Usage, barriers and measurement of social media marketing: An exploratory investigation of small and medium B2B brands

By Nina Michaelidou, Nikoletta-Theofania Siamagka, George Christodoulides. 2011

1,040 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Previous research has established the benefits of branding for business-to-business (B2B) organizations. Various tools can be used to support B2B brands, including the internet and other interactive technologies. Yet research on how organizations use Social Networking Sites (SNS) to achieve brand objectives remains limited. This study addresses the gap by focusing on B2B SMEs and their social networking practices, particularly, usage, perceived barriers, and the measurement of effectiveness of SNS as a marketing tool. Findings from a mail survey show that over a quarter of B2B SMEs in the UK are currently using SNS to achieve brand objectives, the most popular of which is to attract new customers. On the other hand, the most significant barrier is the lack of perceived relevance for particular sectors. Notably, the overwhelming majority of users do not adopt any metrics to assess SNS effectiveness. Almost half of the sample of SMEs that currently use SNS have indicated their intention to increase their marketing spending on this channel, highlighting the growing importance of SNS in a B2B context.

Subfields: Information Systems and Management, Sociology and Political Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/58991b08f4a8b673ab98c74879375ae31dc1ce28

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Citations in the corpus

Business to business digital content marketing: Marketers’ perceptions of best practice (2014, background): “There is also some alignment of objectives with research conducted on social media (Michaelidou et al., 2011), arising from common concerns with the creation and, ultimately, sharing of digital content.”
Social commerce adoption using TOE framework: An empirical investigation of Saudi Arabian SMEs (2020, background): “Michaelidou, Siamagka, and Christodoulides (2011) investigated business-to-business (B2B) SMEs and measured the effectiveness of social networking sites (SNS) as a marketing tool.”
The usage of digital marketing channels in SMEs (2015, methodology): “The lack of human resources, time and expertise are the largest barriers to digital marketing usage in the industrial context among both SMEs and larger corporations (Järvinen et al., 2012; see also Michaelidou et al., 2011).”
Evaluation and decision making in social media marketing (2017, methodology): “For example, Michaelidou et al. (2011) found that most B2B organisations do not adopt any metrics to assess SMM effectiveness.”
Social media for knowledge-sharing: A systematic literature review (2018, background): “On the other hand, social media is considered a tool for facilitating communication mechanisms, and bringing people together through sharing content, which is known as user-generated communication (Michaelidou et al., 2011).”
Sales profession and professionals in the age of digitization and artificial intelligence technologies: concepts, priorities, and questions (2019, background): “…communication patterns between the sales organization and other intra-and extraorganiza-tional entities that support them in the value creation and delivery process in the marketplace would need to undergo metamorphosis (Deepa and Deshmukh 2013; Michaelidou, Siamagka, and Christodoulides 2011).”
What messages to post? Evaluating the popularity of social media communications in business versus consumer markets ☆ (2017, background): “…where there is a lack of research guidance and the presence of unique barriers that business marketers face in their attempts to develop and implement effective social media communications (Michaelidou, Siamagka, and Christodoulides, 2011; Leek, Canning, and Houghton, 2016; Lacka and Chong, 2016).”
Determinants of social media adoption by B2B organizations (2015, methodology): “Following from existing evidence that highlights the significant role of the Internet in B2B contexts (Bauer, Grether, & Leach, 2002; Walters, 2008), B2B researchers have started to appreciate the importance of such tools mainly in attracting new customers and cultivating relationships with existing”
The effect of social media on firm performance (2017, background): “The findings are in consistent with studies such as(Martínez-Román, Tamayo, Gamero, & Romero, 2015; Merrilees et al., 2011; Michaelidou et al., 2011; Yu et al., 2014) .”