Background The emergence of the Internet, and in particular social network sites, has led to the appearance of new powerful actors, i.e. Social Media Influencers, with the power to persuade their audience. This introduced a middleman in the company-consumer relationship and a new stakeholder to build relationships with. Small and medium-sized enterprises’ (SMEs) marketing activities differ from traditional practices. SMEs need to be more creative when engaging in Influencer Marketing given their resource constraints. The presence of a relationship can help SMEs to increase and improve their brand image, support the launch of new products and most essentially avoid large investments of Influencer Marketing. Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore the methods Swedish SMEs use in their relationship building activities with influencers, as well as the underlying dimensions related to those methods. Method An inductive research approach is utilized, with the aim to extend the current knowledge available about relationship building with influencers. The use of a qualitative approach with semi-structured interviews allowed the exploration of how SMEs build relationships with influencers from a management perspective. Conclusion This thesis indicates that Swedish SMEs’ relationship building activities are influenced by certain underlying dimensions. These are adherence to brand values, timeline of the collaboration, nature of the product, paid and earned forms of collaborations and the types of relationships SMEs establish: formal and informal. The means used by SMEs when building relationship with influencers were identified as communication, events, feedback and gifts. Further, resource constraints did not appear to influence how SMEs build relationships with influencers but instead the type and number of influencers they work with.

The work in this thesis sets out to explore how students perceive social media use in the context of higher education. More precisely, the focus is on students' use of, experience with, and attitudes toward the integration of social media into their learning environment. To complement this, teachers' incentives for including social media have been studied; to some extent their communication, attitudes, and online activity were also analyzed. The four different studies included in this thesis incorporated three major types of social media technologies: a social networking service (Facebook), a collaborative editable webpage (Wikipedia), and a microblog (Twitter). The studies adopted different approaches to data collection and analysis, including both qualitative and quantitative methods. The specific methods for each study were chosen to accommodate the research questions, for reasons of access to information, and due to ethical considerations. While each study differs in starting point and scope and provide particular contributions to the research area, the main contributions of the work as a whole are connected to findings on attitude changes, the professional role in students' use of social media, their teacher-like actions, confusion regarding moving between the identified roles, and the implementation of social media in higher education. The findings presented here are appropriate for guiding a nuanced discussion regarding the implementation of social media technologies in higher education, an implementation that was found to be contingent on appropriate use and a suitable social context. The findings suggest that the inclusion of social media in non-private contexts generally needs to have a clear aim and strategy for achieving it. The roles defined in this work - in terms of both being a student and the private and professional roles - could also serve as the basis for further exploration in other areas with comparable hierarchies in which it is necessary to understand how the individual relates to self-presentation, technological constraints, and roles, such as the relation between an employer and employee. / Denna avhandling avser att utforska hur studenter upplever användningen av sociala medier i högre utbildning. Närmare bestämt så ligger fokus på studenternas användning, erfarenhet och attityder till sociala medier när dessa integrerats i studenternas lärmiljö. Som komplement har också lärarnas incitament för inkludering av sociala medier belysts, samt i viss utsträckning även deras attityder, användning och kommunikation i respektive socialt medium. Fyra olika studier inkluderas i denna avhandling, och inkorporerar i sin tur tre olika typer av sociala medier: en social nätverkstjänst (Facebook), en publikt redigerbar webbplats (Wikipedia), och en mikroblogg (Twitter). Vidare har studierna använt olika metoder för datainsamling och analys, där både kvalitativa samt kvantitativa metoder finns representerade. Metoderna valdes med hänsyn till forskningsfrågorna, men baserades även på informationstillgång och etiska överväganden. De enskilda studierna hade olika syften och omfattning, och därigenom har de bidragit till specifika forskningsfynd. Huvudbidraget från detta arbete är kopplat till slutsatser kring studenters attitydförändringar, den professionella rollen i studenters användning av sociala medier, deras lärarliknande agerande, förvirring beträffande att röra sig mellan de identifierade rollerna, och implementeringen av sociala medier i högre utbildning. Resultaten utgör en grund för en nyanserad diskussion kring implementeringen av sociala medier i högre utbildning; en implementation som beror på lämpligt användande i lämplig social kontext. En tolkning av detta är att inkluderande av sociala medier i icke-privata kontexter bör ha ett klart mål och en tydlig strategi. Rollerna som definieras i detta arbete - student, privat och professionell - utgör underlag för utforskande inom områden där jämförbara hierarkier finns representerade och där det är nödvändigt att förstå hur individen förhåller sig till självpresentation, tekniska begränsningar och roller. Exempel på ett sådant är relationen mellan arbetsgivare och arbetstagare. / <p>QC 20171211</p>

