Background
Social media through advent of smartphones has made the information higher than it was previously (Agnihotri et al., 2016). Customers are frequently asking to follow social companies such as “Facebook”, “Twitter”, “LinkedIn” and “Instagram”. Consumers are being connected with brands, more knowledgeable product selections as well as buyer-seller relevance. From the perspective of strength of sales, it could be asserted that social media must be an inseparable segment repertoire of an industry. It could permit salesperson to engage with consumers and construct social capital that would inspire consumers to communicate, involve and establish association with them.
Social media have direct and indirect implication on customer loyalty and satisfaction. Generally, with increased communication and interaction, an enhance in “Buyer-seller collaboration” and “Co-creation” is observed (Guesalaga, 2016). Competence of Organization and assurance with “Social media” are vital determining factor of “Social media” that estimates sales and trades of social media. The organizational commitment and competence are the key factors to enhance the brand value of any product (Verhoef et al., 2015). There has been a rise in the interest in the use of online marketing and even in the social media and therefore it is seen that various kind of new mobile applications are being developed that is useful for the rise in sales for the products and services. The internet users can make use of these applications in order to participate in conversations that are online and accordingly search for individuals who have similar interests. Ashley, & Tuten (2015) in their research addressed the fact that there has been considerable rise in the level of researches and studies that are related to the use of “Social media”, which has an impression on the experiences of the customers and their satisfaction with respect to the use of mobile applications.
The actual reason that has behind selecting this topic related to the experience of the customers with the utilisation of the “Social media” and mobile applications in the fashion industry has primarily been due to the individual interest on this topic. In several researches that have been undertaken, it is seen that the consumers have faced several kinds of issues in relation to the purchasing products and services and accordingly interacting with the companies (Nadeem et al., 2015). In this manner, the consumers have been looking for a better mode of making transactions and interacting with the businesses and therefore have searched online platforms with the help of which these issues can be mitigated.
Social Media and Customer Loyalty
Choi et al., (2016) addressed that with the rise in the level of attractiveness of the social media, the conventional media that was existent earlier has lost its popularity in the current time period. Hence, a lack of reassurance about the two-way communication process among the fashion products and the consumers have been found to be noticeable. Therefore, several issues can be created among the consumers in accordance to having knowledge pattern and the trend that is existent in the fashion industry. It is therefore due to this factor that focus on the fashion industry has increased in the current time period. Earlier, most of the clothing was manufactured either from home or with the assistance of the tailors. However, with the advent of time, there have been changes in the tastes and preferences of the consumers and accordingly there has been a change in the demands from the customers as well (Kumar et al., 2016). In this manner, the fashion industry all over the globe have been developing and accordingly for meeting the demands of the consumers. The development of the fashion industry has again been because of the development of innovative technologies and tools in the information technology sector and it is seen that there has been a rise in the need and advanced tools as well (Hofacker et al., 2016). The development of the “Social media” has been due to the construction of several social websites. The social media websites have acted as an online shopping platform where the sellers have been looking to tract their customers who are interacting in social media. Gürhan-Canli et al., (2016) addressed that development of the science and technologies have led to the development of mobile applications and mobile applications have been mainly used in the fashion industry in order to increase their level of sales.
Bigne et al., (2018) cited that social media explains the blend of three aspects and they have been user communities, user content and web technologies. The fashion companies have been addressing and communicating with their target market with the help of making use of the “Social media” platform and the platforms that are mainly used have been “Instagram”, “Twitter”, “Facebook” and several other platforms. Social media on the other hand even assists the bloggers and the decision makers to create an impact on the of “Decision-making” process among the consumers and thereby all the companies that are within the fashion industry has equivalent source of branding their themselves and increase their market share with the help of the rise in sales.
The Role of Social Media in the Fashion Industry
Schivinski, & Dabrowski (2016) addressed that the experiences of the consumers have a significant role to play in the rise in the level of sales for a company. In this manner, it has been viewed that the satisfaction and the level of experience among the customers with respite to social media and the use of mobile applications determine the extent of sales that the company are able to experience. The consumers in the current time period are looking for better and innovative services and the use of the mobile apps motivates them to make their purchases in a better way because of the fact that unlike the conventional mode of purchase, the consumers can purchase any fashion product with the help of the app from any location and even get to choose from a variety of items. The product they purchase gets delivered to their location and thereby they get to save their time. However, Xiang et al., (2015) discovered that there are several negative impacts as well, which may have an impact on the customers and may induce them from making further purchases and therefore an analysis on this topic has become essential.
