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A study on Impact of Social Media Marketing in Business

with special reference to HT Media
INTRODUCTION :
Past decade has been a golden period for communication technology development.
With the widespread of internet, people have almost instant access to all the
information around the globe. New technologies are evolving everyday and shaping the way
world communicates; Web 2.0 is one of them. It has given people power to communicate,
express opinion and mold the information flow the way they want.
In words of Lee and Bernoff (2008, p.1)- Customers are writing about your (companies)
products on blogs and re-cutting commercials on YouTube. Theyre defining you (company
brand) on Wikipedia and ganging up on you (company) on social networking sites
like Facebook that has created a permanent shift in the way the world works.
Here it is worth mentioning that technology is just an enabler and ever-changing but the key
elements which will always remain dominant are people and their urge to socialize.
It gives rise to another media- Social Media, which though have some similarities
with traditional mass media, is different in many aspects. In past few years social
media has become the hottest topic in marketing arena. Big companies like IKEA, IBM,
Hyundai, HSBC, Ford, Dell, BskyB, AT&T, Apple and many more along with American
Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, have produced success stories of harnessing
power of social media for communication and marketing purposes .For small
businesses it is said to be a boon as most of the social media itself is free of cost
for use and if utilized effectively can prove to be sales driving goldmine for small
businesses. But, unfortunately there is a clear shortage of academic literature defining
social media and answering questions like how it can be used in marketing? What should be the
strategy? How to implement?
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Social networking has become an integral part of the fabric of our culture. The sheer numbers
of social sites users is the main reason why business owners should consider developing a solid
social networking strategy to market their brand on the social network. However, social
networking sites holds potential for brand promotion and need to be integrated into a
business social networking marketing strategy. Social networks allow businesses to interact
with customers and potential customers in real time. Obtaining valuable brand feedback via a
cost effective medium is a resource that businesses dare not ignore or shy away from. In
addition, savvy businesses are expected to have a presence on social networks. Users view a
social networking presence as necessary and relevant. Developing a social networking
marketing strategy is not difficult. Businesses need to take one step at a time to develop a
presence on the leading social networks.
Social networking marketing refers to the process of gaining website traffic or attention
through social media sites. Social media marketing programs usually centre on efforts to
create content that attracts attention and encourages readers to share it with their social
networks. A corporate message spreads from user to user and presumably resonates because
it appears to come from a trusted, third-party source, as opposed to the brand or company
itself. Hence, this form of marketing is driven by word-of-mouth, meaning it results in earned
media rather than paid media. Increased communication for organizations fosters brand
awareness and often, improved customer service.

Social media is currently an evolving phenomena in business marketing. Enlightened
Marketers are beginning to drive the use of social media as a component in their marketing
strategy and campaigns to reach out to customers and fans. Among the sub disciplines of
marketing that may utilize social media include promotions, marketing intelligence,
sentiments research, public relations, marketing communications and product and customer
management. Social media is described as the shift in how people discover, read and share
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news, information and content. This has been made possible through converging
technological evolutions on the internet, dubbed Web 2.0, the internet as a 2-way
communication platform. Particularly the internet facilitates the spread of information across
geographies and boundaries. However, social media has also proven to be a handful for
companies. This has been a critical factor in the success of viral marketing campaigns
launched by businesses.
The growth of social media is nothing but extraordinary and in a little over 8 years
Facebook has gone from a small website set up by 4 Harvard students, to the most frequently
used website on the planet. In parallel, Twitter has grown from a means of communication for
employees working within a pod-casting company back in 2006, to generating over 50 million
tweets every single day in 2012. Just recently, social media made big news when it surpassed
email in terms of the number one online activity.

Social Media Marketing is about recognizing that your existing customers are your best assets
and technology now enables us to influence consumer behavior both before and after the
sale. With low-cost and easy-to-use tools like social media and email, one no longer
has to hope that customers come back and bring their friends with them. Now we can reach
out to our existing customers to remind them to come back, and make word-of-mouth as easy
as clicking the share, like, or tweet buttons.





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Review of Literature
If you are open to trying out new things, you can be first in your industry to use
something new to communicate to your buyers.

Marketing in some social networking websites are still the most popular in their niche.
Shih (2009) says that there are hundreds of millions of active users across sites like Face
book, Hi5, Orkut and MySpace. 2.6 billion min are spent on Face book each day. These
websites are enabling brands to engage the right people in the right conversation at right
time. Marketing the brands through social media is becoming precise, personal,
interesting, interactive and social.

