Blog Marketing On Consumer Buying Behavior

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

On

THE EFFECT OF BLOG MARKETING ON CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR

MBA – International Business Batch of 2011-13

Faculty Guide - Submitted by -

Dr. Kokil Jain Kanika Malhotra

A1802011111

MBA - IB

DECLARATION

I Kanika Malhotra, hereby declare that the project report entitled ―THE EFFECT OF BLOG MARKETING ON CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR under the guidance of Dr. Kokil Jain submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for degree of Advanced Post Graduate Programme to AIBS is my original work. Hereby I declare that this report will not submitted for the award of any other degree/diploma/ fellowship of other similar titles of price to any other institution/ organization of university by any other person or for copying.

Place:

Date: / /

Signature

(Chirag Patel)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

A fruitful work is incomplete without paying a word of thanks to all the people who are directly or indirectly involved in its completion.

I wish to express my heartfelt appreciation to many who have contributed to this project both explicitly and implicitly. Words can never express the extent of indebtedness, but I still wish to express my deep sense of gratitude to all the people for their valuable time and co-operation, which they had given me.

A special thanks goes to Dr. KOKIL JAIN for taking the time and effort to review such extensive and complex material and for providing reaction and recommendation for improvement of my thesis report. And last but not the least to my classmates, who despite their own project have helped in my project as and when they could.

.

Signature

ABSTRACT

The blog marketing has introduced a new way of doing marketing of products. This revolution has led to change the buying behavior of customers. In this paper I will explain what are blogs and what is blog marketing and the contribution of these blogs to get about the change in marketing strategies of companies.

This paper goes on to explain how Blogs leads to news feeds and social media marketing, putting forward the brighter side of blogs as a marketing tool and ending by talking of the future of campaigns promoted through blog marketing.

The present study is conducted to understand the popularity of blogs in businesses, the implementation of blog marketing as a marketing strategy and the impact of these campaigns on the consumer buying behavior.

The internet users are increasing each year, not just internet users but actually active internet users. The accessibility of internet from mobile phones have made internet famous among people including inner villages. There are different types of business ready to come online to promote themselves and their products if they have proper guidance to show them the way ahead.

The implications of this research supplement the limited scale of existing literature in the blogging phenomenon in marketing campaigns. It will assist the corporate in understanding the effectiveness of blogs and manage strategic evolution exactly as per customers’ needs. Through implementation of corporate blogs, the organizations efficiency is likely to increase, satisfying its customers; making the corporate more competent to challenges in the industry.

The research tests the customer acceptance of blogs as a medium to exchange information on mobile phones. The significance of the results indicates blogs are not only effective, but also cost-efficient, generating business revenues at the lowest possible investment.

Since the scope was too vast, the study was condensed by considering the cases of mobile phones and the comparative study on blogs of Apple, Samsung, Blackberry, and Sony Ericson.

The study found that although the impact of blogs on consumer buying behavior is Imperative, there is a wide arena that has been left unexplored by companies like blackberry and others. It also found that Samsung followed by Apple’s blog marketing campaign has been relatively successful in achieving its objectives, of viral marketing.

The use of the blogs for launching campaigns or for news feeds has grown dramatically over the past few years. Approximately three out of five reputed companies are using blog marketing to some extent and an additional one-fifth say they intend to participate in the future. Although estimates vary, there is strong consensus about continued growth, with optimistic projections of increased customer engagement in companies and its product\services through blogs.

In the present financial crisis effective marketing is the only difference to attract customers among competitors. Achieving excellence in this field is of remarkable significance for the business. The research solution blends blog marketing as a modern marketing strategy to create significance for the business in achieving its ultimate goal of customer confidence in the product, increased brand visibility and revenue.

INDEX

INTRODUCTION

The Internet has ushered in huge changes in the marketing world by combining many types of business models such as direct sales, affiliate marketing, product creation and marketing online. It is responsible for making the people all over the world benefit from media.

Internet marketing has provisions for interactive learning as well as instant responses to queries. This makes Internet marketing unique. Internet marketing not only comprises of Internet, e-mail, and wireless media but also management of digital customer data and electronic customer relationship management (ECRM) systems. The creative and technical aspects of the Internet such as design, development, advertising, and sales are tied together by Internet marketing. Blogs or weblogs form an integral part of internet marketing today. While it was once only a domain for experts in the technique, the blogging phenomenon has transformed key elements of the society such as politics and journalism. It has come at par with other platforms for personal commutation such as e-mails and social networking. There has been an exponential rise in the number of blogs lately. Technorati, a blog engine giant in January 2009 tracked 133 million blogs, up from eight million blogs in 2005 (futurebuzz.com, technorati.com). There has been a similar trend in the number of blog readers. Blogging has not only become a buzz marketing tool or a tool for socializing, but also an income generator. 28% of all bloggers engage in blogging as a source of income (Futurebuzz report, December 2009 report). Blogging had become a mainstream web activity as early as 2004 (myjournal.com), with Merriam Webster dictionary rating ‘Blog’ as the Word of the Year. Blogs are a creative and diverse web phenomenon capable of challenging the world’s media; increasingly a media release opportunity as well as a platform for commerce and industry.

The growing popularity of blogs as a marketing tool for businesses has come in the wake of growing realization that consumers are becoming increasingly cynical and markets, fragmented. Traditional marketing channels are no longer relevant in this context. While the 90’s saw the introduction of new marketing tools such as buzz marketing, relationship marketing, word-of-mouth marketing, opt-in marketing and viral marketing, the trend is slowly changing towards the better for businesses and companies.

