Marketing Strategies on Social Media Platforms

Introduction

The recent growth of social networking sites (SNSs) has significantly influenced humans and relationships by changing the nature of their activities, habits, and interactions. The virtual world has replaced real-world social relationships and created online communities that connect people worldwide (Alalwan et al., 2017). The web-based platform such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn facilitate sharing of information, access to entertaining content, and communication among people from different cultural backgrounds. From a business perspective, social media platforms enable interactions between customers and companies, build relationships, and develop experiences that promote purchasing decisions (Bajpai et al., 2012). D’ Andrea et al. (2012, p. 109) stated that “the most important scope to join a Social Network is the possibility for consumers and companies to connect each other and to fulfil their specific needs for information sharing and interaction”. It increases traffic towards the company, leading to a robust company-customers relationship, building trust, and attracting and maintaining potential customers. Social networks also amplify opportunities for businesses: contribute to the growth of social commerce, which Yahia et al. (2018) defined as social media platforms to promote electronic commerce activities and transactions; develop efficient business models through crowd-sourcing (D’Andrea et al., 2015); and create new business models such as virtual communities, proposed by Ferry et al. (2012).

Additionally, social networking sites influence consumer behaviors. Alalwan et al. (2017) indicated that the SNSs have progressively influenced various aspects of people’s lives, such as social life, educational activities, business and commercial life, and political perspectives. Their implications on daily lives have created a marketing opportunity for companies by enhancing consumer involvement and communication. Tiago and Veríssimo (2014) identified various benefits of social media marketing strategy: product diversity that enables selection of products from a wide range, convenience, efficiency, and co-creation of information that increases consumers participation in different business processes. The study by Alrousan et al. (2020) demonstrated that relative advantages, complexity, IT expertise, senior management support, IT manager knowledge, and external pressure have a significant impact on its adoption. However, digital marketing strategies are still in its early stages of adoption in most SMEs, as the lack of human skills limits the use of social media as well as other digital marketing tools (Yaseen et al., 2019). Proactive consumer communication influences their judgments and has created a shift from valuing firm-based promotions to peer opinions and recommendations. Therefore, an effective social media marketing strategy should provide consumers with relevant and accurate information on products and services to initiate conversations that lead to improved judgments and opinions.

Despite the great relevance of social networks to business strategy, scientific documentation in this area is dispersed and framed by several academic databases. This study intends to contribute by providing a bibliographic categorization of the studies and pointing out future lines of investigation using the SCOPUS scientific database being the main indexing in the academic world. In this sense, the main objective of this research was to carry out a Systematic Review of Bibliometric Literature (LRSB) on social media marketing strategies and their implication in the business environment, processes, and activities, of articles indexed in the SCOPUS database.