Social Media Marketing in the B2B Framework: History
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Contributor:
João M. Lopes
,
José Castro Oliveira

Nowadays, human live in the age of Marketing 4.0. Historically, marketing has often depended on changing consumer habits and needs. Thus, it is necessary to understand the new habits and needs of the consumer to make companies more and more effective. Currently, social media marketing (SMM) is ubiquitous in organizations, and is seen as a tool to achieve strategic goals. Therefore, SMM is important for companies to adapt their approach to customer relationship management and advance new marketing competencies to enable customer satisfaction. To drive customer satisfaction and improve customer experience, managers are loading social media applications into their current customer relationship management (CRM) systems.

  • customer relationship management (CRM)
  • customer knowledge management (CKM)
  • social media marketing (SMM)

1. Introduction

Researchers currently live in the Marketing 4.0 era in which online channels are beginning to dominate marketing globally. As such, digital marketing goes beyond the traditional marketing concept, making its role more strategic and global [1][2][3]. Currently, customers are playing an active role in co-creating the value of a brand of a company and its co-innovation [4]. Thus, customer loyalty and maintenance are key components for any company, creating a strong need for customer relationship management (CRM). In addition, and according to Bakhtieva [1], the growth of ubiquitous and multichannel marketing pushes touchpoints to the center of a digital marketing strategy. As a result, companies need to reassess the previous understanding of a product or service portfolio in the company’s external and internal environment.
A digital marketing strategy requires a clear understanding of a product, company and industry-specific factors [5][6]. The arrival of Web 2.0 technologies and related applications, such as social media (SM) tools, has sharply reshaped companies’ business landscape and management processes, allowing more direct and interactive forms of communication in which users play an active role [6]. It also allows the creating and sharing of content related to brands and products [7].
According to Kaplan and Haenlein [8], social media are defined as internet-based applications built on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0 which enable the creation and exchange of user-created content. Huotari et al. [9] elaborated an additional concept, arguing that social media are digital communication platforms and services that allow parties to connect, share information, participate in dialogues and in which organizations and individuals develop and share content and messages for the organization, engaging participants and interacting with others, thus contributing to their discussions. In the line of thought of these authors, this definition emphasizes the key elements of social media, namely technology and its applications, online content, the active role played by users, digital-based social networks and relationships, as well as the opportunities for contact and engagement. Social media and social media marketing became the expression method for the 21st century, allowing people to communicate their choices, thoughts, and ideas in a totally new manner [10]. Social media marketing (SMM) refers to the actual use of social media applications for marketing purposes [11]. Several applications can serve as SMM channels to provide and promote services, including blogs and social networks, e.g., Facebook; LinkedIn; YouTube; Twitter; Pinterest; and Instagram [12].
Nowadays, social media marketing is omnipresent in today’s organizations as a tool to achieve strategic objectives; on the other hand, SMM is important for companies to adapt their approach to customer relationship management and advance new marketing competencies to enable customer satisfaction [13]. To attain and improve customer experience and satisfaction, managers are loading social media applications into their current CRM systems [14]. Thus, it is important to study SMM and CRM in B2B companies in different contexts [6].
This entry seeks to understand the feasibility of implementing social media marketing (SMM) in B2B companies and how this affects customer relationship management (CRM) and customer knowledge management (CKM). In this follow up, researchers formulate the following research question (RQ): is it feasible to implement SMM in B2B companies? For the study, data were collected from two Portuguese micro-enterprises. The case study focuses on three elements, namely customer relationship management, social media marketing, and the integration of these two points in B2B companies, to obtain a holistic view of a digital marketing strategy in the context of the companies under analysis.
Studies that address these three themes (SMM, CRM, and CKM) simultaneously in micro-enterprises are scarce. New consumer habits and needs force companies to incorporate new tools to increase customer engagement. It was found that SMM cannot be used in the B2B companies under investigation because CRM needs are much more dependent on CKM than on the mass interactions and indirect communication with the customer that can potentially exist in SMM.