Since the start of the 21st century, there has been a phenomenal rise in the number of corporate blogs around the world. On 17th August 2010, emarketer news reported that 34% of businesses in USA are currently using blogs to promote their products or services (emarketer.com). The number is all set to rise to 43% by 2012. Microsoft is known to be one of the biggest companies using corporate blogs. Scobleizer, one of their most controversial blogs, generated such high volumes of readers. In 2006, General Motors invested an estimated USD 225,675 in their corporate blog "Fast Lane", and generated consumer insight worth USD 410,470- an impressive 67% return on investment. Prior to that, their blog had generated a return on investment of 99% in 2005 through its blog. Other examples of phenomenal corporate blogs are IBM’s Developer Works, Macromedia’s blogs, Sun Systems’ corporate blog and South West Airlines’ blog. All these blogs are examples of the new platform for promotional advertising, which has reportedly increased their brand visibility and also generated revenues.

Blog marketing has the potential to satisfy the requirements of new marketing strategies. Since it is a platform that enables personal, face-to-face interactions with consumers, companies are able to project a more human face. It has been widely acclaimed by market research and PR professionals that blogs will be one of the most vital marketing tools in years to come.

The Fortune Magazine in January 2005 recognized blogs as the "Topmost Tech Trend to Watch out for", stating that blogs are slowly changing the processes of operations in areas of marketing, PR and advertising (Kirkpatrick and Roth, 2005). Moreoever, it was named the "Breakthrough Idea" in 2005 by the Harvard Business Review, which also stated that blogs are also extremely controversial, unlike other traditional media (Sawhney, 2005). In the same year, The Economist suggested that blogging might soon result in the destruction of traditional PR and marketing channels. Similarly, Postman (2009) proclaims that a blog can "supplement, or replace, some of the standard corporate communications vehicles". Bly (2007) called corporate blogging a "grass-roots phenomenon" that tries to restore connection between companies and consumers. The establishment of the fact that blogs had created a revolution in business mainstream came with Business Week article published in May 2005 stating that ‘blogs have the power to change a business’.

The growing popularity of blogs as a marketing tool for businesses has come in the wake of growing realization that consumers are becoming increasingly cynical and markets, fragmented. Traditional marketing channels are no longer relevant in this context. While the 90’s saw the introduction of new marketing tools such as buzz marketing, relationship marketing, word-of-mouth marketing, opt-in marketing and viral marketing, the trend is slowly changing towards the better for businesses and companies. Blog marketing has the potential to satisfy the requirements of new marketing strategies. Since it is a platform that enables personal, face-to-face interactions with consumers, companies are able to project a more human face. It has been widely acclaimed by market research and PR professionals that blogs will be one of the most vital marketing tools in years to come.

Thus, there has been an exponential rise in support for corporate blogging as a marketing tool for companies. Although its main advantages are establishment of relationship with the consumer and an effective platform for sharing crucial information with them, the exact impact of a corporate blog on the consumer needs to be seen. Particularly in mobile phone context, how does a blog impact the sales/revenues of a company? How does it change the consumer perception of a particular brand?

PROBLEM RECOGNITION

In the present financial crisis effective marketing is the only difference to attract customers among competitors. Achieving excellence in this field is of remarkable significance for the business. The research solution blends blog marketing as a modern marketing strategy to create significance for the business in achieving its ultimate goal of customer confidence in the product, increased brand visibility and revenue.

The issue is that to create Brand Awareness by adopting Cost Effective measures. Companies spend huge budgets on advertising & Press Release. Blog is a source of publicity which is unpaid form of communication which let the company to spread its new updates and feeds to mass audience without paying a huge amount.

The companies need to concentrates on a different attribute of blogs, which proves to be the biggest advantage for companies to promote their product and services. In the era of well-educated and updated customers who have abundance of knowledge and information about companies and their products and services makes it difficult for the marketers to pull them in a low cost and effective means of reaching their target market. For example Apple has shied away from blogging initially and the company blogged only on few occasions. Their attitude towards blogging originated from a need to a crisis management tool rather than to communicate and converse with their legions of users. But lately company realized the importance of blogging from its big time competitor Samsung. Samsung’s has growing popularity among youth because of its news feeds on their blog named Samsung tomorrow. It is a popular and intriguing blog for its fans or general users who wishes to know about the reviews and feeds on Samsung and its products and service. But the blackberry’s blog named Inside Blackberry is a formal blog which makes its customers enjoy the feedback of company partially. As a matter of fact, Sony has gone right, twice by launching two company blogs (Sony Electronics and Sony Play station). Those are the two new Sony corporate blogs that I discovered; the blog is written in an informal and entertaining style and also tells about the internal workings of a premier electronics company. 

Traditional marketing channels are no longer relevant in this context. While the 90’s saw the introduction of new marketing tools such as buzz marketing, relationship marketing, word-of-mouth marketing, opt-in marketing and viral marketing, the trend is slowly changing towards the better for businesses and companies.

So, blogs are a low-cost marketing tool to achieve the marketing aim: for producing content, for promoting the product, for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) purposes, etc. The growing popularity of blogs as a marketing tool for businesses has come in the wake of growing realization that consumers are becoming increasingly cynical and markets, fragmented.

Increase in the popularity of social networking and blogging sites has attracted the interest of the marketers and communication strategists, who forever are searching for new means of advertising. Advertising on these sites in the developed economies has been very successful and has led to increased positive recall and word of mouth advertising. The concern is for the Indian companies to be motivated by the success of blog marketing in top companies like Samsung, Sony, and Apple and to duplicate the same models across blogosphere targeting different cultures and countries. It is in this idea that the current study is undertaken, with the objective to examine, if marketing on such as social communities and blogs, is perceived similarly and positively by various companies.

Blog allow easy spread of information which let the company to cut down the budget of Press Release and Publication. User can easily search the information regarding the product/service through the company’s blog which is easily shareable over the net.

There are lists on several other benefits of corporate blogging: Blogs are a channel to deliver news much faster than any other medium; gains customer insight on the subject as it strikes a conversation with them and helps increase traffic to their website.

Although Advertising and Press Release has mass reach and creates good awareness about Company. But blog is very good source of communication which is both effective and efficient. A good Blog also has a great presence over net which engage the user and also helps to create loyal customers due to its personal touch.

