Background Social media have changed the way of communication and interaction between the organizations and the costumers. The huge merge of social media has led the companies to change their current marketing strategies into the use of social media marketing during the last years. An increasing number of companies adopt this kind of performance and there is a need to study this phenomenon more in depth and explore it through the perspective of strategic renewal. Purpose The purpose of this thesis is to analyze and explore to the phenomenon of strategic renewal through social media marketing. The authors will explore into the challenges and opportunities of strategic renewal through social media marketing in companies located in Swedish rural areas. Method Social media marketing is considered a new phenomenon. The studies held, do not examine social media marketing through a strategic renewal perspective and how rural area companies located in rural areas in Sweden face the challenges and opportunities occurred. Therefore, an abductive approach and case study method were chosen for this research. 7 companies were chosen as the interviewed companies. Within this research primary data were collected through semi- structured interviews with the investigated companies. Conclusion The authors have found that, the interviewed companies pursue strategic renewal through social media marketing, but they do not consider this strategy as the main one but as a complementary one. As a result, certain challenges are emerged, and the investigated companies should face and integrate them to the opportunities generated from this kind of strategic renewal. This will lead to a better performance of the companies since pursuing strategic renewal through social media marketing can help in every factor of the company making them competitive and able to stand out.

Facebook has over 665 million users worldwide and has created a new venue for companies to interact with their stakeholders. However, since it is a new phenomenon it brings some uncertainty and confusion as how to manage the communication on Facebook, and it is only recently that research and literature has become available on this topic. The purpose of this study is to investigate how three chosen companies within the travel industry communicate on Facebook. We also compare the results to the existing literature to see how they can improve from a theoretical point of view. We thereby hope to shed a light on, and add knowledge to, a research area where we have identified weaknesses. In order to fulfill our purpose, we used a quantitative content analysis as well as qualitative interviews. The major findings in our study on Facebook communication include a lack of strategy and target audience awareness, as well as a self-centered communication. These weaknesses are most likely related to the fact that the companies‟ existence on Facebook is still relatively new, and they have not yet fully adapted to the properties and possibilities therein.

The current recession has made it difficult for companies to find customers and therefore tofinance their business which often leads to cuts in the marketing budget. Social mediamarketing could be the solution in these situations. The purpose of this study is to investigatehow marketing efforts in social media, specifically in blogs and Facebook, can be successfulin attracting consumers and also retain customers over time for start-up companies. This wasexamined through interviews with two recently started retail companies along with consumersurveys in these companies’ target markets. The paper has shown that Facebook is moreefficient than blogs and that social media is effective in spreading word-of-mouth andcommunicating with customers. The conclusion of this study is that Facebook is an effectivetool for start-up companies, both to reach new consumers and also to retain current customers.

<p><strong><p>Background</p><p>In Sweden almost 90% of businesses are micro in nature which plays a pivotal role in the economy by generating employment opportunities as well as serving a source of instilling entrepreneurial spirit and innovation. Due to their invaluable contributions to the economy, their survival through revenue generating marketing practices has become an area of much more interest than ever realized before. A common misconception prevalent is that marketing in micro businesses is just a miniature of larger enterprises. This is why earlier researchers have paid scarce treatment to marketing practices in micro businesses as evident from the scant published material on the topic, making it an intriguing area to study. Currently much hype has been created about social media applications like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc and their marketing value for small businesses. It is therefore, in this thesis we study social media and prevalent marketing practices in the context of micro business.</p><strong><p>Purpose</p><p>Micro firms are often cash-strapped which limits their revenue generating ability through prevalent marketing practices which are resource intensive. In the back drop of all the hype about social media as a marketing tool we got the clue to find the right marketing approaches for these businesses regarding the choice of prevalent practices and social media as a new marketing tool. To achieve this purpose, we have formulated the following research questions.RQ1.Which of the two types of marketing is more effective in terms of targeted segment coverage and expenditures? RQ2.Which marketing approach enables micro firms to maintain better relationships with customers? RQ3.Whether or not it is the right time for micro firms in Sweden to adopt social media marketing practices?</p><strong><p>Method</p><p>A qualitative approach has been used to achieve the exploratory purpose of the thesis. Overall; eight micro firms were chosen from a convenience sample, representing different regions and industries of Sweden. In the first phase, two pilot semi-structured interviews were conducted to attain a better understanding of the phenomenon under study. Later, six more semi-structured interviews were carried out from micro businesses representing different sectors in Skövde, Mariestad and Jönköping Counties.</p><strong><p>Conclusion</p><p>This thesis suggests that micro businesses are mostly marketing weak organizations (MWO) as they are sales oriented and see marketing as more of a luxury. Micro businesses in the sample reveal a tendency to carry out marketing activities in a haphazard manner which limits their likelihood of achieving their targets. It has also been indicated that conventional approach to reach target segments, still has a strong effect on micro firms in Sweden and is therefore more</p><p>appropriate for them as majority of their customers are geographically concentrated as well as a major strata of these are yet to start active participation on the social media landscape. In terms of costs social media</p><p>Given, the small population of Sweden, it has also been showed that micro businesses are keeping good customer relationship with customers via word-of-mouth marketing which is considered as instrumental for success of majority of micro business. At the same time, this finding does not indicate any clear picture as to which form of marketing is doing better for these businesses.</p><p>In terms of social media adoption the findings indicate that micro businesses see social media as a great marketing opportunity in which micro businesses can compete on a level playing field with their larger counterparts. This study also concludes that social media is in infancy stages of its development in Sweden as people though they are present on the social media landscape, but have not yet, thought of it as a mainstream marketing channel. Therefore, it is suggested that micro firms in Sweden need to adpot a</p>(high volume, low expense) is more effective only when used in tandem with conventional marketing (low volume, high expense) approaches. It is therefore suggested that micro businesses can use a blend of social and conventional marketing practices till the time that the social media network externalizes to a greater extent. wait and see approach for the time being and start preparing to capitalize on social media soon when it becomes ripe and ready for marketing. </strong></strong></strong></strong></p>