It is in the interest of organizations to understand that the public demand for quick and easy accessibility is growing at a rapid pace. However, the transition from traditional marketing strategies to social media marketing is not a straightforward process, but more complex.The aim of the thesis is to, from a bottom-up perspective, draw conclusions from a comparative study of the social media praxes of Umeå-situated businesses and organizations.The study indicates that the transition into social media still continues, but that there has been a change in organizations’ mindsets. It also shows that the application of a bottom-up approach provides new ways of viewing and understanding activities within social media.It is in the interest of organizations to understand that the public demand for quick and easy accessibility is growing at a rapid pace. However, the transition from traditional marketing strategies to social media marketing is not a straightforward process, but more complex.The aim of the thesis is to, from a bottom-up perspective, draw conclusions from a comparative study of the social media praxes of Umeå-situated businesses and organizations.The study indicates that the transition into social media still continues, but that there has been a change in organizations’ mindsets. It also shows that the application of a bottom-up approach provides new ways of viewing and understanding activities within social media.

The usage of social networking sites is steadily increasing, setting higher demands on companies and their need to be present on social media. This study aims to examine how companies could design their content on Facebook and Instagram to promote interaction from followers. To be able to understand this the company Pantamera is used as a case in this study. Pantamera is responsible for the recycling of metal cans and PET bottles in Sweden, and are experiencing that their usage of strategies on social media is deficient. To answer the purpose, already existing theories of how to form a social media strategy and methods are examined. This is implemented through an online survey aiming to understand the target audience, and the results are used as a foundation for the design process. The designs are evaluated through interviews and the conclusion is that it is possible to design content on social media in order to promote interaction. Important to have in mind when creating content for interaction is its design, what platform it intends to be designed for and that the company should at all times communicate with their target audience on their terms.

Social media has become an integral part of consumers’ lives and a popular platform for interactive marketing communication. In an age boasting of unprecedented digital connectivity, loneliness (defined as perceived social isolation) has, paradoxically, becoming widespread, affecting consumers’ preferences for products and brands in the marketplace. The present research extends the feelings-as-information theory and develops a conceptual framework in which loneliness modifies people’s cognitive processing style and induces concrete thinking in the context of evaluating social media messages. Using a mixed methods research approach, I first take a close look through the lens of a qualitative study at what it is like for the average consumer to experience loneliness. Additional experiments show that lonely consumers have higher digital engagement with concrete (vs. abstract) social media ads. Broadly, my findings on the effects of loneliness on consumers’ digital engagement with social media ads highlight the fact that loneliness may render different types of social media ads (abstract versus concrete) more or less effective.

The rapid rise and popularization of social media has a profound impact on the society today. The emergence of the social media broadens the channels of communication and the people's vision. Citizens can freely express information such as words and pictures, and freely exchange their views on social media. This study will focus on Sina Weibo which is the most popular social media in China. The purpose of this research is to study how to attract so much attention by protagonist‘s post and this certain hot event. Simultaneously, it also focuses on attitude and opinions of audience through the comments of this incident. This research aims to do rhetoric analysis and content analysis by selecting the most popular posts and top 100 hot comments. It is interesting to discover that the most feasible ways of attracting attention are creating emotional response, strengthening credibility and persuading in rational approach. This event has received most of the audience support. The audience expressed their concern and compassion towards this event. They share the valuable information in the comments to express their feelings. However, there still exist some different opinions on it. Although it is hard to guarantee the same attitude of the spectators, the huge number of audience on Micro-blog is an important factor in the rapid spread of this event.

The role of internet and the digitalized world are more relevant than ever before. The new phenomena of digital marketing has created a paradigm shift of existing marketing with new ways to market. Social media plays a significant role in this change, since it allows businesses to easily engage with its customers and to maintain relationships. For small and local businesses, this change has created great opportunities to interact more with the local audience. However, not all such businesses have the sufficient knowledge to optimize the usage of social media. The focus of the study is to explore the current usage of social media in local businesses context. Furthermore, we will suggest social media marketing strategies that will help local business to improve its customer relations. The qualitative approach is applied in this study by using interviews and observations, which is the main source of primary data collection. The conclusion was that local grocery stores still rely much more on traditional marketing methods. However, local grocery stores still use and value social media, but most are unclear of the true benefits and strategies when using social media. Lacking strategies consist of planning the social media marketing strategies, but also lacks the formal management of critical situations on social media. Overall, local stores perform well in building relations with its customers using social media however, there is a scope of further improvements.