This paper goes on to explain how Blogs leads to news feeds and social media marketing, putting forward the brighter side of blogs as a marketing tool and ending by talking of the future of campaigns promoted through blog marketing.

INFORMATION SEARCH

Small Business Trends in April 2010 proclaimed that marketing has changed over the years, with the growing popularity of web and technology, affecting the way many large-sized, as well as small-sized organizations operate (smallbiztrends.com, April 2010 Article). Similarly, The Epoch Times reported in July 2010 that "newspapers, magazines and other print media were losing advertising opportunities to electronic publications". The new age marketing method is online marketing (blogs, social networking), which allows more personal interaction with consumers on a large scale (theepochtimes.com Article, July 2010). Similarly, Shirky (2009) in the article for McKinsey Digital declared that "transparency with customer was the new marketing", adding that internet was one of the mediums to best strike a conversation with the customers directly, offering valuable and useful information about products.

Moreover, Jim Connolly, in his portal on Marketing Blogs, states that it is important for a businessman today to know not only what his customers are saying but also what the prospective customers are saying (jimsmarketingblog.com, August 2010 Article). Business blogs are an effective platform for this purpose.

Alesco Marketing states that Business blogs allow the organisation to reach the targeted marketing niche (dougwilliams.com). The organisation found in its survey on 35,000 respondents that blogs are the most trusted media for information as compared to traditional channels such as newspaper, television, magazines, etc.

Their article on Blog Marketing also states that such is the power of blogs, that it has overtaken websites (another platform for virtual communication) in a very short span of time due to many reasons:

- Blogs are active, while websites are passive

- Bogs are faster: instant posting and syndication

- They build a readership due to easy subscription

- They invite participation and interaction

- They are power influencers (it was found in the survey that more than half of them were likely to purchase a product if it was reviewed positively by private individuals).

In the following sections of the study, literature regarding the biggest marketing trend of corporate blogging is reviewed in context of the Internet age; and how they are relevant to customer engagement and increase in popularity of the company and its products.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

In the current time of the global communication achieved through the Internet, the blog marketing is an essential marketing instrument because of its specific characteristics. Because is suited in the personal, occupational and corporate spheres, the blog eases communication and acts as an active factor that creates and promotes an identity specific to the virtual space of the World Wide Web, with direct and immediate implications over the material financial aspects of the economic and social realities.

The topic of Business blogging has been covered by all sorts of literature mediums such as press articles, white paper, e-books and blogs. For example, Aaron Wall's online tutorials on blog marketing are the guide that I have read to get serious web visibility."

Business Blogging book by Hubspot gave a general idea about blogging and explained the impact of blogging on customer engagement. Maggie Georgieva published the article with Blogs on How to use business blogging for marketing success.

In the personal – occupational sphere, the blog is similar to newspapers and magazines, because most incomes generated by personal blogs come mainly from the hosted advertisements.

A few of the advertising methods promoted by blogs that can be mentioned are:

- Hosting advertising banners for a limited number of companies. With the help of web traffic tracking instruments the efficiency of certain banners can be traced in real time, and if they don’t generate enough traffic, they can be replaced with more appealing banners. According to Bob Stone (Stone et Jacobs, 2004), research paper named BLOG MARKE – the role of blog/blogs in the marketing policy promoted by the company (the blog is seen here as being an instrument used to promote the products/services of a company/organization); – the role of the marketing in promoting blogs (the blog is seen here as a product that must be promoted through different marketing tools).

Regarding the first aspect (the blog’s use as a marketing tool), the blogs kept by a

company, person or organization (political, religious, etc.) can achieve:

- a presentation of the products and services promoted by the company and/or of the ideas and goals (political, religious) pursued by a person or a group of people in the case of the blog, their presentation can be more personal, less formal and more direct than it is possible through other media channels (television, newspapers, magazine, etc); - an easier, faster and less expensive way to monitor the clients’ reactions to the launched products or to the company’s performance.

The promotion of a blog can be done through methods such as:

- posting comments on other blogs relevant for the topic of your own blog – it is recommended to make them to the point, to be respectful, interesting, coherent and accompanied by a link to the blog of the person who is making the comment;

- by optimizing the blog’s content in order to have a better position in the results given by search engines when certain key words are looked for – an important role is played here by the blog’s title in the web address.

Another research paper followed to understand the effect on consumer buying behavior The Effects of Blogging on Consumer buying behavior by Jane Williams states that You may realize that a website helps to solidify your business' brand and services to an online crowd, but don't stop there.

By adding a blog to your website, you will not only help keep your business and website higher in the search engine rankings, but may also attract new clients who would have otherwise overlooked your business. Although providing regularly updated, well-written and informative blog posts can be demanding, the subsequent increase in site traffic could translate to higher sales and profit.

Providing a blog with high-quality, informative content helps establish your company as a knowledgeable leader in your industry. Regular, well-written blog posts addressing common concerns and problems faced by your clients shows your expertise and understanding of your industry, and builds the reader's faith in your company's ability to help them. Offering free tips and helpful advice through your blog gives the impression that each engines love updated content, so every well-written, relevant-keyword embedded blog post you write puts your company further up in the search results. Google, the search engine giant, will re-index your blog every time you update with new content, placing your site higher in the search rankings. This could place your site ahead of your competitors, gaining better traffic and more potential clients. You care about helping the reader's problem and not simply getting their money.

Most people will question "why should I choose this business and how can it help me" when in need of services, which can take time to address one-on-one. Through your company's blog, you can address the most commonly asked questions in-depth, and pre-screen your potential clients before they call or walk through your door. This helps eliminate the time spent on dealing with people who aren't interested in your product or service, and fast-track those who are ready to buy by skipping the sometimes time-consuming "About Us" information.