This study explores how consumer’s attitudes towards consumer-generated advertising (CGA) have changed over time. The study measures consumer attitude changes of the winning contributions from Doritos Crash the Super bowl between the years 2007-2014 on YouTube. The study conducted in total 995 comments that was analysed with Leximancer Software, a research tool for making content analysis to determining the presence of words or concepts in collections of textual documents. Findings didn’t show a distinct change of consumer’s attitudes towards CGA over time. The study gave extended knowledge about consumers attitudes towards CGA and what factors that contribute to positive attitudes towards CGA. Were three main factors was notice, first, the fact that they managed to do an ad on a very low budget seemed to impress other consumers. Second, consumers had a tendency to defend CGA when the ad was criticized. Third, the fact that a company did not make the ad was impressive for many of the viewers.

The last years technological developments have lead to significant improvements in Internet usage, availability and the way people interact online. Recent statistics show how Internet and foremost social media usage increases rapidly, which have been noticed by companies, increasing their presence on social media platforms as well. Previous research has extensively been conducted within the area of social media marketing. However, the focus has mainly been put on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and social media platforms in general. The purpose of this qualitative thesis is to get a deeper understanding of how companies currently make use of the social media platform Instagram for marketing purposes and activities. Moreover, the thesis aims to investigate companies’ awareness and concern regarding their potential reach of 12-15 year olds on Instagram. The thesis aims to provide new insights that can be added to contemporary research within the field of social media marketing. The research question of concern is: How do companies make use of Instagram as a marketing tool? Semi-structured interviews were conducted on seven marketers working for Swedish companies present on Instagram. The empirical findings were analysed and presented through the different building blocks in Kietzmann et al., (2011) Honeycomb of social media, which worked as a foundational skeleton to the study. Other relevant theories were additionally compared with the empirical findings and four themes or approaches were determined. Two main, and one minor theme or approaches of how companies make use of Instagram as a marketing tool were determined. The first approach of Instagram marketing includes companies that we have chosen to call the “rookies”. They are relatively new to Instagram and/or have not been distinctively active in the way they interact on the platform. The rookies share characteristic of being in an experimental stage, trying to find their optimal usage of Instagram. The second approach of Instagram marketing includes companies that we have chosen to call the “Oldies”. A characteristic identified among these companies is a rather extensive Instagram experience, gained either through long-term presence or through distinct active presence during a shorter period of time. However, Company 4 could not be included in any of the above-identified approaches, as their marketing tendencies on Instagram follow a slightly different character. Their specific approach of Instagram marketing belongs to what we have chosen to call “The exception”. It was moreover brought to surface that the interviewed marketers seemed to have no ethical concern regarding the increasingly present 12-15 year olds on Instagram, as they do not believe they reach this group of young users. The final conclusion is how all of these approaches generate from the fact that Instagram is new platform where companies are learning by doing how to best make use of the unique characteristics of Instagram. We would like to encourage firms planning to create an Instagram account to embrace some of these characteristics. 1. The real-time aspect; Instagram users feed constantly updates with the latest content, creates an excellent opportunity for marketers to promote goods and products at a relevant and specific point in time. 2. Hashtags; as Instagram allow for little statistical information we argue that hashtags are great tools for reaching out to specific customer groups. By using hashtags connected to certain topics of interest among ones targeted users, companies can arguably attain enhanced customer interest.