The marketing possibilities on the Internet is growing and so are social media marketing. The budget devoted for marketing activities on social media is constantly increasining every year and the time users are spending on social media is also increasing. Among the increasing activities comes a vast amount of data which create endless of opportunities for companies to optimize their marketing activities. In marketing the most important has always been to know your customers and how to reach out to them. The Internet and data that comes with it has made it possible for companies to get to know their customers even better and to reach them with more precision if data is correctly used.   A gap was identified from the litterature search which showed that it is not always clear how to utilize social media for marketing and it is not easy to analyze and interpret the data derived from social media. This has lead to a lack of knowledge on how data can be used for social media activities. From the identified gap regarding data usage in social media marketing, a research question was formulated:   “How is data used in brand’s strategies for social media?”   A qualitative research design conducting semi-structured interviews was used to examine the research question. A purposeful sample of eleven respondents, defined as experts within the research field, from ten different companies was selected. A pilot study was carried out to get insights in the identified gap, to set a base for the theoretical framework, and to optimize the interview questions. All respondents represented agencies except for the respondent in the pilot study.   Academics and business communities are interested in how data is used in marketing purposes and therefore it was elaborated further in this thesis to how data can be used in social media activities. Branding activities are becoming more engaged with its customers, thus marketers need to keep up to date with the new and emerging trends. Furthermore, the aim was to explore how data is used in social media marketing and how data affect decisions in social media strategies.   The results found in this study shows that data is used to define audiences on social media and to enable a greater reach of the messages for the audiences. The audience is defined by data analysis mostly based on consumer behavior in social media. To achive reach marketers use programmatic buying tools, which are based on data and ultimatley enables conversions among the audience. Data is also analyzed by opinion mining where data insights can show what topics customers are engaged in. Data insights can further give direction on how content can encourage engagement among the targeted audience. Lastly, the result shows that it is important to have knowledge about how to analyze, interpret, and use data insights in order to create successful social media activites.

This thesis examines organizational use of social media. It focuses on developing an understanding of the ways by which social media are used within formal organizational settings. From the vantage point of this thesis such an understanding can be achieved by looking at tensions and incompatibilities that might potentially exist between social media and organization because of their distinct characteristics. It is argued that the distinct characteristics of social media (e.g. openness, transparency, flexibility, etc.) and organization (e.g., hierarchy, formal relationships, standard procedures, etc.) may engender tensions and incompatibilities that affect the ways of using social media and their potential in organizations. The main premise here is that the possibilities, behaviors and practices afforded by social media are recognizably different in nature from common and established organizational practices, behaviors, norms and routines. Through a structurational understanding of organizational use of social media, influenced by Giddens’ theory of structuration and Orlikowski’s practice lens for studying technology use, this thesis offers the perspective of immiscibility to capture tensions and incompatibilities driven by the distinctive characteristics of social media and organization. It basically offers a way of seeing social media use in organizations as a dynamic, in-practice interplay between social media and organization characteristics. One key argument in this thesis is that the immiscible interplay of social media and organization, produces, at least in transition, ‘a bureaucracy of social media’. Social media, it is argued, are used in ways that are essentially bureaucratic, reflecting and also reinforcing established characteristics of formal organizations through the production and reproduction of structures which are driven by the immiscible interplay. The development of such an understanding was achieved through multiple research studies focusing on the use of the wiki technology for knowledge collaboration and sharing practices in two large multinational organizations: CCC and IBM. A number of qualitative methods were used in these studies to collect empirical evidence from the two organizations including interviews, field visits, observations and document analysis. The overarching contribution of this thesis centers on offering a unique way of understanding organizational use of social media by putting forward tensions and incompatibilities between social media and organization and also by providing an understanding of how such tensions and incompatibilities affect the potential for change by social media.

Social media is fast becoming an ever-increasingly significant part of the world of business and a phenomenon which cannot be evaded. The advent of social media in the workplace compels organisations to acclimatise to the transformation emanating from employees‟ adoption of these technologies (Hanaki & Casella, 2008). Approximately seventy percent of organisations do not have a social media governance framework in place (Fink et al., 2011). Social media governance in organisations is very disjointed; companies have varying stances as to social media strategy, the risks, benefits and business use of social media (Thompson et al., 2011). The growth of social media and its use in the business environment will see a more standardised approach to social media governance (Thompson et al., 2011). Being at the forefront of technology development in Africa, and in certain areas, globally (Government of the Republic of South Africa, 2012), places added emphasis on IT organisations in South Africa to set the standard as it relates to social media governance. The diversity and depth of the human and technology resources within these organisations, creates an environment conducive to establishing and pioneering sound social media governance structures. The treatise consists of a study on the governance of social media and the successive development of two frameworks; an integrated framework for the governance of social media in the workplace, as well as integrated framework for a social media policy within an IT organisation. These frameworks are empirically evaluated amongst employees, within the context of Information Technology (IT) organisations, in South Africa. Several recommendations are proposed by the author in relation to the adoption of the proposed frameworks.