The Internet makes it easy to share helpful, informative articles, and each passing of your blog's link attracts a new set of eyes to your site that may not have otherwise seen it. Although not each and every share will result in a new client, the more your blog's link gets passed around, the higher the possibility of it landing in the inbox or on the Facebook page of someone in need of your services.

Media fragmentation and customer indifference to traditional marketing tools are forcing marketers to seek new opportunities so the marketing message not only captures customers’ attention, but also tries to engage them with the company. This paper discusses blogs within the context of creating this new, more enduring relationship with the customer. The research paper by Tanuja Singh named Blogging: A new play in your marketing game plan made me understand the inevitable importance of blogs. As market research and relationship building converge, blogs can be used to generate market research, and then engage the customer in an on-going relationship. Blogs can be developed for specific target markets where information is tailored to particular segments. The resulting community building can help a company differentiate itself. Targeting through blogs, where a community of users can relate to each other and to the company,

can strengthen a company or a brand’s proposition to the customer, and ultimately be more effective in delivering results than traditional media. For example, as the use of Internet videos becomes more common, video blogs or blogs can provide an opportunity where the marketer provides the video content, but the customer controls the timing, access, and feedback.

Applications utilizing podcasting or RSS may also enable a customer to self-diagnose a need, and develop his or her own solutions. For example, for APPLE’s I phone a customer sees a video demonstration customized to a current unmet need. The actions taken by the customer are then tracked as a means of providing market research and targeted product development for the given segment. Similarly the upcoming mobile of SONY ERICSON is also following the same strategy to spread its product through the news feeds about it given both by customers and company.

The advantages of participating in the blogosphere far outweigh the challenges. Firms that actively manage the world of blogs can gather powerful market intelligence, create communities of dedicated brand advocates, and reach the elusive customer more effectively than is possible through traditional media. The only requirement is that companies must truly believe in customer empowerment, and be willing to share power with the technology-savvy customer of today.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The objective to primary research undertaken is to understand the general public’s perspectives regarding blogs, determine the role blogs play in influencing their buying behavior and the general effectiveness of blogs in their daily lives. However, the research is primarily undertaken to determine the impact of corporate blogs initiated by Apple, Samsung, Sony Ericson and Blackberry on the minds of the consumers.

The secondary research comprehended in review of literature strengthens the concept in enhancing the process of investigation. Integrating all the inputs and further developing them is deemed to be helpful in providing suitable recommendation to the company in improving their marketing campaigns. Since the research entails working on effectiveness of blog marketing campaigns initiated on mobile phones by respective companies is very important to gain information from general public who were exposed to the campaign.

RESEARCH AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

The research is to understand the blogging phenomenon in the corporate marketing scenario by collecting relevant information and enabling a better understanding and fulfillment of company objectives, augmenting customer support and participation and revenue.

Aim

"To understand the effectiveness and efficiency of new-age marketing communications tools, particularly blog marketing, in influencing consumer perceptions and their buying behavior; and how these strategies have been successful in the context of mobile phones."

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

To understand and explore the potential for blog marketing as an effective

Marketing tool.

To understand the popularity and reach of blogs in consumers.

To identify the different types of blogs used among and their effectiveness.

To understand and evaluate the impact of blogs on the buying behavior of consumers in respect to mobile phones.

To identify the different ways in which businesses are using blogs as a

Marketing tool.

To do the comparative analysis of blog marketing of mobile phone by companies like Apple, Samsung, Sony Ericson, Blackberry.

To understand the impact/outcome of these blogs on the target market of these companies .

PLAN OVERVIEW

An Analytical approach to identify the effectiveness of blogs on peoples’ everyday lives in order to determine their importance as a marketing platform today is considered apt. It is framed in a way to provide the richness and relevance to justify the variable intended in diverse backgrounds.

RESEARCH DESIGN

The study adopts a Descriptive design where we undertake a statistical research to describe and characteristics of the population. We explore the following dimensions of the current situation- who, what, when, where and how. We investigate blogging initiative of four companies and do the comparative analysis of it, examining whether or not they had a favorable impact on the audience. The queries link to the study utilizing the Analytical method. The method undertaken for data collection through communication with the respondents is the survey approach. Feedback from the audience is expected to provide valuable information. The research entails multiple units of data collection methods. The analytical method selected to gather, assess and validate the data helps us link the gathered data to the research questions and the findings of the study, with reliable results.

The research makes use of qualitative as well as quantitative approach. The benefits of selecting this research design is the reliable results based on a limited scope, where we can concentrate on consumer opinions rather than having to worry about the general implications.

QUESTIONNAIRE

Investigation tool consisted of a total of 15 questions, distributed to 50 computer savvy college individuals. The questionnaire was administered by the interviewer. The questionnaire consisted of only fixed alternative questions to help identify the imperative opinions of people about blogs in a company’s marketing initiative.

TYPE OF RESEARCH

Quantitative Method was undertaken to verify and connect the data obtained from primary research to the information obtained from secondary sources and draw suitable conclusions. This method is undertaken because of following:

-It is recognized research methodology and it is the type of data collection technique that has no imperfections.

- It suits our research study in the best way, as primary data will be collected from

different individuals.

-We use quantitative (validation) and qualitative (inquiry) techniques to create ease

and increase credibility in interpreting the results.

Methods of Data Collection

The primary data was collected through questionnaire and its analysis. This research design helps collect data from samples categorized as under:

- Survey Research/ Questionnaires: It helps us understand the customer’s opinions about blogs as an influential medium in decision-making, and the success of blogs in mobile phones. The respondents were given questionnaires to gain feedback.

Secondary data was evaluated along with examination of the primary data. The historical studies, published literature and statistical anecdotes are mainly referred to for secondary data collection. The previous data so referred to was also reflected in the research questionnaire to test their reliability, implications and validity.

SAMPLING

.Sample selection technique

We followed probability sampling technique for the questionnaire method. The sample was drawn from mostly young population, and was followed as the research needed an unbiased opinion of respondents from all professions, income groups and genders.

