Chapter 21

Kotler, P. and Keller, K.L. (2017) Marketing Management 15th Edition, Prentice Hall
International, Inc.
Managing Digital Communications: Online, Social Media, And Mobile

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
In this chapter, we will address the following questions:
1. What are the pros and cons of online marketing?
2. How can companies carry out effective social media campaigns?
3. What are some tips for enjoying positive word of mouth?
4. What are important guidelines for mobile marketing?

CHAPTER SUMMARY
1. Online marketing provides marketers with opportunities for much greater interaction
and individualization through well-designed and executed Web sites, search ads, display ads,
and e-mails.
2. Social media come in many forms: online communities and forums, blogs, and social
networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.
3. Social media offer marketers the opportunity to have a public voice and presence
online for their brands and reinforce other communications. Marketers can build or tap into
online communities, inviting participation from consumers and creating a long-term
marketing asset in the process. Social media are rarely the sole source of marketing
communications for a brand.
4. Word-of-mouth marketing finds ways to engage customers so they will choose to talk
positively with others about products, services, and brands. Viral marketing encourages people
to exchange online information related to a product or service.
5. Mobile marketing is an increasingly important form of interactive marketing by which
marketers can use text messages, software apps, and ads to connect with consumers via their
smart phones and tablets.

OPENING THOUGHT
It is important to focus on how and why the traditional view of marketing has changed, and to
introduce the various ways of measuring performance, since they will reappear throughout the
text. Marketing applies to a variety of different areas and is increasingly involving many
levels of the organization. Students who are not marketing majors may have some difficulty
accepting the encompassing role that marketing has on the other functional disciplines within
a firm. For those students who have never been exposed to marketing and its components, the
instructor’s challenge is to educate the students about the world of marketing. The in-class and

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

outside of class assignments noted in this text should help both educate and excite the students
about the “world of marketing.”

TEACHING STRATEGY AND CLASS ORGANIZATION

PROJECTS

1. Semester-Long Marketing Plan Project: At this point in the semester-long project,

students who have decided to market their product/service using social media, referral
programs or buzz marketing should submit their proposals.

2. Ask students to interview someone who manages social media information at a

company about how they track online buzz. Ask students to read Cotton Dello,
“Wells Fargo Command Center to Handle Surge of Social Content,” Advertising Age,
April 8, 2014; Ryan Holmes, “NASA-Style Mission Control Centers for Social Media
Are Taking Off,” www.tech.fortune.cnn.com, October 25, 2012 to inform their
interview questions.

3. Ask students to review the Search Engine Optimization efforts of four of their favorite
Web sites. Students should create a table, which indicates whether each Web site was
implementing SEO guidelines suggested in the chapter, as well as their overall
analysis of each Web site’s search strategy.

ASSIGNMENTS

Ask students to select three emails they received from marketers in the past week and see how
many of the suggestions the Marketing Memo: “How to Maximize the Marketing Value of E-
mails” were incorporated into the messages. Then, ask them to relate the tactics used to their
personal perceptions of the e-mails effectiveness. Based on their analysis, ask them to provide
additional suggestions, if any, for maximizing the marketing value of e-mails.

In a research paper, students are to comb appropriate Internet sites, and documents, illustrating
the power of the “buzz” and “viral marketing” about products and/or services. Which ones do
they think are effective and why?

Have students write a memo to their boss in the industry of their choice that explains how the
firm should manage information from online ratings. Have the students read, “Sinan Aral,
“The Problem with Online Ratings,” MIT Sloan Management Review, Winter 2014, pp. 47–
52. See also Shrihari Sridhar and Raji Srinivasan, “Social Influence Effects in Online Product
Ratings,” Journal of Marketing 76 (September 2012), pp. 70–88; Wendy W. Moe and
Michael Trusov, “The Value of Social Dynamics in Online Product Ratings Forums,” Journal
of Marketing Research 48 (June 2011), pp. 444–56” to help inform their responses.

Ask students to select a campaign that generated buzz and analyze why it caught on, using the
memo “How to Start a Buzz Fire” as a guide. Then, ask them to write up the results of the
analysis, which should include the positive and negative aspects of the buzz marketing effort,
Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.
as well as a consideration of the resources allocated to the effort and alternative ways the
brand could have tried to reach consumers.

END-OF-CHAPTER SUPPORT
MARKETING DEBATE—What is the value of buzz?

