Keegan, B. J. (2018). Social media marketing evaluation decision making processes and the agency-client relationship (Doctoral dissertation, Manchester Metropolitan University).

According to Keegan (2018), the use of social media by businesses has increased drastically as new modern marketing channels grow stronger by the day. Social media has created a paradigmatic shift in current practice towards consumer-centric strategies. Businesses are turning to these channels and new media to interact with their target audience. Keegan (2018) summarizes that “social media marketing strategy development involves the following stages of activity: situation analyses, setting campaign objectives, creative decision-making, implementation, evaluation and management decision making.” And “social media marketing evaluation involves the following stages of activity: identifying evaluation objectives, identifying KPIs, identifying metrics, data collection and analysis, report generation, management decision-making.”


Tingley, C. (2015). Social media marketing strategies to engage generation Y consumers. (Doctoral Dissertation, Walden University).

Social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter have become an integral part of the internet user's daily lives. For instance, Generation Y consumers are considered digital natives since they have been connected to digital technology for most of their lives. The consumers of the Generation Y cohort make about 75 million Americans with significant purchasing power. Social media has granted consumers the potential to be co-creators of marketing information and has driven the business model of customer interaction and user-generated content. Due to their increased presence on the internet and purchasing power, Generation Y has turned out as an important target demographic for marketers. Tingley (2015) offers the following recommendations for marketers.

  • Understand the social media platforms that are populated by your target market and focus efforts on them.
  • Offer incentives to the target (Generation Y) and ensure the incentives align with your business/brand.
  • Be aware of social media campaign timing by determining the time of the day your target market is active on social media.
  • Engage in information overload to reach Generation Y on social media.
  • Though social media selling is possible, ensure to empower audiences' independence and avoid hard selling when targeting Generation Y.
  • Remember to customize marketing efforts to individual consumers.
  • Remain open, transparent, and honest with customers.
  • Get input from your target audience and consider employing Generation Y's advice in your social media marketing.


Chaffey, D. (2019). Digital marketing: Strategy, implementation and practice (7th Edition). Pearson: UK.

Digital marketing strategy involves defining the capabilities and strategic initiatives to support marketing and business objectives deployed by a business to harness digital media, data, and marketing technology to develop multichannel engagement with their audiences through the use of digital devices and platforms. Organizations seeking to use digital marketing strategies need to understand that it represents decisions on how to use digital channels to support existing marketing strategies, exploit its strengths and manage its weaknesses, and use it in conjunction with other channels. Today, most sectors are using virtual channels such as email marketing, websites, and applications to integrate the real customer experience with the digital to offer services and communicate with consumers. Chaffey (2019) recommends that organizations should:

  • Examine broader issues of how to utilize marketing tools for customer relationship development.
  • Develop overall customer experience across multiple channels using structured experiments such as A/B testing.
  • Maximize the results from collaborations and promotions with online intermediaries such as influencers.
  • Harness social media marketing via paid ads on social platforms and user-generated content.


Ryan, D. (2014). Understanding Digital marketing: Marketing strategies for engaging the digital generation. (3rd Edition). Kogan Page Limited: UK.

Ryan (2014) states that developments in technology and the evolution of marketing are inextricably intertwined. Innovative marketers have jumped in to explore new ways they can harness the power of the emerging technology to connect with their target audience. There are several key ways in which the widespread adoption of technology is influencing consumer behavior. One is interconnectivity on the internet since technology allows them to connect with each other more readily. Two is that technology has leveled the information playing field since content can be created, published, accessed, and consumed in the shortest time and easiest way possible. Three is that digital consumers can now filter out information they don’t want by use of personalization features that block out irrelevant content. Four is that the content on the internet can now allow consumers to take part and indulge in their interests with groups or niche that is like-minded.


Haug, A. (2015). DIY: Social media content strategy. Gyldendal Business.

Haug (2015) states that content strategy for social media refers to the strategy focusing on the information you will share on social media. Having a content strategy helps marketers avoid a shotgun approach on social media and allows them to focus their marketing efforts to achieve better results. Marketers need to understand that a content strategy is not an onetime thing. Instead, it should be considered a series of processes that occur continuously, and each phase affects the others. This is because the markets keep changing, and consumers of the information also change their interests and taste now and then. A content strategy will ensure you work strategically with social media to harness its power to gain influence over your target audience.  


Jarhult, W., & Köhler, T. (2012). Corporate strategy in digital-and social media. (Bachelor´s Thesis, Linnaeus University).

Due to the increased use of social media, consumers are becoming more empowered, getting the ability to participate and evaluate the content, share with other consumers, and review it. This is why most people are going to the internet to look for opinions, beliefs, and attitudes towards a specific product before making a purchase. Consumers are now broadcasters and are no longer just satisfied with listening to marketing messages from brands, but want to be engaged and to alter flow and conversations to fit their interests through the social marketing channels (Jarhult & Köhler, 2012). For this reason, a developed strategy is essential for every business that wishes to adapt to the changing market.


Thomas, D. B., & Barlow, M. (2013). The executive's guide to enterprise social media strategy: how social networks are radically transforming your business. Wiley.

Being relevant to the online community and generating positive relations are a crucial part of engagement in the digital world. According to Thomas and Barlow (2013), listening is an essential part of social media strategy. Brands need to observe the different types of listening, including search, monitoring, altering, measuring, and mining. A brand can use the search engine to see what people are saying about their company. Current technology allows brands to monitor their performance on social media continuously. Brands can also get information much faster through alerts on their performance sent directly through emails or other alerts rather than visiting the dashboard every time. Another essential practice is measuring performance, which is mostly done using social media metrics such as likes, comments, and shares. Lastly, mining is done by organizations for due diligence when scouting business partners, competitor research, or when exploring scenarios for potential business. Mining is different from measuring in that measuring is an ongoing practice, whereas mining is looking at archival data.


Carvill, M. (2018). Get social: Social media strategy and tactics for leaders. Kogan Page Publishers.

Carvill (2018) mentions that the pace of change and digital transformation is swift, and many leaders continue to struggle to keep up. It is now evident that social media is a necessity that businesses and leaders can utilize to get closer to customers and to build engagement and trust. Carvill (2018) states that in order to succeed, it is essential to focus on the human experience. Since you are a consumer too, consider your individual experiences and where digital and social fit in. In a successful social media strategy, leaders to listen to what the internet is saying, conduct an analysis of the information and decide what to do with it, what platform is perfect for engaging, measure performance or what is working and what is not working.


Schaffer, N. (2013). Maximize your social: A one-stop guide to building a social media strategy for marketing and business success. John Wiley & Sons.

According to Schaffer (2013), a social media strategy is a road map for online campaigns; it determines the number of resources to be used and on which platform it will be used, and also it defines the tactics that need to be pursued on social media. Schaffer (2013) notes that creating a robust social media strategy is the secret to managing your social media return on investment (ROI). Having a social media strategy should entail perfectly outline objectives, tactics, and metrics, which are the solution to managing and making sense of social media activities that an organization and its team engage.


Effing, R. (2013). Social media strategy design. In Proceedings of the 2nd scientific conference Information Science in an Age of Change (pp. -). Warsaw.

The purpose of having a social media strategy is to summarize everything you want to do and wish to achieve on social media. A plan needs to be more specific to be effective. Due to the changes taking place on the internet, businesses need to have their social media aligned with business goals. The different aspects of social media strategy include external analysis, internal analysis, social media strategy, and monitoring (Effing, 2013). these must be observed to have a successful campaign on social media.

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Social Media
Academic
Strategy