Social Media Marketing Strategies and Their Impact on Consumer-Based Brand Equity

Abstract

Social media marketing has become one of the significant tools which organizations can utilize to attract consumers, create brand awareness and convince consumers to make purchases in the digital era. With the popularity of the platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, rising rapidly, the businesses begin to utilize interactive and content-oriented marketing strategies in an attempt to achieve good relations with the target audience. Even though this is widely used, contribution to consumer-based brand equity by specific social media marketing strategies is yet to be empirically investigated. The main aim of the present study is to examine how the key social media marketing metrics, such as engagement, interaction, trendiness, customization, and electronic word of mouth (eWOM) affect the dimensions of consumer-based brand equity, including brand awareness, brand associations, perceived quality, and brand loyalty. A quantitative research design was used with the primary data being collected using a structured questionnaire of 250 active social media users and using a convenience sampling technique. The data obtained were examined with the help of a descriptive analysis, correlation analysis, and multiple regression methods. The findings indicate that engagement and eWOM have strong positive impact on brand awareness and brand loyalty and customization and interaction have strong positive impact on the perceived quality and brand associations. The paper has indicated that an effective application of the social media strategies can aid in hiking the brand equity to large levels. The findings can be used by marketers and organizations to come up with specific social media campaigns that would not only improve consumers relationship but also increase the brand performance in the long run.