Busn2019 International Business Context-Digital Marketing Assessment Answers

The broad context of the above data set is “electricity pricing”, so you can go searching for scholarly papers about electricity prices and what makes those prices go up and down. You can do further searches about Variable 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Take detailed notes on your readings. Make sure youreference each statement to the correct source. Make sure you use correct APA style (and note that I have given clear and easy instructions on how to do this on the Moodle site…many of you have ignored this.

Create a research question about two or more of the variables.If I were you I would pick a research question that has been talked about in the scholarly literature.If there is a lot of literature that talks about how Variable 1 impacts on Variable 2, then that will probably be a good research question to explore with your data set. If you want to create a slightly more interesting research project you could say that “Variable 1 impacts on Variable 2, particularly in cases where there is a high level of Variable 3.” If you do that, you may even be working in what is called a research gap, which is a place where other scholars have NOT yet explored.

You should do some basic reading on statistics, so you can pick your correct statistical tool. There are some online statistical tools at this site that are really good. if you click on “Go here for the help page index” and then click on the various procedures, you can get nice simple explanations of each statistical procedure and then do the calculations on line.The ones you will likely need are either T-Test, One-way ANOVA, Correlations/regressions/ and under the set called “descriptives”. In all cases you should probably report in your results section on descriptives. It’s always a good practice.

As you can imagine, this is not so easy. Have a look at the News Forum site at the section called “Sample Assignment for Assignment 2 plus some news”. This will give you an idea of what to aim for… You don’t need to do as well as this student of course, but you can do quite well by following the above basic steps and also focusing on the material I have given in the ‘feedforward’ pdf document I uploaded earlier today on the News Forum site. Please do take time to read it carefully.

It’s VERY important if you want to get a high enough mark in order to say get a ‘credit’ or ‘distinction’ in this second assignment—and that is what many of you will have to aim for in order to get a ‘pass’ for this unit overall.

Digital marketing and social media have a correlation as both are used as the marketing tool in the business. However, in the new era, modern marketers need to understand the importance of social media marketing in business in order to detect the new leads. Hence, it is important to understand the concept of digital marketing and social media marketing and their working nature (Dekoulou et al., 2017). Digital marketing is considered as the umbrella to encompass all the marketing efforts in order to increase the brand awareness. Media marketing, e-mail, blogging, mobile marketing SEM, and SEO are the examples of digital marketing. On the other hand, social media includes Facebook, Twitter to enhance the brand value. Social media marketing is considered as the latest version of digital marketing.

This study deals with the role of social media and digital marketing to create brand awareness among the Australian retail sectors. However, critical factors of social media marketing will be discussed in this section. However, by using Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Tumbler, Snapchat, and Google+ the business organizations promote their brand through digitization. However, it is important to get a clear concept that social media marketing is a part of digital marketing. In the present years, social media marketing is a popular marketing tool to promote the business by creating the brand awareness (Gainsbury et al., 2016).

1.2 Background of the study in professional context

Social media is a vital part o digital marketing and according to meet the current demand of the market, the retail sectors use this marketing approach. However, in Australian retail, sectors web marketing, blogging; SEM, mobile marketing and SEO are very popular as the digital marketing. On the other hand, social media provides scope to the retailers to connect with the million consumers from different geographical regions (Mena & Bourlakis, 2016).

Traditional marketing is too expensive and time-consuming to create the brand awareness while social media marketing is a cost-efficient way and less time-consuming. In order to minimize the hectic process and high cost in traditional marketing can be reduced by the social media as well digital marketing in the context of retail sectors. However, the web has been evolving day by day as a result people get more opportunities to get more knowledge about a brand. In the previous, the internet was static and few content developers are engaged in web developing.

Over the time, the technology becomes advanced and many technical experts are involved in the web development, which improves the digital marketing. However, in the recent years, people spend more time and money in their online shopping. According to the statistics, 14% of the online sale has increased in last year in Australian retail sectors (Kasemsap, 2017).

Social communities are the vital areas to promote a brand and make a connection with the target audience. However, social media provides a platform for the people to share their psychological urge by talking and sharing perspectives (Scott et al., 2017). However, it has been found that a third of the women and 40% of the men prefer to purchase a brand that is recommended by their friends. Based on this the marketers use social media as the tool of digital marketing to develop the brand awareness in the public domain.