The social media is an advancing platform that assists in the recognition of several brands and popularity of the designers who are associated with the fashion industry while giving out a contribution with respect to the interaction among the companies and the customers. Even though the industry has been developing but it still does not comprise of the standards that are industry based with respect to the success and the utilisation of the social media equipment like Twitter, Facebook etc. The social media platform is beneficial for the fashion industry in order to gather feedback and thereby leads to transparency (Blázquez, 2014).
The role of “Social media” in the fashion industry has led to significant amount of feedbacks and opinions where suggestions have been provided with respect to collections and the styles that would be constructed in order to make the designer and their products popular in the market. However, the observations indicate that social media especially the use of mobile applications have not yet been very much effective as most of the companies of the fashion industry are not able to make use of the applications in an effective manner as there are unavailability of the effective strategies and plans that would be capable to develop the use of “Social media” and “Mobile applications”. In this manner, the customers have different kinds of experiences and therefore assessment of the same is required in order to have an understanding of the effectiveness of the usage of “Social media” and “Mobile applications” in the “Fashion industry”.
Mobile Applications and the Fashion Industry
The aim of the research has been to discover the fact that fashion industry has restructure after the use of the mobile applications. The aim even looks to have an idea of how the customer experiences on social media and mobile apps have been influential for the development of the fashion industry as well as the experiences of the customers.
The research objectives that is related to this paper are as follows:
- To assess the experiences of the customers with respect to the social media and development of mobile apps on fashion industry
- To verify the impact of “Social media marketing” and “Customer relationship”
- To examine impact of customer relationships with respect to the purchase intentions
The key question of the research is:
“Is there any statistical significance between Customer Satisfaction and Social Media Marketing with the help of Mobile application in case of Fashion industry?”
The hypothesis is the presumed assertion that is generated for showing queries created by research aims and research questions. The considered research hypothesis is:
Null hypothesis (H0): There exists a linear statistical significance between Customer Satisfaction and Social Media Marketing.
Alternative hypothesis (HA): There does not exist a linear statistical significance between Customer Satisfaction and Social Media Marketing.
The topic that has been considered in this paper has the intention of discovering the process using “Social media” and “Mobile applications” according to the experiences of the customers in the fashion industry. In the current time period, there has been several researches that have been undertaken on this topic as numerous issues have been identified on this topic. The demand for online marketing has been developing from the last decade and accordingly new and improved technologies and tools are being introduced, that assists in the development of online marketing especially in the “Fashion industry” (Zhang et al., 2017). The development of the mobile applications has incorporated several transformations in the market and even in the mindset of the customers. Therefore, the analysis on this topic would be helpful in creating an actual understanding of the experiences of the customers in accordance to these developments and whether these developments are a boon for them or a loss.
The research report highlights the social media applications with two-way commination abilities that results theoretical and practical implications (Go & You, 2016). According to Nadeem et al. (2015), customers gradually search for products purchase via “Social media and websites” that is affecting level of faith, attitudes towards “Online retailing” and “Online shopping” behaviours. Hence, the study highlights on the “Online shopping” and retailing via social websites that enhanced “Website service quality” affecting trust of the consumer, “Loyalty attitudes” and “E-tailing”.
The process of “Social media” process in the “Fashion industry” constitutes of the specific factors with respect to the conventional process of marketing. For having an “Understanding of the experiences” of the customers and their intentions regarding the purchase, there are several factors that may have a positive impact on the extent of intimacy. The companies that are functioning in the fashion industry therefore tries to incorporate the entertainment component within the activities that are undertaken in the social media and laying some stress on these factors can lead to the development of the customer relationship and the purchase intention of the customers.
Research Objectives
The traditional brands in the current time period have understood the essentiality of the development of mobile applications (Parker, & Wang 2016). The fashion companies therefore need to be initiate several actions and needs to discover suitable processes in order to incorporate the customer-based applications with respect to the distinctiveness that needs to be developed.
The revolutions that have taken place in the social media with respect to the fashion industry creates used created context in order to develop the interactions among the brands, designers and their customers. The development of social media has led to extensive impacts in the fashion industry and has expressed how it has been able to generate a stable dialogue and the instant feedback to the customers. Ramanathan et al., (2017) explained that the customers are the active value generators and focuses in social networking and therefore are no longer submissive receivers of the messages received from the market. It is due to this factor, that there has been a change in the balance and therefore developments in the online social media sites and company based mobile applications.