Influencer marketing has become a significant marketing tool for companies since the profession as an influencer is emerging. Especially on Instagram as it is one of the biggest social media platforms for influencers. This results in a change for followers also being consumers since more products are being marketed through Instagram. Further, the easy access of mobile devices makes it effortless to purchase products endorsed by influencers. Previous research exists about Influencer marketing, m-shopping and impulse buying behavior. However, an opportunity was found to study the relation of these. Thus, this paper focus on investigating factors on consumers mobile impulse buying behavior affected by influencers, in the context of Instagram. The purpose of this thesis was to investigate influencers impact on consumers mobile impulse buying behavior, analyzing through the social media platform of Instagram. A study with mixed method research design was conducted to carry out the purpose of this thesis. The qualitative data was collected through semi-structured interviews with the aim to discover in what way Instagram influencers affect consumers mobile impulse buying behavior. The themes and codes acquired from the findings of the qualitative study were tested with a questionnaire through a quantitative study, this to identify which factors impact the consumer’s mobile impulse buying behavior the from Instagram influencers. The empirical evidence suggests that the Relation to influencers content, Perception of influencer, Conscious spontaneous purchase and Cause of purchase are factors that have an impact on consumers mobile impulse buying behavior by influencers on Instagram. The empirical evidence further implies an influential process between the different factors. Tough, it was not tested how they were related as the study did not aim to compare the interrelation between the factors.

The growth of the Internet and social media has led to companies considering the use of influencers in sponsorships and collaborations on Instagram. The subject has been problematized and the gap found is a need for a framework combining different factors when identifying influencers, which resulted in the following research question; From both a company- and consumer perspective, which factors are important to take into account when identifying an influencer for sponsorships and collaborations on Instagram? The purpose is first to identify and incorporate important factors discussed in previous research into a proposed framework, which aims to be used when identifying influencers to sponsor on Instagram. Second, after conducting the empirical research, the framework is extended depending on the new collected information. Background theories and concepts that lay the foundation to influencer marketing are presented. Also, previous frameworks regarding identification of influencers are introduced. The theoretical framework chapter is concluded with a proposed framework alongside introducing the factors. Abductive research strategy is used as well as a method triangulation, using both a qualitative and a quantitative approach. The study is an explorative research due to conducting both a documentary analysis and a questionnaire. The factors studied have shown to be of different importance for companies and consumers. The findings indicate that there are multiple types of influencers. The Updated influencer identification model consists of seven important factors; ideal, trust, popularity, productivity, managing sponsorships and collaborations, information content and visual aspect.

On Valentine’s day 2018, Swedish watchmaker Daniel Wellington posted a photo of a gay male couple followed by a caption celebrating the love between the two subjects. The photo was posted to the brand’s Instagram account reaching an audience of four million followers. The brand’s followers responded with great amounts of engagement ranging from excitement and support for featuring a same-sex couple, to almost equal amounts homophobic disapproval. This thesis, a case study of Daniel Wellington’s social media and social media staff, examines the effects of including same-sex couples in social media marketing. Previous research on LGBTQ+ representation in advertising has identified the polarizing reactions same-sex couples in marketing usually evoke. Using existing literature on the subject as a theoretical framework, this thesis analyzes the effects of including two photos of same-sex couples, one male-male couple and one female-female couple, in Daniel Wellington’s Instagram account. A statistical analysis of the reactions to these photos on Instagram will be followed by interviews with the brand’s social media staff in order to explore the corporate response to the reactions to the social media representations of same-sex couples. This thesis will suggest, partially in line with previous research, that the social media content featuring same-sex couples created a lot of engagement among its followers, with comparatively high levels of polarization. The data identified a significant difference between how the gay male couple and the same-sex female couple were evaluated. Additionally, the interviews with the social media staff suggest that, despite the high levels of negative reactions, including same-sex couples in their social media channels did not have a deterring effect on their commitment to include more types of diversity in the brand’s social media feeds. The interviews with the social media staff indicate that the experience of including same-sex couples in the brand’s social media marketing efforts had the effect of raising awareness of issues of homophobia among the staff members.

Building a corporate brand is as a crucial resource for the survival of companies. Social media as a tool for branding practices has been emphasized in research about startups. In such research, less focus is on certain groups of startups, such as Knowledge-intensive startups (KI Startups). This is peculiar as such startups differ in societal contributions and how they are constituted. Thus, as social media branding practices might enhance the survival rate, it is important to extend this research about KI startups.    The purpose of this thesis is to understand how and why KI startups in Sweden use social media to build their corporate brands in regards of four different branding elements.   The thesis has an exploratory and interpretivist philosophy with an abductive approach. A qualitative method was chosen to collect the empirical data. Firstly, a pilot study which contained a questionnaire was sent to a sample of KI startups to attain an initial understanding of the field. Secondly, semi-structured interviews with six KI startups were conducted for a main study.   The findings indicate that the interviewed KI startups use social media to build brand awareness, influence and engage customers, attract new employees, and to build reputation. The findings also indicate that some KI startups use social media to attain a credible and knowledgeable brand perception.    Our findings may help other KI startups when choosing a social media channel, and what content to post in the brand building process. Suggestions for further research are a similar, but more extensive study in Sweden, or a study in a country that is different to Sweden.