1.3 Literature Review

Concept of digital and social media marketing

Digital marketing has drawn a lot of attention of the customers and the business organization towards a brand. However, as a part of digital marketing social media plays an important role in generating brand awareness in the customer domain (Suh, 2017). However, the digital marketing has various tools while social media is most popular among the digital marketing tools. Blogging, SEO, e-mail, SMO and web content are beneficial to develop the brand awareness by promoting the business of an organization. Therefore, the proliferation of the social media on the marketing attracts the customers to a brand or a particular service. However, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Linkedin are the most popular social media that are widely used to promote business in the Australian retail sectors. The retailers mostly used Linkedin to create brand awareness among the customers.

Factors influencing application of digital marketing and social media

Cost-effectiveness is one of the biggest factors that lead the organization to use social media as a promotional tool in comparison to other tools of digital marketing (Ramanathan et al., 2017). However, traditional marketing campaign includes radio, television cultural events that are costly to create brand awareness. Hence, application of social media through Facebook, Twitter is a cost-efficient process to provide information via online to the customers regarding a product or brand.

Time saving is vital while promoting a brand, however, in the traditional marketing, the marketers need to give more effort to provide information to the customers regarding a new brand (Felix, Rauschnabel & Hinsch, 2017). Therefore, it is difficult for the marketers to cover a large population in the single time from different geographical regions. Therefore, use of digital marketing and social media marketing is effective to communicate with a large number of people at the same time. Therefore, it is helpful for the retailers to save their time during the creation of brand awareness among the population.

Technological incorporation is another factor that influences the business organizations to use the digital marketing and social media to improve the brand value as well as the brand awareness in the consumer domain. However, in the recent years, business is technology oriented and to cope with the emerging technology it is essential for the business organizations to incorporate new technology in their marketing tool to enhance the brand awareness (Weitzl et al., 2017). Digital marketing and social media give the scope to the Australia retailers to utilize the benefits of the social media. In Australia people is addicted to the social media. Hence, brand promotion via social media allows the consumers to gain knowledge about the new brand on their social networking sites. This creates brand awareness as well as brand value for a particular organization.

Generational theory of digital marketing

According to this theory, consumers who are the same age have the similar choice and purchasing behavior as they share their experience regarding their shopping (Kumar, Choi & Greene, 2017). This theory has a relation with the digital marketing in a way in which the young generation shares their choices on their social networking sites via online and the marketers can access their needs easily. Hence, by developing social media marketing as a part of digital marketing the retailers especially the fashion retailers are able to influence the customers by posting information on a new brand on the social networking sites. However, by following this theory the marketers are able to advertise their products via digital marketing tool.

Role of digital marketing and social media in developing brand awareness

Digital marketing offers a good branding source by using the advanced technology through different electronic tools (Wang & Kim, 2017). In the traditional marketing, the non-electronic media such as newspapers, leaflets, pamphlets, banners and the electronic media like television and radio are used to promote a brand in the customer domain. However, in this traditional marketing campaign, it is not possible for the marketers to measure the effectiveness of the promotional campaign.

Search engine optimization or SEO is one of the vital tools of digital marketing. Yahoo and Google are the most popular search engines that allow the users to enter in a company website to get information about their product or service.  However, such digital marketing is vital for the online retail marketers to get more traffic. As mentioned by Itani, Agnihotri and Dingus, (2017), the customer gets quick access to the company product and service. The digital marketing provides a visible evidence of the product to the customers that influence them to purchase the product of a particular brand.

Social media plays an important role in the development of the brand image by delivering product message to the customers (Molinillo et al., 2017). However, in the modern era, the people have a great attachment to the social networking sites and they spend a long time on different social media. Hence, use of social media as a marketing tool is an effective approach to build brand image. As argued by Wang and Kim, (2017), social media has positive as well as negative aspects. The retailers create a web page and share it via Google Plus, Facebook, and Twitter. As a result, the product information easily reaches to the customer domain. Social marketing strategy enables the business owners to engage a large audience with different resourceful messages in order to get significant outcomes. Through the Facebook, an organization is able to provide detail information to the customers in an attractive way.