Sample Size

30 respondents were selected as the sample size for this study. They were selected randomly from college and coffee shops in New Delhi, India where the target population is most likely to be obtained.

Data Collection

Data was collected through questionnaires among the 30 respondents.

Data Processing

The data obtained through questionnaire distribution was put through the Microsoft Excel software. A combined analysis was done of the questionnaire and analyzed using percentage method.

Data Analysis and Interpretation

We used the following statistical tools to interpret and the data:

- Percentage analysis: To analyze the proportion of respondents opting for a particular option in the questionnaire.

-Graphical representation: Findings were also represented in the graphical form in tables, bar diagrams and charts. They facilitate easy understanding and interpretation of the data.

DATA COLLECTION

The data collection sources are primary and secondary; hence the primary data collected is from a structured questionnaire is employed for collecting information from the respondents about their demographic and shopping orientations, Apple technology familiarity, there past shopping experiences with four companies and intentions to buy mobile phones of them, online in future and the secondary research is done by personal observation and news feed of Apple, Samsung, Sony and Blackberry which gave the idea about how the company leads to user engagement and social media sharing.

DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION

Demographic Profile of Respondents

Firstly, we analyze the demographic profile of respondents considered in the questionnaire survey. The demographic profile will reveal which age group of customers are most likely to blog/ read a blog, which gender group is most likely to buy mobile phones after reading their corporate blogs and secondly which group is most likely to be affected by blogs in making their purchase decision.

Age Group of Respondents

AGE GROUP

NO. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

18-22Years

24

48%

23-27 Years

17

34%

28-32Years

9

18%

48% of the 50 respondents belonged to the age group 18-22 years. This was followed by the age group 23-27 years, which consisted of 364% of the share. Only a small portion of the total respondents belonged to the age group 28- 32 years (9% in all). The age group ratio is it is categorized in the tabular form in Table 1.

Gender Group of the Respondents

GENDER

NO. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

Male

28

Female

22

45%

Maximum number of respondents in our survey were male (28% respondents), while the remaining 22% respondents were female.

Profession of the respondents

Profession

No. of Respondents

% Share

Employed

13

26%

Student

30

60%

Self Employed

7

14%

The customers were categorized on the basis of the professions: Working, Student and Homemaker. In the study, 60% respondents were students; 26%% were employed with other firms, 14% were self-employed.

The cognizance of the respondents

FAMILIARITY WITH BLOGS

NO. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

Yes

46

93%

No

4

7%

The first step in this methodology was to confirm the familiarity of the respondents to blogs. To accomplish this, the first question posed was whether or not they were familiar with blogs. The survey supported findings of the literature review, as blogs are extremely popular among the general public. 93% of the respondents affirmed their familiarity with the phenomenon.

Relevance of blogging as a source of information.

BLOGS A GOOD SOURCE OF INFORMATION

NO. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

YES

32

64%

NO

18

36%

The data collected showed that 64% of respondents believe that blogs are good source of information. Focus sing on response, they also claimed that blogs tend to be accurate about product information most of the times, impacting their purchase. Some also said that that was the whole point of a blog. Almost all of the respondents who said they only referred to blogs for information in case of certain products/services admitted that blogs influence their purchasing decision.

Most effective source of information about mobile phones.

MOST EFFECTIVE SOURCE OF

INFORMATION

NO. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

TV

19

38%

INTERNET

26

52%

RADIO

1

2%

PRINT MEDIA

3

6%

WORD OF MOUTH

1

38%

Whether or not they blog, it was imperative to know if the respondents felt blogs were a good source of information. The respondents in the survey responded that since blogs were the voice of the general public, they were indeed a relevant source of information. According to most respondents in focus groups, other channels of marketing such as T.V. and Radio were only means of one-way communication, but blogs gives two dimensions to the product being marketed. They were more likely to trust the quality of a product if the received positive feedback in a blog rather than its T.V./Magazine/ Radio advertisements.

The Comparison on most favored blog.

COMPANY

No. OF RESPONDENTS

% SHARE

APPLE

13

26%

SAMSUNG

20

40%

SONY ERICSON

10

20%

BLACKBERRY

7

14%

The most popular blog is of Samsung (40%) respondent’s favor this followed by Apple and Sony with 26% and 20%. It is because of the reach of Samsung’s blog named Samsung tomorrow whereas Blackberry is least popular.

The blog is written in an informal and entertaining style and is great to find out more about the internal workings of a premier electronics company. More interestingly, they admire the candor with which Sony writes and similarly with Samsung Blog named Samsung tomorrow it makes user Engagement: Yes, it allows comments and they do have a a lot of comments on their posts. The goal is to maintain that level of comments depending on the interest level of the post itself. Now Apple’s blog is basically based more on information bases but less on comments that’s y Apple no matter an elite brand is favored less but blackberry is out of the lead. Its blogs do not serve the purpose of engaging user that’s why on comparative analysis blackberry is the weakest.

Duration of reference to blogs for mobile phones.

DURATION OF REFERENCE

RESPONSE

% SHARE

Daily

27

54%

Weekly

8

16%

Fortnightly

12

24%

Monthly

3

6%

It Has been found that response rate of blogging on daily basis is 27% which states that majority of people blog or look at the news feed of companies be it fortnightly and weekly. The blogging activity is very popular among people these days.

Best feature of blog

Since we found in the literature review that there are multiple benefits of a blog, respondents were asked what in their opinion was the best feature of a blog. The options given to them are as follows:

- It is a platform to voice your opinion to a global audience.

- It is easy to use and update than any other socializing forum on the internet.

- It helps gain a true and honest opinion about many things, particularly products and services.

Regular bloggers or even blog readers understand the benefits offered by blogs the most.

