Abstract

The rise of the Internet and smartphones in the 21st century has created and developed social media as an extremely effective means of communication in society. In life, business, sports, and politics, social media facilitates the democratization of ideas like never before. Social media content gives consumers different information sources that they must decipher to discern its trustworthiness and influence in their own opinions. Marketers must be savvy about using social media in their attempts to persuade consumers and build brand equity.

As social media has permeated our everyday lives, scholars in various disciplines are actively conducting research into this aspect regarding our way of life. In this scholarly endeavor, marketing has taken a leading role in this research endeavor as a discipline involving human communications and idea persuasion. Thus, rather than considering social media broadly across multiple disciplines, in this monograph, we concentrate on social media analytics in marketing.

This monograph comprises the following four sections:

• First, we provide an overview of social media and social media analytics (SMA). While much has already been said about social media generally, relatively less has been said about social media analytics. Thus, much of our focus is on SMA in terms of contributing to the current understanding of SMA in the field.
• Second, we concentrate on social media analytics in marketing. We discuss practical industry perspectives and examples, as well as recent marketing research by academics. Notably, we show how analytics may be used to address concerns about social media privacy and help detect fake reviews.
• Third, we summarize common tools for social media analytics in marketing. These methods can be complex, but they must be mastered for sound SMA practice. They encompass big data, artificial intelligence, machine learning, deep learning, text analytics, and visual analytics.
• Fourth, we discuss trends and a future research agenda. We also discuss how SMA might be better integrated into higher education.

Social Media Analytics and Its Applications in Marketing

Social Media Analytics and Its Applications in Marketing focuses on the intersection of three closely related domains -- marketing, social media, and social media analytics (SMA). In other words, this monograph concerns marketing-based decisions related to social media and social media analytics (SMA) or social media and social media analytics from the perspective of the marketing discipline. In SMA, the authors emphasize the roles of data and tools in tackling marketing problems. In marketing applications within the context of SMA, they discuss not only current problems, but also trends and future directions. The basic approach of this monograph can help both marketing practitioners and academics better understand how to use marketing analytics to identify the common patterns and trends produced by consumers and firms.

The monograph is organized as follows. First, it describes the general state of social media and SMA offering both practical and theoretical perspectives. A four-step SMA framework called AAVF (Acquisition-Analysis-Value-Feedback) is proposed based on examination of some existing frameworks and processes for SMA. Second, it examines social media analytics (SMA) particularly within marketing as a collection of tools and methods used to unearth the practical values of consumer and brand data. Third, it shows how common methods for SMA have been utilized for common marketing problems. Some common SMA methods encompass the analysis of big data, text analytics, visual analytics, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and deep learning. Finally, trends and future research topics for SMA are discussed, particularly within marketing.