With its online travel communities Flying Blue Club Africa and Flying Blue Club China, the Dutch airline KLM offers its business travelers a digital meeting place to connect and network with fellow travelers. On the platform #1 social needs are addressed as customers can share experiences, either travel- or business-related, maintain valuable contacts as well as learn from others’ insights into the Chinese/African business world. The stimulated knowledge exchange fosters the required reciprocity and social ties. By starting discussions, the airline attempts to promote communication and the integration of members. This form of active moderation needs to be considered critically, though as users might feel disrupted in their freedom of posting travel experiences or opinions and thus, possibly perceive the brand community as an implicit advertising tool. The airline places strong emphasis on stimulating #2 intellectual needs. KLM considers its online travel communities as rich sources of expertise which allow the exchange of invaluable experiences and knowledge (KLM, 2015). Several steps are taken to ensure high-quality: the continuous monitoring of user-generated content as well as the airline’s effort to thoroughly check travelers’ subscription first in order to keep the brand communities’ nature of exclusivity and expertise.
Read moreUsers’ 5 Needs When Seeking eWOM in Online Travel Communities Part 1
Times are gone when travel experiences only started at the chosen destination. In times of online travel communities like-minded users can already build relationships, share travel experiences, information and tips during their planning process. The Web has turned into a ‘travel square’ (Wang et al., 2002) that allows the stimulation of interaction and exchange, also known as electronic word of mouth (eWOM), to happen on a common platform. Speaking of those, travelers can choose from numerous opportunities such as social networking sites, fan sites, travel forums and blogs or brand-based sites. Focusing on user-generated content in online travel communities, special emphasis is placed on the latter, namely brand communities in the tourism sector. This form of firm-consumer-consumer interaction represents a renewed version of traditionally applied firm-customer engagement methods.
Read moreWill e-WOM Be A Substitute of Traditional Advertising? –A Case Study of Pepsi Refresh Project
Internet-dependent segments such as online marketing, e-commerce and social media are currently enjoying a favorable environment, owning to the increasing high internet penetration worldwide. Accordingly, brands are now are redefining their traditional marketing mix to incorporate social media as one of the key aspects (Armelini & Villanueva, 2011). With a huge number of users, social media not only allows brands to communicate directly with consumers, but also enables consumers to converse with one another (Burkhalter, Wood & Tryce, 2014). Consumers are taking the driver’s seats and can freely share their opinions of brands on social media, which is known as interpersonal communication, or word of mouth (WOM) (Burkhalter, Wood & Tryce, 2014). We call those WOM occurrences online “e-WOM”, specifically, e-WOM is defined as “any positive or negative statement made by potential, actual or former customers about a product or company, which is made available to a multitude of people and institutions via the internet” (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2004, p.39; King, Racherla & Bush, 2014). Extremely challenging as it is, quite a few of brands still evolve in this digital age and strategically utilize e-WOM for their benefits.
Read moreThe Rise of Social Media - A Double Sided Coin for Marketers
The development of Web. 2.0 technologies and rise of social media have taken most of us by surprise, marketers included, with the unexpected power shift and empowerment of consumers. The rise of social media and resulting power shift has turned the world upside down for marketers, requiring immediate adjustment to their mindsets, alteration of their strategies, and rethinking of their business approach to marketing.With the new interconnected era comes a new set of opportunities and challenges for marketers, which are to be examined shortly along with the areas in which marketers have experienced empowerment or disempowerment.
Read moreProtect your Quality of Life: Don’t Let Social Media Ruin Your Productivity and Well-Being Part 2
Social media’s unfavorable impact on humans’ productivity, mentioned in Part 1, is not the only issue that arose with the development of these networks. Their effect on humans’ well-being might even be more dramatic.
Read moreProtect your Quality of Life: Don’t Let Social Media Ruin Your Productivity and Well-Being Part 1
What are the moments that stay in your memory forever, the moments you think back many times? Is it the one time you got hundreds of likes on one of your posts? Was it when you realized you had thousands of followers? Or was it the time when your post was shared hundred or thousand times? Probably these events are not those that came to your mind. They did not stay in you memory as life changing events.
Read moreDeterminants of the Perceived eWOM Review Credibility Part 2
Several studies, in the past few years, have demonstrated that eWOM review credibility is a basic requirement for the adoption of the eWOM message (Lis, 2013). Indeed, according to the author, the more the recipient perceives the message as credible, the greater is the chance that the message information will be adopted and used. This is the reason why it is crucial, in order to understand the effects of eWOM reviews on the purchase decision process, to gain a better understanding of all of the determinants which lead the review to be perceived as credible by the reader.
Read moreDeterminants of the Perceived eWOM Review Credibility Part 1
In 2008 Dave Carroll, a passenger of United Airlines, had a problem with the company, since one of the baggage handlers destroyed his 3500-dollar guitar. Dave did not obtain any compensation from the airline, thus he decided to broadcast a video on YouTube, “United breaks guitars”, which went viral in a few, reaching consumers all over the world, and causing remarkable financial losses to United Airlines. (Gensler et al., 2013)
Read moreAnonymity a Double-Edged Sword: What are the implications of anonymity of the sender in electronic word of mouth?
In reality, everybody can create some sort of content on the internet, share information with others using different platforms as social networks, blogs, YouTube, review sites and so on. The internet allows people to interact with each other under a nickname or just disclose only a part of their real identity, generating what is called the online disinhibition effect, in which people change their behavior in the online world (Suler, 2004). In recent years the media and some studies have been worried about the effect of anonymity on the internet, arguing that it can foster a violent behavior and particularly in the case of electronic word of mouth can generate dishonest messages and un-ethical business practices.
Read moreHarnessing the Power of Social Media Marketing: How International Brand Managers can Leverage the Influence of Empowered Consumers without Losing Control
A condensed toolkit for the international brand marketer to leverage social media marketing to reach empowered consumers while avoiding backlashes (shitstorms).
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