent controls for effective application.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Social Media Marketing
Advantages of Social Media
Social media platforms have substantially transformed how organizations engage with customers or other stakeholders by fostering a two-way communication system that is important in gathering feedback from a large population. Social media features such as commenting and direct messages can help marketers to build credibility among the target audience and potential customers (Tsimonis & Dimitriadis, 2014). Therefore, social media planners of the Sheffield ski activities can adequately engage with different stakeholders to establish their expectations and interests. Furthermore, social media allows connection with a large group of people in a timely and cost-effective manner (Baruah, 2012). Social media platforms also facilitate word of mouth, which is critical in developing a positive impression among customers and partners by creating a positive image and reputation. Nevertheless, Hamari et al. (2016) highlight that the information shared online can have either positive or negative effects based on the information shared among the people. Therefore, the organization and employees need to influence positive word of mouth and make clarifications to avoid miscommunication.
The use of social media by Sheffield City will require minimal investments considering that most platforms allow the creation of free profiles. Payment required by the service providers for verification or promoting content to reach a wider targeted audience is small compared to investments in other marketing strategies, such as television or newspapers (Tong et al., 2020). Bakeman and Hanson (2012) suggest that a tech-savvy workforce reduces the costs incurred in social media marketing by encouraging them to be part of the process. However, the city should hire a social media manager with the skills and experience to coordinate how the different platforms are used and ensure consistency and quality in the shared content. More staff might be required with a surge in the number of people interacting with the city. McCarthy et al. (2014) state that the effectiveness of social media marketing relies on effective engagement, which entails the timely sharing of information and responses to concerned parties and achieving consistency in the information shared.
Social media platforms can facilitate a data-driven approach to decision-making. Social media companies gather vast volumes of consumer data that help marketers to meet the target audience (Camilleri, 2020). Data analytics facilitated by the companies can be instrumental for the city in prioritizing the audience and understanding their expectations through user trends and demographic data. Companies can use social media information to generate user interest, enhance marketing campaigns, and improve the services and products offered. Part of the data gathered through social media is the feedback from users, which can highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the company in different contexts of the marketing initiative or products and services.
Disadvantages of Social Media
Social media has provided new strategies for the IMC, but its success is subject to the dynamic nature of the online space. The disadvantages of social media are reflected in the loss of control over the information shared with the large online audience (Mislove et al., 2007). The large number of people involved in social media communication makes managing it challenging. Furthermore, customers and competitors are actively engaged in communication, which can make the process less transparent (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004). The participation of stakeholders with similar power to the organization to express their opinions can present substantial challenges. Social media can also be time-consuming in dealing with comments and views that might harm the organization (Killian & McManus, 2015). Social media also requires constant work and innovative approaches to reach a diverse audience. This raises the need for the city to engage a social media manager who can effectively use the available resources to maximize the marketing campaign. Engaging professionals in social media marketing is also vital to ensure that the content shared is appropriate to meet the objectives of the IMC.
Social media presents different strategies that can be adopted in marketing, which makes it difficult for organizations to choose the most appropriate. Organizations can use virtual content such as videos and images or typed posts. The content used depends on the platforms used. For instance, Instagram is preferred when using visual content such as images, while TikTok is more effective for sharing video content (Haenlein et al., 2020). Creating content and operating the social media environment ...