Weber (2009) says promoting a community is just like as promoting a new brand
product or service to the consumers. Social media is used to communicate people in the
promotional aspect and inclined to involve the people. Traditional advertising and direct
marketing in social media is to send people to the digital community to be informed,
entertained and heard. Users find appealing, a value high enough to encourage them to
participate.

Borges (2009) finds that today's buyers want to be engaged differently than in years past
and many traditional marketing tactics simply do not work anymore. Social media
marketing is a revolutionary way to build solid relationships with buyers. Low cost,
brand building, staffing advantages, loyalty and level playing field are key benefits of
social networking sites as a successful marketing media.

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Internet: where from it came, where is it going?
Internet is no doubt the most revolutionary invention of last century. It began in 1968
as an initiative by Advance Research Projects Agency (ARPAnet) of Department of
Defense to connect different university computers. Today NSF net (a broken wing of
ARPAnet) and commercially available backbone services together form what
we know as Internet. (Westphal and Towell, 1998). It is the worlds largest collection of
decentralized computer networks which is made of millions of private and
public networks scoping from government, business, academics and others.
This system uses standard protocols (TCP/IP) for data transfer, authentication and error
detection. According to (Westphal and Towell,1998) it is the most democratic
part of the cyberspace which is relatively open, low cost and provides information on
everything imaginable. In last one decade Internet has shown tremendous
growth worldwide, much more than any other sector or technology. According to
latest Internet World Stats (June 2009 data), today 1.6 billion people use
internet, which is 24.7% of the world population.
World Internet Penetration Rates

Source: Internet World States 2012- http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm
Talking about India in particular, there are 120,000,000 Internet users as of
Nov/12, 13.0% penetration, per ITU (Internet world states, June 2012 data). Although
this penetration rate is quite low as compared to other western nations, it is growing at
fast pace. In urban cities like Delhi much higher is this rate and consumers
(especially youth) spends hours on internet (Delhi-TCS Survey). Reasons of such rapid
acceptance of internet differ from time period to time period. Factors which used to
encourage people to use internet in 1996 would be obsolete by 2010, but then there
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would be different driving forces pulling new users towards fascinating
world of internet. eTForecast lists the driving forces then and now.
E-commerce and online interactivity :
Anderson (1999) cited in Cox and Dale (2001) defines E-commerce as ``the conduct
of business among e-enterprises and consumers''. Any business enterprise which has
capability of exchanging money, goods, services or/and information
electronically might be considered as e-enterprise in the above definition. Internet has
provided companies a robust means of spreading there scope of business
beyond the imagination. Linda Peters (1998) affirms that, the Web, if seen from the
traditional communication channel perspective is both Market and Medium. It creates a
market space for selling and also serves the medium of exchange. More and more
websites are popping up every single second and new ways of conducting businesses
online are being explored. Following table shows that more than 111 M websites are
active presently.

Literature related to Online interactivity
This revolution in communication has changed the behavior of people. Internet has
provided multiple ways of Communication and above all this communication is free and
instant. Online people are connected to one another at all the time and
can communicate their message across the globe without practically paying any money.
Constantinides (2008) claims that internet has become daily reality for over a billion of
users worldwide because it offers following advantages-
Transparency and abundant information: It provides easy, fast and inexpensive
information about businesses, products, persons and service which is necessary
to make informed purchasing decisions.
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More alternatives and choice: Buyer can choose products/services from
around the world sitting in his/her home and engage in any transactional
conversation.
Easy contacts and business deals: Transactions can be made with a click of mouse.
The public trust in online commerce is increasing and the confidence in online payments
is higher than ever before.

Control over the transaction process: The buyer has absolute control on all processes
leading to commercial transactions (information search, product comparison,
purchasing, delivery, payment) without intervention of intermediaries.
Furthermore, the consumer is able to influence other fellow consumers who are
interested in similar products .




