The individuals and focus groups and survey respondents gave almost similar opinions

regarding the same: the most cited reason was the availability of true information about a

Product/service in a blog. They assert that most of the time they were likely to get an honest opinion about a product. Other cited reasons are that it is a good platform to voice their opinions. In an age where books and magazines as publishing forums have become

extremely rare and expensive, they prefer to be seen on the internet. Some respondents in

focus groups also said that when they can gain popularity in intense blogs.

Blogs build brand image

BLOGS BUILD BRAND IMAGE

RESPONSEDENTS RESPONSE

% SHARE

YES

36

72%

NO

14

28%

If the respondents felt that blogs were a good source of information about products and services and helps in building brand image. This question was put forth to respondents in order to understand the role. An extension to this question was whether they were influenced by blogs for product purchases i.e. if majority of blogs voted against a product, would they not buy the product? Most of the respondents who replied affirmative to looking up for product information in blogs stated that they of course were less likely to buy a product if they read negative about it in a blog. So, blogs build brand image of the product.

LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

The study is subject to several limitations, some of which are highlighted as under:

The study is confined to customers in New Delhi, India. The finding of the study, therefore, cannot be generalized for different cities.

Sample size, being small, is not completely representative of all localities, Communities, religions, cultures, etc. All this might have affected the reliability of the results to some extent.

Time as well as financial constraints are also one of the limitations of the study.

This study was limited to web blogs alone and does not include any other tool.

This study involved the understanding of blogs restricted only to mobile phones and particularly of Apple, Samsung, Sony Ericson, and Blackberry.

This study covers only the blogging feature offered by these companies to its consumers and does not involve any other feature.

This study takes into consideration blog marketing technique alone and does not involve any other marketing.

MEANING AND DEFINITION OF "BLOGS"

In simple terms, Blog is the short term universally used for "weblog", a genre of websites that construct and display entries similar to those in a journal or diary, in a chronological order (Thoms and Walden, 2007). It is an online diary for person, or even a brand/ product/ business or any form of organization. The term gained popularity in the mid-1990s, when it became a platform for new social media. The rise in its popularity is due to the unique feature that allows people to self-publish without the traditional restrictions set by an editor or publisher. It expressed the personal thoughts, reflections, and experiences of bloggers through a popular channel (Harris, 2008).

TYPES OF BLOGS

As explained above, blogs are used not only by the general public for socializing purposes, but also by corporates for marketing purposes. However, there are slightly more types of blogs than personal or corporate blogs. While many authors such as Tasner (2010) and Sauers (2006) classify blogs into these two main categories, blogs have been divided into many more categories such as political, charity, media and social (Sauers, 2006).

Thus blogs can be of the following types (Harris, 2008; Tasner, 2010):

i. Personal Blogs

A personal blog is an ongoing diary or commentary written by an individual (Harris, 2008). Personal blogs are most common and popular as they can be on any topic including hobbies, schools, sports, or even opinions (Tasner, 2010). These blogs are also somewhat private, sometimes meant to be read by the blogger’s family or friends. According to Tasner (2010), personal blogs are most successful when they criticize or rant about a product/service. Personal blogs are also referred to as "Individual Blogs" by Sauers (2006); who opinionates that these blogs are in a journalistic form.

ii. Corporate/ Business Blogs

Corporate blogs are created by companies for business purposes like enhancing communication and culture within the organization and outside it for marketing, branding and PR purposes. According to Tasner (2010), it is the best way to promote a product/service while building a relationship with the customer. Blogs are a mix between promotion of a product offerings and PR content that helps build brand loyalty. The contents of a corporate blog may range from photos of executives at office to customer testimonials and production processes. Sauers

(2006) refers to corporate blogs as ‘organizational’ blogs.

iii. Subject Blogs

According to Sauers (2006), there is a third category of blogs called as the ‘subject blog’ which is produced by one or more than one individual, focusing on a particular topic. This topic might be related to politics, pets, hobbies, etc. Examples of popular blogs in this category are War blogs on recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is also called as ‘Genre Blogs’ by Harris (2008).Harris (2008) introduces several other types of blogs such as Question Blogs (for answering public questions) and Device Blogs (blogs written using a mobile device).

What is blog marketing?

"Blog marketing is the use of weblogs to promote a company, brand, product or service, occasions and events, among other initiatives" (Andrew Corcoran, Paul Marsden, Thomas Zorbach and Bernd Röthlingshöfer, LSE). It is a popular tool for attracting the target market because blogs often follow a theme, covering views and incidents concerning a certain product/industry; making it a favorite among marketers.

ï‚· Primary approaches to this tool

There are three prime approaches marketers make use of in order to promote their

brand/ company effectively and profit from them:

i. The first approach is blogvertorials, a method through which marketers

invite endorsements on opinion leading, popular blogs written by the general

public.

ii. The second approach is business blogs/ corporate blogs/ brand blogs, wherein the marketers directly or indirectly promote their brand/ company through blogs.

iii. The third and controversial approach is ‘faux blogs/ fake blogs’ which

marketers create, portraying happy and satisfied customers/consumers.

The practice of blog marketing is growing rapidly, particularly on subjects like politics, food, local news, etc. The typical blog used by marketers is a combination of images, text, link pages, and web pages. While most blogs focus on text, some others make use of photographs (photoblog), videos (vblogs) and audio-video (podcasting). They are not only used professionally, but also in the personal context, making them all the more effective for marketing purposes (Thoms and Walden, 2007).

BlOG AS A SOCIAL NETWORKING TOOL

Blogs allow individuals to interact with one another and build relationships. When products or companies make their blogs, people can interact with the product or company. That interaction feels personal to users because of their previous experiences with social networking site interactions.

 Blogs allow individual followers to "retweet" or "repost" comments made by the product being promoted. By repeating the message, all of the users connections are able to see the message, therefore reaching more people.

So blogs act as word of mouth. Because the information about the product is being put out there and is getting repeated, more traffic is brought to the product/company.