Social media generates a platform for the consumers to make a connection with the organization. Therefore, the target buyers get an insight regarding the brand as well as the product and service (Zahoor, & Qureshi, 2017). However, the contents are presenting in a balancing way in social media to give a clear idea to the consumers about the product or service. Therefore, use of right social channels such as Facebook the retailers get more traffic. Social media marketing develops a stronger relationship with the customers by creating brand awareness. According to Australian social media statistics it has been observed that in the year 2017, 17,000,000 users are actively use social media per month. Approx 7 out of 10 users  are addicted to the social media, which ensures the success of the social media marketing in creating brand awareness.

Challenges regarding the use of social media and digital marketing in creating brand value

Application of the social media as a marketing tool is an emerging technique of today. However, several challenges are associated with the digital marketing as well as the social media marketing (Hult & Sjölund, 2017). One of the major challenges is to choose the right audience. It is often difficult for the business organizations to select the proper target audience through social media as several people use it.  Therefore, it is not possible for the retailers to cover the people from rural areas through social media marketing. Hence, it is difficult to identify the people having social media. On the other hand, accessing the data is another obstacle of digital marketing as due to the technical issue often data of the customer are difficult to access. Apart from this network, problem and breach of personal information are another challenges of digital marketing that affect the brand image (Clark et al., 2017).

1.4 Research Aim and Objectives 

This current study aims to identify the role of social media and digital marketing in generating brand awareness in the Australian retail sectors.

Objectives

• To understand the concept of social media and digital marketing
• To identify the factors influencing the application of social media marketing and digital marketing in Australian retail sectors
• To evaluate the function of social media and digital marketing in enhancing brand awareness of Australian retail sectors
• To recommend the methods to develop the use of social media and digital marketing
• What are the roles of social media and digital marketing to create brand awareness in Australian retail sectors?
• What is the significance of the application of social media and digital marketing in the Australian retail sectors?
• What are the ways to enhance the application of social media and digital marketing in Australian retail sectors?

This current research study is based on secondary data. Hence, secondary research methodology has been taken in this study. However, secondary analysis is an authentic process to get accurate data on the selected topic (Humphries, 2017). Therefore, post-positivism philosophy has been taken in this section. Positivism philosophy is associated with the logical observation and statistical data analysis. Positivism philosophy is an independent process and includes the hypothesis.

Note: General approach includes research approach, philosophy and the design method of a research. The secondary data is obtained by reviewing the articles through different data bases. Exclusion and inclusion criteria are used for the selection of journals. Positivism philosophy is logical approach.

Deductive approach highlights on the hypothesis method. Therefore, the deductive approach is based on the existing concepts and theories from which the secondary information has been gathered (Horvath, 2017). This approach allows the researcher to collect secondary information from the valid journals. The descriptive design is suitable for this study as it focuses on the current barriers regarding the research methodology that allows the researcher to carry out the research method properly.  On the other hand, deductive approach and descriptive design methods are chosen for this current study.

2.2 Population and sampling

Sampling techniques include probability and non-probability techniques (Fletcher, 2017). However, in this current study probability technique has been selected to collect data. However, In the study, there are two variables one is dependent and another is independent. Role of social media and digital marketing is independent variable while the role of social media and digital marketing in creating brand awareness in Australian retail sectors is the dependent variable.

Note: Deductive approach highlights on the hypothesis and descriptive design focuses on the methodological issues.

2.3 Analytical approach

 The analytical approach includes the cause-effect analysis in a research (Cvetkovic & Medic, 2017). In this present research, study data is collected through the secondary data collection method from the different journal articles. Journals are collected from various databases. Therefore, inclusion and exclusion criteria are used to select journals from the databases. Themes are developed to analyze the data. Maintenance of validity and reliability is a big factor of data collection method. However, no data can be manipulated and it should be presented according to its original form. Therefore, proper citation is needed.

Outcomes

According toAustralian Bureau of Statistics, it has been found that digital marketing and social media have great impact on the retail marketing in Australia as 7 users out of 10 are addicted to facebook, which ensures the success of the social media in business performance. This fulfills the objective three that is associated with the function of social media in creating the brand awareness in Australian retail sectors. According to Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, (Clark et al., 2017) .

it has been occupied that time saving, cost effectiveness and technological marketing are the basic three factors of social media marketing that leads the Australian retail sectors to use social media marketing for creating brand awareness. This outcome fulfills the objective three, which is associated with the factors of the social media marketing. According to the journal of Business Research (Felix, R., Rauschnabel, P. A., & Hinsch, 2017) the concept off social media marketing is understood, which reveals that social media marketing is a part of digital marketing that has been using rapidly to establish the brand awareness. This fulfills the objective 1, which highlights on the concept of social media marketing.