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CHAPTER - 2








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Company Profile:
HT Media found its beginning in 1924 when its flagship newspaper, Hindustan Times was
inaugurated by Mahatma Gandhi. HT Media (BSE, NSE) has today grown to become one of
India's largest media companies.
Produced by an editorial team known for its quality, innovation and integrity, Hindustan Times
(English newspaper) and Hindustan (Hindi newspaper through a subsidiary Hindustan Media
Ventures Limited),Hindustan Times is the choice for nearly 3.7 million readers across India,
who turn to it daily for news, information, analysis and entertainment. Hindustan, the group's
Hindi daily, continues to be the second-largest daily in the country with a total readership of
36.6 million,(based 0n Indian Readership Survey (IRS) for the first quarter (Q1) of 2011. Both
dailies enjoy a strong brand recognition among readers as well as advertisers.
In addition to Hindustan Times, HT Media also publishes a national business newspaper, Mint.
Mint is a one-of-its-kind newspaper in the sense that the company has an exclusive agreement
with the Wall Street Journal to publish Journal-branded news and information in India. Mint is
today the second-largest business newspaper in India with presence in the key markets of Delhi,
Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Pune, Kolkata and now Ahmedabad too.
HT Media has also made its foray into electronic media. Diversifying its ambit of operations,
the company in a consulting partnership with Virgin Radio, has launched the FM radio channel
- Fever 104. Currently available in Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Kolkata, Fever 104 has
established a strong presence as being one of the most vibrant channels on air. In a short span,
the channel's rise has been meteoric considering its position in Mumbai and Bengaluru at No. 1
and in Delhi as the No. 2 station on the popularity charts.
Internet businesses of HT Media incorporated under Firefly e-ventures, operate leading web
portals Hindustantimes.com and livemint.com in the general and business news categories
respectively. The company's job portal Shine.com which has received high appreciation from
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consumers and industry for its innovative design and usability crossed 7 million
registrations. Desimartini.com -a platform to discover and express oneself on movies. The
company also has an education portal www.HTCampus.com aimed at students passing out of
school and college to help them take the right decision about their higher education.

While the overall economy continued to face constraints, our diversification strategy kept us in
good stead. On a consolidated basis, our Total Revenue reached Rs 2,142 Crore in FY2013,
driven Print Advertising Revenues at Rs 1,529 Crore, Circulation Revenues at Rs 223 Crore and
Radio Revenues at Rs 78 Cr. Digital revenues also contributed to revenue growth and reached
Rs 54 Cr in FY2013. EBITDA improved to Rs 376 Crore in FY2013 and EBITDA margin
improved to 18% from 17% in FY2012 mainly due to strict cost control initiatives.
HT Media Limited is a mammoth player in the Indian print media industry. The extent of its
presence is undisputed as it is leading the English newspaper market in North India and
occupies second place in the Hindi newspaper market in North and East India. The group now
intends to further consolidate its already established position as a dynamic media powerhouse.
The group has diversified itself across different media to captivate a wider range of consumers
and businesses. Hindustan Times, the flagship publication of the group, inaugurated by
Mahatma Gandhi in 1924, is a name to reckon with in today's times. It is ensconced in the
minds of people as a newspaper of editorial excellence and integrity. Hindustan Times, Delhi, is
Indias largest single-edition daily. Riding on the phenomenal success of the newspaper in
Delhi, Hindustan Times made a successful entry into the commercial capital of India Mumbai,
in July 2005.
HT Medias Hindi daily, Hindustan, has been growing phenomenally. In addition to high-
quality reportage, Hindustan aspires to become an ally to its readers in their quest for success.
The ambition for the brand is to become a partner in the progress of the youth across the Hindi
belt. HT Media launched a national business newspaper Mint, in February 2007 with an
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exclusive agreement with Wall Street Journal to publish Journal-branded news and information
in India. As part of an aggressive growth strategy to build a robust Internet business, Firefly e-
ventures was launched as an HT Media company, recognizing the importance of Internet as the
most important media vehicle of the future. Firefly portfolio consists of Desimartini.com, and
runs Shine.com for jobseekers and employers. The registrations on Shine.com have crossed 7
million. Firefly also launched an education portal, HTCampus.com, the target audience being
students graduating from schools and colleges to help them with their decisions regarding
higher education.
The group's news portal Hindustantimes.com, with over 10 million unique visitors and 100
million page views per month, is one of the largest news portals in the country. It has
consistently been ranked amongst the top 10 news sites in the world by Forbes and offers in-
depth coverage and analysis to its users.
The business news website, livemint.com covers business and related news in India as well as
across the world. livemint.com is the integrated offering with Mint. It combines the editorial
strength of Mint with a best-in-class web interface and a selection of online tools that aid the
users to stay abreast with the developments in the business world as well as help them with
investments.
As part of its expansion into electronic media, HT Media, in consulting partnership with Virgin
Radio, entered the FM radio market in key Indian cities with its channel Fever 104, which has
grown to become the No. 2 channel in Delhi in a span of just two years.
The groups business - "Strategic Partnerships" - is dedicated to cater to the advertising needs of
growth companies by providing them a cashless form of advertising and building up their
brands thereby enhancing the value of the business. This division identifies growth companies
and enters into strategic partnerships with them. The overall objective is to create a strategic
platform wherein different companies can come together and benefit with the synergies of
partnering with each other.
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Industry profile:
Social media is the social interaction among people in which they create, share or exchange
information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. Andreas Kaplan and Michael
Haenlein define social media as "A group of Internet-based applications that build on the
ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange
of user-generated content". Furthermore, social media depend on mobile and web-based
technologies to create highly interactive platforms through which individuals and communities
share, co-create, discuss, and modify user-generated content. They introduce substantial and
pervasive changes to communication between organizations, communities, and individuals.
Social media differ from traditional or industrial media in many ways, including quality, reach,
frequency, usability, immediacy, and permanence. There are many effects that stem from
internet usage. According to Nielsen, internet users continue to spend more time with social
media sites than any other type of site. At the same time, the total time spent on social media in
the U.S. across PC and mobile devices increased by 37 percent to 121 billion minutes in July
2012 compared to 88 billion minutes in July 2011. For content contributors, the benefits of
participating in social media have gone beyond simply social sharing to building reputation and
bringing in career opportunities and monetary income, as discussed in Tang, Gu, and Whinston
(2012).
Geocities, created in 1994, was one of the first social media sites. The concept was for users to
create their own websites, characterized by one of six "cities" that were known for certain
characteristics
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E-commerce businesses may refer to social media as consumer-generated media (CGM). A
common thread running through all definitions of social media is a blending of technology and
social interaction for the co-creation of value.
[5]