The explanation of the power in the fashion industry in the current time period is correlated to the impact that these factors have on the customers and the critics have just explained that opposition has been made in the selling of the products and their advertising. One of the most significant impact has been that it leads to the creation of brand and thereby development in consumer feedback and their opinions. Lemon, & Verhoef (2017) addresses that this has been the aspect many other researchers have looked upon to be the most important when explaining a new potential for establishment. The most reputed fashion products are-
- Cosmetics
- Costume Jewellery
- Casual footwear
- Casual clothing
- Fashionistas
- Social shopper.
Hansen, & Sia (2015) explains that social media establishes a marketing promise, which is essential for a business and it has an effective potential for being a customer service medium for the retailers. The reaction that is seen immediately and the explanations that social media permits and encourages leads to a trust development relationship among the fashion designers and the customers. This online networking is helping the global economy to be an unprecedented extent to access the fashion professionals.
According to Pagani, & Malacarne (2017), the incorporation internet in the process of marketing is not expensive, delivers immediate reach to the international level, offers a great amount of time suggestions and reaches out to the several customers who use web to be the centre of the all kinds of communications. Social media is a process with the help of which the fashion designers and the publications can undertake discussions in order to understand in a better way regarding the concerns and the desires of their customers. By making utilisation of the “Social media” as a tool, it is seen to be an efficient marketing strategy and therefore fashion industry can reveal the examination of the pattern and the inspiration of the customers. The social media websites provide the power to the fashion designers with the capability to capitalise and recognise the factors that are demanding and the increasing in the patterns that can make all the differences to a brand of fashion and even on the margin of the retailers.
Research Question
According to Carter, & Yeo (2016), the most active websites of the social media have assisted in creating better access among the fashion brands and the customers thereby making the fashion brands look to be more open and transparent. Due to the popular responses of the customers in the favour of the transparency of the organizations, the social networking websites can definitely lead to rise in the trust among the customers. From the view point of the public reactions, the advantages of the “Social media” usage in the “Fashion industry” initiates from the enhanced relationship among the designers and the customers. Hew et al., (2016) discovered that the professionals related to public relations have had an idea that social media establishes a platform for an open discussion with the public that leads to better interactions and communications and thereby increased the topics that have been unexpected that assists in the improvements of the relationships.
The development in the popularity of the “Social media” has been addressed by the social capital theory explains that the average of the real and the latent resources that are connected to the ownership of a network that is durable of greater or less better associations of the common identification and acquaintance. Social capital concentrates on the optimisms with regards to sociability and does not consider the features that are less attractive. It concentrates on placing those positive outcomes in the model that has an extensive explanation of the capital and demands attention towards how such non-monetary factors can be an essential source of influence and power (Piotrowicz, & Cuthbertson 2014). With respect to the social media, social capital is looked upon to be the relationship that is generated with the help of networking. The profits that are accrued from the membership of a group are the foundation of the solidarity that actually makes them possible. The social networks are not provided and therefore needs to be established with the help of social capital with the help of which the actors can gain entry to the economic resources, rise in the use of the culture-based capital with the help of the contacts with the professionals and the entities of refinement and thereby can affiliate with the organizations. This process is influenced by the social theory that assesses the culture of the social media: the social capital is influenced on the outlets of the social media and thereby benefits the group owners of the societies.
Hypothesis
Kim et al., (2015) cited that in cases where most of the conventional advertising process depends on the concepts associated to motivation and undertaking selections under the scenario of uncertainty, social media survives in the world of creating relationship. Agnihotri et al., (2016) explained that liking and reciprocity are the concepts for the construction of relationship in the process of social networking and it is seen that reciprocity is used in the social media acts as a dialogue that influences the process of feedback and engagement that leads to the development of liking. Without the compelling process of social capital, the tools associated to social media would become ineffective.
The significance of making utilization of the “Social media” by the “Fashion industry” and the brands is in forecasting the demand that will be seen in the future for the collections and the products. Forecasting analytical tools undertake a comparison of the past patterns with the current topic that is being explained in order to make a statement that the fashion winners have made use of the analytical tools in order to undertake the interactions through social media in order to gain the actual feedback regarding where the fashion is going and what the customers have in mind regarding the designs that are upcoming. The social media websites have upgraded with respect to the ones who control the patterns and the topics related to the fashion industry for effective responses from the public, from the process of merchandising to transparency of the designs in order to enhance promotions. Park et al., (2016) explained that social media and technology has enhanced the interactions with the public and inputs in all the aspects of the fashion industry and this can take place with the help of live streaming from several demanding fashion shows, online shopping, bloggers attaining their seats within the fashion editors and the icons and several tweets that provides a virtual seat. Hagberg et al., (2016) explained that when talking about social media, normal idea is about the online platforms and the websites that assist the fashion industry to interact with the consumers by making use of the innovative technologies related to social networking. The popular social networking websites addresses the brands that they need to undertake participations and thereby generate dialogues with the individuals who interact online. It is seen that there are certain outlets of the social media are developing but there have been observations that there have been several social media websites and applications that have not been able to offer the same.
