The document discusses the role of social media in content marketing, emphasizing the importance of electronic word of mouth (ewom), engagement, and analytics for brands like Walmart and Target. It highlights how positive mentions from friends are more influential than brand promotions, and stresses the need for brands to engage genuinely with customers to foster community. The document also presents analytics data comparing Walmart and Target's social media presence and stock performance, while suggesting future research into the relationship between musicians and retailers regarding ewom.

1. Social Media as a
Function in Relation to
Content Marketing
ALLISHA ANDERSON – SOCIAL MEDIA METRICS – SPRING 2015

2. What is content marketing?
 “Content marketing is the marketing and business process for creating
and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and
engage a clearly defined and understood target audience – with the
objective of driving profitable customer action.”

3. Focus on:
 Electronic word of mouth (eWOM)
 Engagement
 Analytics

4. EWOM
 According to Vander Lans (2010) electronic word of mouth (eWOM) is
something that marketers immensely value. Companies use tweets,
videos, interactive sites and games to help their viral marketing
campaigns.
 Berger and Iyengar (2010) discuss how campaigns should focus on
different aspects based on the channel markets which they are hoping to
generate discussion in. “If the goal is to get more online discussion,
framing the product in an interesting or surprising way should help (p. 571).
They add that if these ads or online content surprise people, exceed
expectations or evoke interest, they will be more likely to be shared, giving
them a higher chance of going viral.

5. EWOM
 While campaigns can try all they want to get a customer to test their
product, it has been shown that messages from friends have more impact
than messages posted by a brand trying to promote themselves (Vander
Lans, 2010).
 If a blogger or friend posts something pertaining to a specific product,
people are more likely to try that product than if the company posts
about it.

6. Engagement
 For potential customers to want to engage with your business or brand
you need to provide value to your customers. This value, according to
Quesenberry (2014), can be achieved by inviting people to share their
information, thoughts or opinions about your brand. If these people say
positive things in the online world it is more likely to boost sales, new
customer acquisitions and spread the word about your product or
business more quickly (Burger, 2010).

7. Engagement
 When people are talking about interesting things, they’re more likely to
engage with people they don’t know.
 Example: a person talking about a new brand that a Twitter follower is
interested in, the interested person may reach out to the unknown person. This
would show engagement as well as word of mouth.
 A brand needs to be involved with its consumers because it show’s they
are listening. If they’re not involved, consumers are likely to be less
pleased with the brand.
 As Evans (2011) states, “On the social web, transparency is everything (p.
26).”

8. Analytics
 Over 200 million Tweets are published each day.
 Brands have to watch their analytics to continue to stay relevant.
 Using sites like Topsy, TweetReach and others can help businesses know the key
time for them to share content.
 Attaching a photo or video helps to draw attention to specific content.
 One study suggests that the number of followers or how active a user is
does not have an effect on what becomes trending, it is typically a
community effort and it’s based on the topic (Asur, 2011). Vander Lans
(2010) states that “An important feature of viral marketing campaigns is
that marketers are able to accurately measure the actions of customers,
such as when they open an email and which pages they visit” (p. 355).

9. Research Questions
 RQ 1: How do retailers like Walmart and Target use engagement to create
an online community?
 RQ 2: How do Walmart and Target rank in terms of analytics versus where
they are in the stock market?
 RQ 3: When referring to eWOM, who influences keeping Walmart and
Target in the eyes of the people?

10. Using engagement to create an
online community: Walmart
 Keeps their social media open and
honest.
 Video posted Facebook in February
about the changes for employees.
 Had hundreds of comments. Social media
team helped customers and informed
employees about who to talk to for further
questions.
 Twitter is more of a community, with
Walmart reaching out to customers to
thank them for shopping.

11. Using engagement to create an
online community: Target
 Target uses Facebook similar to promote
current sales and talk about upcoming
releases at the retailer.
 Social media team keeps up with
consumers by responding to their issues
right away and helping them have a more
positive experience.
 Twitter is used for promoting things they’re
excited about.
 Target effectively uses media and hashtags
to promote themselves and their brands.

12. Analytics and the stock market:
Walmart
 According to Alexa, Walmart.com is ranked 37th in the US and 171st in the
world, with over 52,000 sites linking in.
 Topsy Sentiment Score: 61
 Twitter followers: 657,000 and counting
 Facebook likes: 32.8 million and counting
 Stocks as of April 15, 2015: $79.25

13. Analytics and the stock market: Target
 According to Alexa, Target.com is ranked 52nd in the US and 264th in the
world, with over 50,000 sites linking in.
 Topsy Sentiment Score: 90
 Twitter followers: 1.2 million
 Facebook likes: 22 million
 Stocks as of April 15, 2015: $81.91

14. EWOM Influencers: Walmart
 Week of April 12th: Shawn Mendes (@ShawnMendes) and his fan club
(@shawn_access) were both in the top five influencers for Walmart.
 Tweets tagged Walmart, talked about going to the retailer to purchase
CD’s.
 One Tweeter (@huntervespinosa) posted a picture of her purchasing the CD at
Walmart and that increased engagement.
 Other influencers include @listentolina, a lifestyles and home blogger.

15. EWOM Influencers: Target
 Target’s Twitter is number one for influencers, with Shawn Mendes’ Twitter
following in second.
 Mendes and his fans Tweeting about Target (and Walmart) should increase
traffic both in stores and to the websites of the brands.
 Body Armor, a new sports drink, was the number three influencer for
Target after announcing a partnership to distribute the drink in Target
locations.
 This is beneficial to both Target and the Body Armor drink brand.

16. Conclusion
 Likes and followers don’t matter, engagement and sharing content does.
 EWOM drives people to Twitter pages, websites and stores.
 If Walmart and Target continue to post frequently, engage with customers
and share relevant content, they will easily stay in the eyes of people in
the online world.

17. Future Research
 Look deeper into the online relationship of musicians/product suppliers
with retailers like Walmart and Target to see how their EWOM effects one
another.
 Compare the likes and comments on a Facebook status to the favorites
and replies of a Tweet of similar content to determine which method of
social media works best for the specific company.