One of the classic debates in the popular press is whether all buzz or word of mouth—
positive and negative—is good for a brand. Some feel that “any press is good press” and
that as long as people are talking, that is a good thing. Others challenge that notion and
say the content of the dialogue is what really matters.

Take a position: ”All news is good news” and any buzz is helpful for a brand versus The
content of buzz can make or break a brand.

Pro: Consumers will often remember the brand and not the source of the message (the sleeper
effect), so buzz may be helpful for building brand awareness, particularly for relatively
unknown brands. Due to an increasingly cluttered media market, buzz can help a brand break
through competitive clutter and perceptual barriers.

Con: Consumers are savvy and are most likely to respond favorably to messages that allow
them to differentiate between offerings. Attention-getting tactics that do not provide
information may be viewed as intrusive. Further, consumers desire authentic dialogue with
brands, where their feedback is considered and incorporated. In addition, negative word-of-
mouth is likely to be weighted for heavily than positive word-of-mouth or traditional
advertising in decision-making, particularly if the negative word-of-mouth comes from a
trusted source.

MARKETING DISCUSSION—Corporate Web Sites

Pick one of your favorite brands and go to its Web site. How would you evaluate the Web
site? How well does it score on the 7Cs of design elements: context, content, community,
customization, communication, connection, and commerce?

Suggested Response: Student responses will vary depending on the Web sites they select.
Spend extra time discussing the community and customization Cs, as they are particularly
relevant in the context of social media.

Marketing Excellence: FACEBOOK

1. Why is Facebook unique in the world of personal marketing? What are Facebook’s
greatest strengths?
Suggested Answer: The social networking Web site fulfills people’s desire to
communicate and interact with each other and uses that power to help other companies
target very specific audiences with personalized messages. The site allows users to create
personal profiles with information such as their hometowns, work, educational
background, favorite things, and religious affiliation. It encourages users to extend their

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

network by adding other users as friends, and many people try to see how many “friends”
they can accumulate. Facebook also has a more upscale, educated, desirable
demographic than competitive social networks, so it can charge more for ads. The
company’s greatest strengths lies in the sheer number of members and active users.

2. Who are Facebook’s biggest competitors? What are the greatest risks it faces in the
future?

Suggested Answer: Facebook is a media company, so it competes with other social media and
traditional media firms for advertising dollars. It also competes with search advertising, since
both search ads and Facebook’s personalized ads offer opportunities to provide relevant ads to
consumers. Risks include a new market entrant that supersedes Facebook as a way to
connect, failure to be relevant in an increasingly mobile format, low consumer engagement
with ads, and privacy concerns from users.
3. What does a company gain by having a Facebook page or advertising through
Facebook? What would you think if a brand or company were not on Facebook?

Suggested Answer: Marketers need to communicate with consumers where they are, and
consumers spend a great deal of time on Facebook. Student responses to the question about
brands or companies that are not on Facebook may vary, and is likely to depend on the brand
or company. Companies or brands that desire emotional relationships or two-way
communication are likely to take advantage of Facebook as a platform for communication
exchange. Some students may note that brands may be better off NOT participating in
Facebook if they are not prepared for consumers to co-create communications and/or if the
brand is not appropriately staffed to keep its part of the conversation going.

Marketing Excellence: UNILEVER (Axe and Dove)

1. What makes personal marketing work? Why are Dove and Axe so successful at it?
Suggested Answer: Personal marketing works when the company targets specific age
groups, demographics, and lifestyles with their communication. Dove works because it
targets males who are interested in improving their appeal to the opposite sex. In essence
then the brand Axe becomes aspirational and approachable.
2. Can a company take personal marketing too far? Explain.
Suggested Answer: Student answers will vary from Yes—personal branding can be edgy
and engaging to No—people can “turn off” the personal messages that they find
distasteful.
3. Is there a conflict of interests in the way Unilever markets to women and young men?
Is it undoing all the good that might be done in the “Campaign for Real Beauty” by
making women sex symbols in Axe ads? Discuss.

Suggested Answer: Student answers will vary and calls for judgments on the effectiveness of
the two brands. And secondly, how many consumers identify that Dove and Axe are produced
by the same corporate owner.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Suggested in-class activity: Break the class up into two sections (male and female) and play
both Dove’s campaign for Real Beauty and the Axe commercials (found on YouTube) and
open the classroom up for discussion with this question: Is the Campaign for Real Beauty a
“genuine” attempt by Unilever or is it just a publicity stunt to offset Unilever’s Axe campaign.

