Customer Relationship Marketing: Digital Marketing and Social Media

In Chapter 10, we examine the intricate relationship between digital and social media marketing and customer–brand relationship. First, we discuss how digital technologies are changing marketing strategies by way of search engine advertising, mobile marketing, and the Internet of Things (IoT), followed by a framework of digital marketing that links the five ‘C’s: (1) customers, (2) collaborators, (3) competitors, (4) context, and the (5) company. The next part of this chapter relates to social media marketing and relationship marketing. We discuss social media marketing followed by two frameworks of social media: (1) contingency framework of social commerce and (2) the functional blocks framework. We then discuss and provide an assessment of the critical issues in the implementation of social media marketing. In particular, we discuss seven functions: (1) identity function, (2) conversation function, (3) sharing function, (4) presence function, (5) relationship function, (6) reputation function, and (7) group function. Finally, we summarize the seven steps to social media success for firms (Kumar and Mirchandani, 2012). At the end of the chapter, we provide key takeaways and conclude with discussion questions and HBS and Ivey cases. But first, to give a flavor of customer relationship marketing (CRM) in an age of digital technologies and social media, we provide some real-life vignettes.