Through blogs, companies can have conversations and interactions with individual followers. This personal interaction can instill a feeling of loyalty into followers and potential customers. Also, by choosing whom to follow on these sites, products can reach a very narrow target audience.

Social networking sites also include a vast amount of information about what products and services prospective clients might be interested in.

BLOGS LEAD TO CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT

In the context of the blog marketing, engagement means that customers and stakeholders are participants rather than viewers. Blogs in business allows anyone and everyone to express and share an opinion or an idea somewhere along the business’s path to market. Each participating customer becomes part of the marketing department, as other customers read their comments or reviews. The engagement process is then fundamental to successful social media marketing.

APPLICATION OF BLOGS IN MOBILE PHONES

Every day there are more reasons for companies like Apple, Sony and Samsung to use blogging platforms for their social media repertoire on mobile phones.

Platforms like blogs created by fan or by the company’s executive creates an environment for companies and clients to connect online. Companies that recognize the need for information, originality, and accessibility employ blogs to make their products popular and unique, and ultimately reach out to consumers who are privy to social media.

Blogs allow respective company to provide longer descriptions of mobiles or services. The longer description can include reasoning and uses. It can also include testimonials and can link to and from Facebook, Twitter and many social network and blog pages. Blogs can be updated frequently and are promotional techniques for keeping customers. Other promotional uses are acquiring followers and subscribers and direct them to your social network pages.

In a similar fashion, online communities benefit businesses because the online communities enable the businesses to reach the clients of other businesses using the platform. These online environments can be accessed by virtually anyone; therefore consumers are invited to be a part of the creative process. Companies fear that the general public have too much power over how their marketing is perceived, due to the accessibility of blogs. In order to ensure, the advantage in a business-consumer relationship, businesses have to be aware of four key assets that consumers maintain through blogs: information, involvement, community, and control.

WHY DO BUSINESSES NEED BLOGS?

There are numerous reasons why businesses should use weblogs as a tool for marketing and communicating their products/services. The most commonly cited reason was that corporate blogs allow marketers to personalize the feedback channel by opening the door for direct conversation with consumers (Lamb, 2009). Other benefits of corporate blogging are (Karr and Flannery, 2010):

Blogs can provide latest information on products that leads to a direct sale from the blog post.

Blogs help raise awareness of the company’s expertise in order to attract and acquire customers.

Blogs may provide valuable information to stockholders in order to maintain a good public image and attract more investment

In case of large scale organizations, corporate blogging offers several other benefits: leadership blogs that speak about the company vision to employees and stockholders, customer service blogs dedicated specially to assisting customers and marketing blogs that promote upcoming events and integrations.

Remenyi (2008) concentrates on a different attribute of blogs, which she states is also its biggest advantage: they are a low-cost means to achieve the marketing aim: for producing content, for promoting the product, for Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) purposes, etc.

Potts (2007) lists several other benefits of corporate blogging: Blogs are a channel to deliver news much faster than any other medium; gains customer insight on the subject as it strikes a conversation with them and helps increase traffic to their website.

RELATIONSHIP MARKETING

During this time, organizations realized the need to shift from traditional marketing tools which concentrate on the masses, to an approach that enabled them to build long-lasting, fruitful relationships with their customers. The need for such a realization, stating; the end of brand loyalty is due to the substantial increase in customer choice. The solution to this issue was to ‘increased customer involvement in the organization, to create a long-lasting relationship between the organization and the customer’. The role of blogs in relationship building with customers: "If you’re only in business to make money, you probably don’t need a blog. If you have a corporate mission, a blog keeps you engaged with the world"

Gunelius (2010) said the "a blog is an excellent tool to enhance customer relationships", as it is the best platform to deliver information on customer service issues.

BLOGS LEAD TO VIRAL MARKETING

This relationship between viral, buzz and word-of-mouth marketing has been further explored by Kimmel (2010): "Off the internet, viral marketing has been referred to as ‘word-of-mouth’, ‘creating a buzz’, ‘leveraging the media’, ‘network marketing’. On the internet, it is often called ‘viral marketing’

The blogs as one of the channels for viral marketing have led an increase in revenues earned through web-based services by over ten times.

Similarly, Hartnett (2006) says that blogging is a form of viral marketing that "combines the power of word of mouth with the efficiency of the internet". Blogs can be used be organizations to discriminate their products form their competitors’ due to their growing popularity. In 2005, Susannah Gardner dedicated an entire book to the subject, titled ‘Buzz marketing with blogs for dummies’. Gardener in her book considers that ‘power of a blog lies in its buzz, or word-of-mouth that bounce from one blog to another and create impact on a mass scale’.

BLOG IS THE BEST MEANS OF COMMUNICATING WITH CUSTOMERS

Unlike other channels of media such as newsletters and forms, blogs can be accessed and used by anyone with Internet. Furthermore, the important attribute of blogs is their comments section, which enables its readers to comment on the post easily. There is vast amount of literature written in favor of blogs as an effective tool for organizations to interact with their customers directly, on a large scale.

Karr and Flannery (2010) voice that the advantage of blogs over other internet marketing tools is that through blogs, it is possible for companies to deal with multiple customers at a time, unlike e-mails or websites. Scoble (2006) gives the example of Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, who stated that blogging makes it very easy to communicate with the customer, taking away the drawbacks of e-mail and web-sites. He added that blogs will soon be the most-used business marketing tool for communicating with customers as it is two-way and more satisfying.

So, blogs are fast becoming the most favorable form of communication with customers as they enhance customer relationships through better and regular interactions.

BUILDING A REPUTATION

Blogs are most commonly used by companies to demonstrate their expertise in a specific area. Karr and Flannery (2010) call blogs an "extraordinary tool" to demonstrate a company’s expertise in a particular domain.

Potts (2007) notes that blogs can be effective in demonstrating the company’s expertise and passion for their industry only if the right person or the right team authors the blog. He says that it is very important to talk about interesting topics, to keep the customer engaged; only then can the firm start building a reputation through positive buzz generated from the customers.