DETAILED CHAPTER OUTLINE

Opening Vignette: Marketing communications today increasingly occur as a kind of
personal dialogue between the company and its customers. New technologies have
encouraged companies, like PepsiCo, to move from mass communication to more
targeted, two-way communications. The Internet provides marketers and consumers with
opportunities for much greater interaction and individualization.

I. Online Marketing
A. Advantages of Online Marketing Communications
a. The variety of online communication options means companies can offer or
send tailored information or messages that engage consumers by reflecting
their special interests and behavior.
b. Marketers can easily trace their effects by noting how many unique visitors or
“UVs” click on a page or ad, how long they spend with it, what they do on it,
and where they go afterward
c. Contextual placement, which means marketers can buy ads on sites related to
their own offerings or place advertising based on keywords customers type
into search engines to reach people when they’ve actually started the buying
process.
B. Disadvantages of Online Marketing Communications
a. Consumers can effectively screen out most messages.
b. Marketers may think their ads are more effective than they really are if bogus
clicks are generated by software-powered Web sites.
c. Advertisers also lose some control over their online messages, which can be
hacked or vandalized.
C. Customers define the rules of engagement online
a. They insulate themselves with the help of agents and intermediaries if they so
choose
b. They define what information they need, what offerings they’re interested in,
and what they’re willing to pay
D. Online Marketing Communication Options
a. Web Sites  
i. Companies must design Web sites that embody or express their
purpose, history, products, and vision and that are attractive on first
viewing and interesting enough to encourage repeat visits.
ii. To encourage repeat visits, companies must pay special attention to
context and content factors and constant change.
iii. A site’s performance will be judged on ease of use and physical
attractiveness
1. Ease of use means:

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 a. The site downloads quickly
b. The first page is easy to understand
c. It is easy to navigate to other pages that open quickly
2. Physical attractiveness is ensured when:
a. Individual pages are clean and not crammed with
content
b. Typefaces and font sizes are very readable
c. The site makes good use of color (and sound).
iv. Companies can transform various “touch points” related to privacy on
the Web site into a positive customer experience by:
1. Developing user-centric privacy controls to give customer
control
2. Avoiding multiple intrusions
3. Preventing human intrusion by using automation whenever
possible
v. Companies may employ microsites, individual Web pages or clusters
of pages that function as supplements to a primary site.
b. Search Ads: An important component of online marketing is paid search or
pay-per-click ads.
i. In paid search, marketers bid in a continuous auction on search terms
that serve as a proxy for the consumer’s product or consumption
interests.
ii. Advertisers pay only if people click on the links, but marketers believe
consumers who have already expressed interest by engaging in search
are prime prospects.
iii. Average click-through in terms of the percentage of consumers who
click on a link is about 2 percent, much more than for comparable
online display ads
iv. The cost per click depends on how highly the link is ranked on the
page and the popularity of the keyword.
v. Search engine optimization (SEO) describes activities designed to
improve the likelihood that a link for a brand is as high as possible in
the rank order of all nonpaid links when consumers search for relevant
terms.
1. Broader search terms are useful for general brand building;
more specific ones identifying a particular product model or
service are useful for generating and converting sales leads.
2. Search terms need to be spotlighted on the appropriate pages
of the marketer’s Web site so search engines can easily
identify them.
3. Any one product can usually be identified by means of
multiple keywords, but marketers must bid on each keyword
according to its likely return on revenue.
4. It also helps to have popular sites link back to the marketer’s
Web site.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 c. Display Ads or banner ads are small, rectangular boxes containing text and
perhaps a picture that companies pay to place on relevant Web sites.
i. The larger the audience, the higher the cost.
ii. Internet users spend only 5 percent of their time online actually
searching for information, so display ads still hold great promise
compared to popular search ads
iii. Interstitials are advertisements, often with video or animation, that pop
up between page changes within a Web site or across Web sites.
d. E-mail allows marketers to inform and communicate with customers at a
fraction of the cost of a d-mail, or direct mail, campaign.
i. E-mails can be very productive selling tools.
ii. The rate at which they prompt purchase has been estimated to be at
least three times that of social media ads, and the average order value
is thought to be 17 percent higher
iii. Consumers are besieged by e-mails, though, and many employ spam
filters to halt the flow
iv. Privacy concerns are also growing
v. E-mails must be timely, targeted, and relevant.
1. Give the customer a reason to respond. 
2. Personalize the content of your e-mails. 
3. Offer something the customer can’t get via direct mail. 
4. Make it easy for customers to opt in as well as unsubscribe. 
5. Combine e-mail with other communications such as social
media.
vi. Some researchers are employing “heat mapping,” which tracks eye
movements with cameras to measure what people read on a computer
screen, to improve the effectiveness of their emails.
II. Social Media
A. Social media are a means for consumers to share text, images, audio, and video
information with each other and with companies, and vice versa.
a. Social media allow marketers to establish a public voice and presence online.
b. They can cost-effectively reinforce other communication activities.
c. Because of their day-to-day immediacy, they can also encourage companies to
stay innovative and relevant.
d. Marketers can build or tap into online communities, inviting participation
from consumers and creating a long-term marketing asset in the process.
B. Social Media Platforms include (1) online communities and forums, (2) blogs
(individual blogs and blog networks such as Sugar and Gawker), and (3) social
networks (like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube).
C. Online Communities and Forums
a. Often created by consumers or groups of consumers with no commercial
interests or company affiliations
b. Others are sponsored by companies whose members communicate with the
company and with each other through postings, text messaging, and chat
discussions about special interests related to the company’s products and
brands.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 c. Online communities and forums can be a valuable resource for companies and
fill multiple functions by both collecting and conveying key information.
d. A key for success in online communities is to create individual and group
activities that help form bonds among community members.
e. Information flow in online communities and forums is two-way and can
provide companies with useful, hard-to-get customer information and insights.
f. Firms should avoid too much democratization of innovation or
groundbreaking ideas can be replaced by lowest-common-denominator
solutions
D. Blogs, regularly updated online journals or diaries, have become an important outlet
for word of mouth.
a. Blogs bring together people with common interests.
b. Corporations are creating their own blogs and carefully monitoring those of
others.
c. Popular blogs are creating influential opinion leaders.
d. Because many consumers examine product information and reviews contained
in blogs, the Federal Trade Commission has also taken steps to require
bloggers to disclose their relationship with marketers whose products they
endorse.
e. At the other extreme, some consumers use blogs and videos as a means of
getting retribution for a company’s bad service or faulty products.
E. Social networks have become an important force in both business-to-consumer and
business-to-business marketing
a. Different networks offer different benefits to firms.
b. Twitter can be an early warning system that permits rapid response
c. Facebook allows deeper dives to engage consumers in more meaningful ways
d. Marketers are still learning how to best tap into social networks and their huge,
well-defined audiences
e. Users are generally there looking to connect with others—attracting attention
and persuading are more challenging.
f. Given that users generate their own content, ads may find themselves
appearing beside inappropriate or even offensive material.
F. Using Social Media: only some consumers want to engage with some brands, and,
even then, only some of the time
a. Social media may not be as effective in attracting new users and driving brand
penetration.
b. Consumers are most likely to engage with media, charities, and fashion and
least likely to engage with consumer goods.
c. Although consumers may use social media to get useful information or deals
and promotions or to enjoy interesting or entertaining brand-created content, a
much smaller percentage want use social media to engage in two-way
“conversations” with brands.
III. Word of Mouth
A. Word of mouth (WOM) is a powerful marketing tool, one of the most effective drivers
of its sales in some cases, along with unaided advertising awareness.
B. Forms of Word of Mouth

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 a. Most word of mouth is offline: 75 percent face to face and 15 percent over the
phone.
b. Viral marketing is a form of online word of mouth, or “word of mouse,” that
encourages consumers to pass along company-developed products and
services or audio, video, or written information to others online
C. Creating Word-of-Mouth Buzz
a. Brands discussed offline are often those that are salient and visible and come
easily to mind.
b. Research has shown that consumers tend to generate positive WOM
themselves and share information about their own positive consumption
experiences.
c. They tend to only transmit negative WOM and pass on information they heard
about others’ negative consumption experiences.
d. In deciding whether to contribute to social media, consumers can be motivated
by intrinsic factors such as whether they are having fun or learning, but more
often they are swayed by extrinsic factors such as social and self-image
considerations
e. Advice for getting a viral ad shared:
i. Utilize brand pulsing so the brand is not too intrusive within the video;
ii. Open with joy or surprise to hook those fickle viewers who are easily
bored;
iii. Build an emotional roller coaster within the ad to keep viewers
engaged throughout;
iv. Surprise but don’t shock—if an ad makes viewers too uncomfortable,
they are unlikely to share it.
f. Companies can help create buzz for their products or services, and media and
advertising are not always necessary for it to occur.
g. Viral marketing tries to create a splash in the marketplace to showcase a brand
and its noteworthy features.
i. Some believe viral marketing efforts are driven more by the rules of
entertainment than by the rules of selling
ii. The success of any viral or word-of-mouth buzz campaign depends on
the willingness of consumers to talk to other consumers
h. Customer reviews can be especially influential, but can be biased or fake
i. Research has shown that social influence can lead to disproportionally
positive online ratings, and subsequent raters are more likely to be
influenced by previous positive ratings than negative ones.
ii. Consumers posting reviews are susceptible to conformity pressures
and adopting norms of others
iii. Positive online reviews or ratings are often not as influential or valued
as much as negative ones
i. Companies can try to stimulate personal influence channels to work on their
behalf.
j. Certain steps can improve the likelihood of starting positive buzz:
i. Identify influential individuals and companies and devote extra effort
to them

