| dc.description.abstract | The use of social media in companies is a complex subject, which requires more research. The knowledge of companies regarding the use of social media is limited and companies are often faced with the problem of choosing techniques, strategies and frameworks that can be utilized to the benefit of the company. Social media can be used for a variety of purposes, for example to increase brand awareness, as a marketing tool, to improve the engagement between the company and its customers, etc. The aim of this study is to identify which techniques a company can use to ensure that social media is utilized effectively.
For this study, a positivist research paradigm was adopted to ensure that the researcher has an objective view of the reality. The quality of this positivistic study was assessed according to the following criteria: objectivity, reliability, internal validity and external validity. This research paradigm was chosen because it is regarded as the dominant paradigm when researching information systems, computer science or information technology.
To identify which techniques, strategies and frameworks are currently being used to manage social media of a company, a survey was conducted. The data generation method chosen to complement the survey research method was web-based questionnaires. A total of 122 questionnaires were returned from employees in different departments and different companies. Twitter data of three different South African companies was collected and analysed. A tweet was categorised according to positive or negative, indicating the sentiment, as well as subjective or objective, indicating the opinion. Sentiment analysis and opinion mining offers a company the ability to observe a variety of social media platforms in real time and to act accordingly in respect of the social media data gathered.
Each company is unique, not only the type of company, but also the company’s customers or clients. When choosing a technique to ensure that social media is utilized effectively, the techniques should be chosen in such a manner that it is fitting to what the company wants to achieve by using social media. If a company wants to measure the activity and awareness of customers/clients on the company’s social media platforms, techniques that can be used include reporting tools, advertisement managing software, Application Programming Interfaces (API’s) of different social media platforms, social media management systems (for example Hootsuite) and built-in dashboards offered by social media platforms. A basic framework was developed and can be used by companies as a tool or guideline when deciding to use social media | en_US |