People obtain information, education, news, and other data from electronic and print media.
Social media are distinct from industrial or traditional media such as newspapers, television,
and film as they are comparatively inexpensive and accessible. They enable anyone (even
private individuals) to publish or access information. Industrial media generally require
significant resources to publish information as in most cases the articles goes through many
revisions before being published.
One characteristic shared by both social and industrial media is the capability to reach small or
large audiences; for example, either a blog post or a television show may reach no people or
millions of people. Some of the properties that help describe the differences between social and
industrial media are:
1. Quality: In industrial (traditional) publishing-mediated by a publisher-the typical range
of quality is substantially narrower than in niche, unmediated markets. The main
challenge posed by content in social media sites is the fact that the distribution of
quality has high variance: from very high-quality items to low-quality, sometimes
abusive content.
[4]

2. Reach: Both industrial and social media technologies provide scale and are capable of
reaching a global audience. Industrial media, however, typically use a centralized
framework for organization, production, and dissemination, whereas social media are
by their very nature more decentralized, less hierarchical, and distinguished by multiple
points of production and utility.
[5]

3. Frequency: The number of times an advertisement is displayed on social media
platforms.
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4. Accessibility: The means of production for industrial media are typically government
and/or corporate (privately owned); social media tools are generally available to the
public at little or no cost.
5. Usability: Industrial media production typically requires specialized skills and training.
Conversely, most social media production requires only modest reinterpretation of
existing skills; in theory, anyone with access can operate the means of social media
production.
6. Immediacy: The time lag between communications produced by industrial media can
be long (days, weeks, or even months) compared to social media (which can be capable
of virtually instantaneous responses).
7. Permanence: Industrial media, once created, cannot be altered (once a magazine article
is printed and distributed, changes cannot be made to that same article) whereas social
media can be altered almost instantaneously by comments or editing.
[5]










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Community media constitute a hybrid of industrial and social media. Though community-
owned, some community radio, TV, and newspapers are run by professionals and some by
amateurs. They use both social and industrial media frameworks.
Social media have also been recognized for the way they have changed how public relations
professionals conduct their jobs. They have provided an open arena where people are free to
exchange ideas on companies, brands, and products. As stated by Doc Searls and David
Wagner, two authorities on the effects of Internet on marketing, advertising, and PR, "The best
of the people in PR are not PR types at all. They understand that there aren't censors, they're the
company's best conversationalists."
[13]
Social media provides an environment where users and
PR professionals can converse, and where PR professionals can promote their brand and
improve their company's image by listening and responding to what the public is saying about
their product.











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Chapter 3:










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Research Design:
REASERCH DESIGN:
Research design is the plan, structure and strategy of investigation conceived so as to obtain
answer to research questions and to control variance (Kerliner, 1973). The choice of research
design depends on the specific research problem and research setting. In fact, the research
design is the conceptual structure within which research is conducted; it constitute blueprint for
the collection, measurement and analysis of data. (Kothari, 1996). The process of designing a
research study involves many interrelated decision. The most significant is the choice of
research approach, because it determines how information will be obtained. (Aaker, Kumar &
day, 2002). The design includes an outline of what the researcher will do, from writing
hypothesis and its operational implication to the final analysis of the data. The study is an
empirical one based on primary data. The data required for the study was collected from both
primary and secondary sources. Secondary data required for the study was collected from media
houses, industry association reports, journal, websites and other published literature.