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 ii. Supply key people with product samples
iii. Work through community influential
iv. Develop word-of-mouth referral channels to build business
v. Provide compelling information that customers want to pass along
k. A customer’s value to a company depends in part on his or her ability and
likelihood of making referrals and engaging in positive word of mouth
l. Rungs on the customer loyalty ladder (in ascending order):
i. Satisfaction—Sticks with your organization as long as expectations are
met.
ii. Repeat purchase—Returns to your company to buy again.
iii. Word of mouth/buzz—Puts his or her reputation on the line to tell
others about you.
iv. Evangelism—Convinces others to purchase/join.
v. Ownership—Feels responsible for the continued success of your
organization.
D. Measuring the Effects of Word of Mouth
a. Many marketers concentrate on the online effects of word of mouth, given the
ease of tracking them through advertising, PR, and digital agencies.
b. Through demographic information or proxies for that information and cookies,
firms can monitor when customers blog, comment, post, share, link, upload,
friend, stream, write on a wall, or update a profile.
c. Other researchers focus more on characterizing the source of word of mouth.
d. More firms are setting up technologically advanced central locations to direct
their online tracking efforts.
i. Teams might monitor blog conversations, track sentiment, and, based
on feedback, make appropriate changes to the company’s marketing
on its Web page and elsewhere.
ii. The team also has to decide when it is appropriate to intervene in an
online conversation and when it is not.
iii. Any post that includes a query directly about the brand or that reflects
a misunderstanding is usually an opportunity for the team to weigh in,
but as one team member notes, “If they want to talk about working
out, we let them have that conversation.”
IV. Mobile Marketing
A. The Scope of Mobile Marketing
a. Mobile device is uniquely tied to one user
b. It is virtually always “on” given it is typically carried everywhere
c. It allows for immediate consumption because it is in effect a channel of
distribution with a payment system
d. It is highly interactive given it allows for geotracking and picture and video
taking.
B. Major opportunity for advertisers to reach consumers on the “third screen” (TV and
the computer are the first and second
a. Mobile apps can perform useful functions—adding convenience, social value,
incentives, and entertainment and making consumers’ lives a little or a lot
better.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 b. Mobile coupons are getting more popular and offset redemption declines in
traditional coupons
c. Although the cookies that allow firms to track online activity don’t typically
work in wireless applications, technological advances are making it easier to
track users across their smart phones and tablets too.
d. With user privacy safeguards in place, marketers’ greater knowledge of cross-
screen identities (online and mobile) can permit more relevant, targeted ads.
e. New measurement techniques are also aiding the adoption of mobile
marketing.
C. Developing Effective Mobile Marketing Programs: the Web experience can be very
different for users given smaller screen sizes, longer download times, and the lack of
some software capabilities.
a. Marketers are wise to design simple, clear, and clean sites, paying even greater
attention than usual to user experience and navigation.
b. Being concise is critical with mobile messaging
i. Mobile ad copy should occupy only 50 percent of the screen, avoiding
complex viewing experiences that may take a toll on consumers’
battery and data availability as well as on their time.
ii. Brands should limit their ads to a pair of phrases—the offer and the
tagline.
iii. Brands should place their logo in the corner of the mobile ad frame.
iv. Ads should use at least one bright color, but no more than two. Calls to
action should be highlighted with a bright color.
D. Mobile Marketing across Markets: U.S. marketers can learn much about mobile
marketing by looking overseas.
a. In developed Asian markets such as Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, and South
Korea, mobile marketing is fast becoming a central component of customer
experiences
b. In developing markets, high smart-phone penetration also makes mobile
marketing attractive.
c. As marketers learn more about effective mobile campaigns from all over the
world, they are figuring out how to adapt these programs to work in their
markets.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.