Conclusion
The renowned and the popular social networking sites permits their users to post status and even photos and even connect to the other users of the network. The sites of the social media allow several kinds of interactions among the users and undertake interference within the browsers within the indexing of the contents that are published. These social websites have upgraded the conventional press platforms and the values as the releases given out the press can be reported and can be forwarded to the conventional media sources and thereafter can be posted to the page of the company that is available in the social networking website.
However, not all the social media websites are driven by words, as there are several applications and websites that function based on photos and these pictures are open for comments. According to Goworek et al., (2016), leadership that is seen within a profession may not be in need of an extensive prominence in the aspect of the social media as those who are popular in accordance to the others within the same group are likely to observe the social media value for themselves individually. The fashion industry in this manner is relatively new within the social media and therefore the mainstream users are still in doubt regarding the credibility of these kinds of websites and the outlets (Go, & You 2016). The purpose of those within the “Fashion industry” for accessing the scene of the “Social media” are even not certain as the several previous researches have indicated that social media applications rarely are able to display the construction of dialogue and relationship among the users who are functioning the accounts of the fashion companies. As there has been an observation that certain social media websites have been unable to operate in the market in a successful manner, there are several professionals who have feared of making use of social media within their marketing promotion for the fashion industry.
With the establishment of “Social media” equipment in the current years, the public relation professionals had to bring in alterations regarding how the customers and the designers communicate and how the public reacts to the materials related to the public relations. According to Tarute et al., (2016), it is the liability of the professionals of the public relations to look after the social media and the online conversations. The public relation shops have played an essential in the creation, development and execution of the social and the digital exertion of the vital customers. A section of the public relation promotions are inclusive campaigns on the social media and presence and the assessment and the participation within the comments and the discussions that are made by the customers. Jara et al., (2014) addressed that the marketers are discovering because of the digital and the guidance of the “Social media” and therefore the public relations have observed developments from the present customers and lead to better relationships with the customer management officers and a better course for the pitch for the new business activities.
The literature that has been constructed in this paper has looked to address the several aspects and the elements that are related to the development of social media and accordingly have even addressed the benefits and the limitations that have been observed and, in this manner, a better observation about the utilization of “Social media” in the fashion industry has been observed that would be useful for the determination of analysis in this current research paper.
The methodology constitutes of what kind of data would be used for the purpose of taking assessment on this topic and the process that would be utilised to gather the data in an effective way. The sample size to gather the data is even highlighted in this section and thereby the design and the approach that is ideal for this research is even explained. This assists the researcher and the reader to have a clear idea about the data that has been gathered and the process that has been used for the purpose of collecting relevant and authentic data.
There are numerous kinds of methodologies that can be used for the purpose of undertaking analysis. The current paper tries to undertake an analysis of the experiences of the customers with respect to the use of the “Social media” in the “Fashion industry” and therefore secondary data analysis would be used for the reason of collecting the data. Hence, quantitative data analysis should be used by the researcher in order to gather the most precise and authentic results.
The researcher in this paper has applied deductive approach as the researcher has used models and theories that are already available in the economy and is not looking to incorporate and create any new theory or framework in order to gain the final outcome of the paper (Royle, & Laing 2014).
The research that is currently been undertaken is analytical in nature. The topic looks to create an understanding of the experiences of the customers in accordance to the utilisation of “Social media” in the fashion industry and therefore explanatory as well as descriptive statistics would be used for the purpose of framing the design. The exploratory aspect would explore the several aspects that is associated to the data and accordingly would even explain the overall proficiencies of the data (Chae, & Ko 2016). On the other hand, the descriptive design would undertake an extensive explanation of the data that has been collected with the help of which the researcher can bring out the original element of the data that can be used for the purpose of analysis.
“Random Sampling Technique” has been usd by the researcher for selecting the respondents from the large pool of the customer who are residing in Australia and have been undertaking purchases of the fashionable products. Out of the large pool a total of 70 respondents have been selected for this research in order to gather their experience on the social media in the fashion industry.