 Result

The current study reveals the function of digital and social media marketing in generating brand value in the retail sectors of Australia. However, the social media is a popular tool for digital marketing in the modern era (Tsimonis & Dimitriadis, 2014). According to the secondary analysis in the literature review section, it has been found that application of social media is crucial for the business sectors to develop their brand image and brand value. It has been received that to communicate with a large population digital marketing as well as social media marketing is necessary. In Australia, social media marketing is considered as the popular way to create brand awareness among the customers.

On the other hand, the generational theory is effective for the retailers to understand the importance of the social media application. However, reduction in cost and time are the main two components that encourage the marketers to adopt digital marketing to enhance their brand awareness campaign. From this study, it has been observed that social media is part of digital marketing while digital marketing includes another marketing tool like SEO, web content and e-mail. Among the tools, social media is most popular in digital marketing. It can be said that digital marketing is a current marketing technique that needs to adopt for each business (Humphries, 2017).

As per the above discussion, it has been received that social media marketing has some negative aspects besides its advantages. Breaking in the confidentiality of the personal data and data accessing are the major challenges of digital and social media marketing. Hence, it has been observed that the digital and online marketing have both advantages and disadvantages in promoting brand awareness in public domain.

 It has been found that the percentage of Facebook users in Australia is 53% that ensures the addiction of the Australian people to the social media. On the other hand, 61% retailers rely on the Facebook for advertisement of their product. Among the different retail products, media products have percentage in the online marketing. According to the statistical data of the Australia the consumer index is 1.9% in 2017. On the other hand, GDP is 0.8% in the year of 2017, which ensures the good economic condition of Australia. In the year of 2013 and 2014 the financial inequality becomes stable in Australia which occurred due to economic recession in 2008. This highlights that purchasing behavior of the consumers become strong in this country (Abs.gov.au, 2017).

Conclusion

According to the entire secondary data, it has been found that in the modern trade digital marketing and social media marketing are adopted as the popular marketing tool in the retail industry. However, fashion is the part of the retail industry. In the context of fashion, social media marketing serves as the effective marketing tool to create brand value in a large population (Gensler et al., 2013). Therefore, the present literature review reveals that social media marketing gives a platform to the consumers and the marketers to build a good communication between them.

Technology is invaded in the each business sector and digital marketing is a gift of modern technology. Different factors are associated with the digital marketing. Digital marketing is cost effective and time-saving process. On the other hand, in order to incorporate the modern technology in the marketing strategy, the organization adopts digital and social media marketing (Horvath, 2017). Social media marketing not only develops product information via online but also develops communication with the customers.

From the above statistical data it has been observed that Facebook is the most popular social media for the online retailing. However, maximum retail marketers prefer the Facebook rather that other social media to enhance their brand awareness. The gap of the literature review focuses that the factors of social media and digital marketing need to be explained more critically in this section. Therefore, proper critical evaluation is important to analyze the impact of social media marketing in context of business. Based on this gap further research can be proceed that is big opportunity of such gap.

Research Limitations

Limitation of the research focuses on the time constraint and the budget. Therefore, some journals are of paid versions that were difficult to access for the researcher. On the other hand, some journals were out of data that is a big limitation of the research.

Conclusion

This above study highlights on the application of social media and digital marketing in the context of Australian retail sectors. In the recent years, Australian people are more technology-oriented and habituated with the social media. By keeping this in mind, the retail marketers use social media as the digital marketing tool to promote their brand awareness. It has been discussed above that social media is an example of digitization in the business. In order to develop food and fashion products, retailers use social media and digital marketing in Australia. However, social media marketing possesses low price in the context of business promotion rather than traditional campaign.

Therefore, traditional advertisement campaign is a time-consuming process while social media marketing is a quick and easier process to create brand awareness in the public domain. Therefore, an individual also suggests their friends about a new brand through communicating via social media. Barriers related to digital marketing often highlights on the distribution of the false information in the consumer domain that affects the perception of the consumers regarding a brand.

References

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