2. Digital Marketing in B2B

Today’s digital environment has considerably changed the way in which organizations communicate and create relationships with their customers. The adoption of digital marketing techniques has transformed traditional communication channels and created the possibility to customize marketing, from both B2B and business to consumer (B2C) [15]. This means that creating content that can influence customers is now a core activity for digital marketing. In this new form of marketing, companies are not pushing their offer onto customers; instead, they are generating treasured content to attract, retain and transform random customers into loyal customers [16][17].
More and more, digital marketing takes on a more strategic and more aggregative role, that is, it incorporates various strategies in a holistic and integrated manner [1]. Any strategy that incorporates digital marketing requires a clear understanding of a particular product, the company in question, and the specific factors that characterize this industry [5].
For Smith and Chaffey [18] and Hao [19], the web can be considered as pull-marketing environment in which companies try to move customers to their websites, which is possible thanks to search engine optimization and social media.
Currently, with the presence of a new consumer profile which is more demanding and omnipresent, it can be considered that this has become a key part in the co-creation of the value of numerous brands in the world [4][20]. As such, building customer loyalty has become a central and fundamental element in their relationship management. New consumers actively seek different brands that provide engaging and valuable content relevant to meeting their needs [1][21]. To assure a constant flow of products to meet customer requirements, organizations should have in place a functional supply chain management. A supply chain is the flow of goods from the producer to the warehouse and from there to the retailers or the final sale [22]. Supply chain management is a strategic task that can bring advantages and profit to individual companies or business groups [23][24][25][26][27][28].
Content is a fundamental component of pull-marketing techniques and digital marketing in general. To develop an effective and efficient strategy, it is necessary to understand that content is essential in marketing and engaging with customers [1].

3. Customer Relationship Manager (CRM)

CRM can be seen as an existing process due to the existing resulting from the relationships between companies and their customers such as the prospection of customers, the offer of a particular product or service, acceptance by consumers, or even the consumption generated by them. Concerning the companies under analysis, both mentioned that in the markets where they operate, customer relationship management is a function of the commercial agent who should manage all the information and all the activity history [29][30][31][32][33]. CRM can be defined as technological tools that help develop the degree of interaction between consumers and companies. CRM may be the key to predicting business success [34][35][36].
CRM is considered a business strategy of a company whose goal is to absorb and use information about its customers to maximize the value and profitability of the relationship of that same company with its customers in the long term. Numerous terms have been created and introduced in the industry since CRM was first introduced, among which are CMR (customer-managed relationships); ERM (enterprise relationship management); CEM (customer experience management); and CKM (customer knowledge management). These are fundamental for intervening in a company’s business since they are considered catalysts for making it more profitable and above all, more customer-focused [37].
Concerning CRM, authors such as Peppard [36] and Mendoza, Marius, Pérez and Grimán [34] argue that CRM can be defined as a technological tool that improves the relationship and the degree of interaction between customers and companies.

4. Customer Knowledge Management (CKM)

Being an element of peripheral information, customer knowledge can be understood as a significant resource that can be steered towards developing new products, looking into emergent market opportunities, and expanding longstanding customer relationships [38]. CKM can be a path for implementing knowledge management in companies [39].
To introduce this CKM acronym, it is essential to first understand its relationship with the term CRM. According to Stefanou et al. [40], Tzokas and Saren [41] and Massey et al. [42], CRM and knowledge management are two distinct management techniques with different principles and perspectives. Whilst CRM is looking to customer knowledge and its preferences, knowledge management aims to create, shape and build functional knowledge, thus improving the organization’s performance [43].
Regarding the definition of CKM, Parirokh et al. [44] and Dalkir [45] indicated that it can be stipulated as a process that aims to collect and/or create, share, acquire and apply customer knowledge with the ultimate goal of creating value for companies and their customers. On the other hand, and according to Blosch [46], customer knowledge can be characterized as a combination of different elements such as values, experiences, information collections and ideas developed and observed in the existing relationship between companies and their customers. An updated definition of customer knowledge management by Castagna et al. [47] states that CKM can be seen as a logical juncture of customer relationship management and knowledge management.
For Lomas [48], despite the numerous CKM resources available and the many advantages presented, some leaders, mainly in the B2B sector, question the strategic purpose of the technology.
In this context, CKM is a combination of different points such as the values, type of information, knowledge, and experience that develops in the existing processes between customers and an organization [49][50][51]. CKM is also defined as the process of collecting or creating as well as sharing and applying customer knowledge [45]. Parirokh, Daneshgar and Fattahi [44] complemented this definition by saying that this process is used for the organization’s value creation and its customers.

This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/businesses2020011

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