The impact of blog marketing on companies, it was found that majority of the companies found blogs to be effective in building credibility and establish their employees as "thought leaders".

Similarly, blogs can easily establish a company’s credibility and demonstrate their expertise on a certain subject.

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATION

From the survey conducted from various Consumers, the following things could be inferred.48% of the 50 respondents belonged to the age group 18-22 years. This was followed by the age group 23-27 years, which consisted of 364% of the share. Only a small portion of the total respondents belonged to the age group 28- 32 years (9% in all).

Maximum number of respondents in our survey were male (28% respondents), while the remaining 22% respondents were female.

The customers were categorized on the basis of the professions: Working, Student and Homemaker. In the study, 60% respondents were students; 26%% were employed with other firms, 14% were self-employed.

The first step in this methodology was to confirm the familiarity of the respondents to blogs. To accomplish this, the first question posed was whether or not they were familiar with blogs. The survey supported findings of the literature review, as blogs are extremely popular among the general public. 93% of the respondents affirmed their familiarity with the phenomenon.

If people are familiar with blogs, how many of them have actually tried it? Knowing the proportion of total respondents who have actually experienced the blogging phenomenon will help establish the popularity further, as many only prefer reading them. 10% of respondents in the survey had their own blog, the remaining did not.

In the literature it was found that although many people are familiar with blogs, some tend to give up blogging after a while due to various reasons like the phenomenon of social networking websites. In this study, however most of the respondents who like reading blogs or blogged regularly ( 27 of 50 respondents).

Whether or not they blog, it was imperative to know if the respondents felt blogs were a good source of information. The survey responded that since blogs were the voice of the general public, they were indeed a relevant source of information. According to most respondents in focus groups, other channels of marketing such as T.V. and Radio were only means of one way communication, but blogs gives two dimensions to the product being marketed.

They were more likely to trust the quality of a product if the received positive feedback in a blog rather than its T.V./Magazine/ Radio advertisements.

If the respondents felt that blogs were a good source of information about products and services, did they actually bother to refer to them for reviews about a product before purchasing? This question was put forth to respondents in order to understand the role blogs play in product purchasing behavior of consumers. Respondents in stated that most of the times, they did bother to check product/service reviews in blogs, but it was very random. They did not always plan to look up for information in blogs, as other channels like social networking websites were becoming more popular than blogs today. In the survey, 45% said yes, they did often look up for product information in blogs, 28% said no and 27% said it depends on the product/service.

The primary research in this survey found that although internet as a source of information has been advancing rapidly with 52%, T.V. continues to be the reigning medium.

Participants in groups voiced that they are accustomed to T.V. and advertisements did inform them first about a new product in most cases. The same was found in case of surveys, as of the hundred respondents, 38% felt that the T.V was the best source of information about a product; whilst another 52% affirmed that the internet was the best source. 2% respondents vouched for radio, 2% for word-of mouth and remaining 6% respondents in the survey said print media. Whereas other respondents who favor blog as a relevant source of information said that the blogs brought together people from across the country in one platform, exposing a wide variety of hair problems likely to occur, hence were effective as 64% favor blogs as a effective source of information.

In the survey, more than half (72%) of the respondents replied affirmative; that the blogs worked in favor of the brand. 28% respondents said that it could have been made better, hence were dissatisfied, whereas remaining said it made no difference to the brand.

Many said they were likely to consider the product in future after getting acquainted with the news feeds, whereas very said they were using the product before too and that they were tempted to buy the product after reading its blog.

The most popular blog is of Samsung (40%) respondent’s favor this followed by Apple and Sony with 26% and 20%. It is because of the reach of Samsung’s blog named Samsung tomorrow whereas Blackberry is least popular.

The blog is written in an informal and entertaining style and is great to find out more about the internal workings of a premier electronics company. More interestingly, they admire the candor with which Sony writes and similarly with Samsung Blog named Samsung tomorrow it makes user Engagement: Yes, it allows comments and they do have a a lot of comments on their posts. The goal is to maintain that level of comments depending on the interest level of the post itself. Now Apple’s blog is basically based more on information bases but less on comments that’s y Apple no matter an elite brand is favored less but blackberry is out of the lead. Its blogs do not serve the purpose of engaging user that’s why on comparative analysis blackberry is the weakest.

EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES

The growing popularity of blogs as a marketing tool for businesses has come in the wake of growing realization that consumers are becoming increasingly cynical and markets, fragmented.

Traditional marketing channels are no longer relevant in this context. While the 90’s saw the introduction of new marketing tools such as buzz marketing, relationship marketing, word-of-mouth marketing, opt-in marketing and viral marketing, the trend is slowly changing towards the better for businesses and companies. The issue is that to create Brand Awareness by adopting Cost Effective measures. Companies spend huge budgets on advertising & Press Release. Blog is a source of publicity which is unpaid form of communication which let the company to spread its new updates and feeds to mass audience without paying a huge amount.

Although Advertising and Press Release has mass reach and creates good awareness about Company. But blog is very good source of communication which is both effective and efficient. A good Blog also has a great presence over net which engage the user and also helps to create loyal customers due to its personal touch.

Moreover Blogs leads to news feeds and social media marketing, putting forward the brighter side of blogs as a marketing tool with podcasting and RSS feeds.

Blog marketing has the potential to satisfy the requirements of new marketing strategies. Since it is a platform that enables personal, face-to-face interactions with consumers, companies are able to project a more human face. It has been widely acclaimed by market research and PR professionals that blogs will be one of the most vital marketing tools in years to come (O’Malley, 2005).

Newer mediums of interaction and socializing like social networking websites are gaining more popularity as a platform for instant messaging. As buzz/ word of mouth is an extremely powerful tool for influencing consumer behavior, social networking sites are useful in cases where people want a first-hand opi