Title: Success and failure factors of social media integration - insights from business experience

Authors: Maha Al-Essa; Imene Ben Yahia

Addresses: HEC Paris in Qatar, Tornado Tower, Doha, Qatar ' High School of Commerce, ARBRE (Applied Research in Business Relationships and Economics) Laboratory, Tunis University, Tunisia

Abstract: This research investigates how companies are coping with the integration of various social media platforms in their marketing strategy. It relies on companies experience with social media to answer to the following questions: What are the success and failure factors of social media integration within a marketing strategy? Which factors to keep common and which ones require adaptation across social media platforms? Qualitative data was collected from 92 companies involved in social media. Content was analysed manually. First, results draw attention to 11 critical factors of success. Seven factors are internal related to the social media management team and to the company strategy and four factors are external linked to the platform tools and usage. Second, seven most reoccurring factors of failure are identified. Results highlight the factors that require adaptation across social media platforms.

Keywords: social media; success factors; failure factors; qualitative study.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEMR.2019.098749

International Journal of Electronic Marketing and Retailing, 2019 Vol.10 No.2, pp.118 - 129

Received: 22 Mar 2017
Accepted: 28 Aug 2017
Published online: 02 Apr 2019 *

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