Statement of the problem:
Todays world the Social networking sites are helping the companies to increase
trust worthiness and goodwill that will definitely yield in ROI and companies are able
to have conversations with their customers on a continous basis and social media
marketing is also helping the company in lead generation. Social media is also
helping in retaining a companys existing customers and increasing brand credibility.
So the statement of the Problem is A study on Impact of Social Media Marketing in
Business with special reference to HT Media

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Research Type:
Exploratory research is research conducted for a problem that has not been clearly defined. It
often occurs before we know enough to make conceptual distinctions or posit an explanatory
relationship. Exploratory research helps determine the best research design, data
collection method and selection of subjects. It should draw definitive conclusions only with
extreme caution. Given its fundamental nature, exploratory research often concludes that a
perceived problem does not actually exist.
Exploratory research often relies on secondary research such as reviewing available literature
and/or data, or qualitative approaches such as informal discussions with consumers, employees,
management or competitors, and more formal approaches through in-depth interviews, focus
groups, projective methods, case studies or pilot studies. The Internet allows for research
methods that are more interactive in nature. For example, RSS feeds efficiently supply
researchers with up-to-date information; major search engine search results may be sent
by email to researchers by services such as Google Alerts; comprehensive search results are
tracked over lengthy periods of time by services such as Google Trends; and websites may be
created to attract worldwide feedback on any subject.

Objectives of the Study:

To understand the importance of social media in todays Business world
To analyze the perception of clients towards the Social Media
To know the reasons to choose social media as a promotional tool.
To understand the responsiveness of clients towards Social Media.
To understand cost benefit advantage of social Media.

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Sampling Unit:
The sample includes only those respondents who are 18 years and above. The sampling
procedure used for the Study will be convenience sampling as in questionnaires are
administered to the clients of HT media Only.

Research Type: Exploratory research

Sample size: Since the universe constitutes a large numbers people who could be the readers of
the newspaper, appropriate sampling technique was required to have the right sample
representative of the population from which meaningful conclusion could be drawn. Total of
150 respondents are are taken as the sample size for this study.

Research Instrument:
Questionnaire method Interviewing will be done in the form of face-face interviews with the
help of Open ended question and Closed ended question. Most of questions are in likert scale.
The questionnaires consist of a set of questions, asked to the respondent for his/her response.

Tools for analysis:

In order to analyze the consumer preference of respondents, the following tables of analysis
were used to obtain the various objectives of the study.

Percentage analysis
Percentage refers to a special kind of ratio percentages are used in making comparing between
preferences, awareness and satisfaction with various other factors.



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DATA COLLECTION/SOURCE OF DATA
Primary data required for the study was collected by means of structured schedule administered
questionnaire to the identified sample in Bangalore. These discussion were critical in
developing direction for the study and design of data collection plan. The primary data required
for the study was collected from the decision makers of various companies who are doing
business with HT media Limited.
SECONDORY DATA
Secondary information regarding the different types of newspaper published, circulation, reach
of different media, and advertising expenditure in different were collected from a number of
sources vis. Newspapers, magazines, books, journals, IRS reports and reports from different
Media houses. The magazines and journal like Journal of marketing, journal of Advertising,
Communication Research, Economics, Advertising World, Harvard Business Review.
Collection of secondary data from IIM Bangalore, Central Library Bangalore, Departmental
library of Journalism and Mass communication Jain and Christ university also found very useful
for the research work. Electronic database like PROQUEST, EBSCO & J-GATE made this
research work rich in terms of literature review and problem formulation.
Chapter Scheme:
Chapter








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Limitation:
The main hindrance behind preparing this paper was time. Since it is a vast area, it is
not possible to cover or go through within this short span of time. Other limitations are:

One of the major limitation of this paper is the lack of adequate data,

In this paper there are only secondary sources of data and no primary to incorporate a
better view.
Relevant documents were not available as it is a technical issue.
Omission and error may be there due to lack of experience in preparing a paper based
on this topic.
Not many researchers have been conducted in Bangladesh in the field of social
networking marketing strategy formulation.
Lack of experience and limited knowledge about the concerned topic.
Inaccurate or Contradictory information created huge confusion.










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