The researcher in order to collect the data has undertaken survey analysis in which close ended questions are framed within the questionnaire and accordingly these questionnaires are forwarded to the selected respondents in order to gather their responses (Homburg et al., 2017).
“Secondary data” assistances with essential source which could respond to the questions of the researcher. The “Secondary data” contains compiled and raw data that is grouped in “Documentary data”, “Official data”, “Website stored data”, “Surveyed data” and “Multiple source data” simultaneously.
Because research purpose, the data analyst utilised “Multiple resources” of secondary data. The multiple-source secondary data is used for multiple sources of secondary data and the combination of data sources. Several internet websites used in this research with “Online data” include “Qualitative data” and statistics from “Social media” relevant articles, surveys and reports.
The researcher has maintained the code of ethics and therefore has all the data that has been gathered has come from true and reliable source and does not have any false statements and recordings (Chen & Lin 2015). Therefore, the data that would be used for the purpose of analysis is true and fair and thereby outcome would valid as well.
The data analysing procedure is the method of emphasizing the “Significant information” by “Cleaning”, “Transcribing” and “Coding” of collected data. The data analysis helps to establish theory and draw conclusions. In this research report, secondary data analysis is accomplished.
“Secondary data” are the information that already exist and published in data storages. According to Rew et al. (2000), the secondary data reveals “A set of Endeavours” that utilises the data to respond to the “Research questions” that may have been projected while the “Original data” was gathered. Based on the research study, the secondary data analysis is carried out to collect and analyse information in the “Data Analysis” chapter on how social networks have enhanced e-trading for fast trading business, that increases customer satisfaction also (Yuan, Kim & Kim, 2016). These secondary data sources are the “Scientific journal” articles on “Google Scholar”, “Electronic Books” and “Websites” such as the “Background information” of the fashion companies.
According to N Markova (2012), the number of users visiting different websites with the help of different web applications have colossal enhancement. Common people spend more time behind communicating and searching. As per the statistics of internet world, more than 2 billion of “Global Online” participants and more than 1 billion users contribute in “Social media” (Lunden 2012).
Among all the social networking sites, “Facebook” is the major and crucial “Social-networking website” in the globe that ties organisation with the people. “Facebook” provides important link between consumers, content, data and companies. The most vigorous “General audience” of “Facebook” is “18 years to 24 years old”. “LinkedIn” is also mostly handled by the people of “18 years to 24 years old”. “Blog” is an “Online diary” or “Journal”, consistently restructured and came across in opposite “Chronological order” on “Webpages”. Bloggers help the fashion brands more involved in and reserved by the “Personal attitude” and “Action”. According to Cass (2017), marketing is used for understanding the customer requirements and a corporate blog creates the scope of learning about the concerns of customers for getting their feedback and enhance better product and service. “Youtube” is also another audience attracting website that primarily attracts the visitors of 18 years to 34 years old.
Many businesses are getting leverages from several kinds of “Social media” and “Mobile devices”. Social media is being transformed in the manner how “Social channels” and “Social Information” about consumers are being utilised by “Marketers”. As per Forrester Research in 2008, 75% operators of “Social media” communicate with the help of “Social Networking Websites”, “Reading” or “Commenting” on social media posts or giving “Reviews” to “Shopping sites”. This number indicates a significant rise from 56% in 2007.
Marketing profs (2012) published the ranking of top 50 websites, where-
- “Google” (rank =1, visitors = 187 million).
- “Facebook” (rank = 4, visitors = 150 million).
- “LinkedIn” (rank = 26, visitors = 39 million).
- “Twitter” (rank = 27, visitors = 36 million).
- “Pinterest” (rank = 50, visitors = 25 million).
Global popularity of online marketing and social media specifically is rapidly evolving. Now days, more than 76% of business ate utilising social media marketing and 16% of fashion brands adopted it by the end of 2012.
The survey of “Social marketing trends” of 2012 refers that 76% people arranges social marketing followed by 16% people who are planning to make social marketing in the current year. Only 6% people neither made any social marketing nor had any plan to make “Social media” marketing in the current session.
According to the research report of N. Natalia (2012), most of the people are using Social media for marketing purpose for 1 year to 3 years.
40% people expense weekly time 1-5 hours commitment for Social Media marketing followed by the 40% people who expense weekly time commitment 5-9 hours per week.
Since 2000, the “Online revenues” for “Fashion products” increased from 25% to 30%. The “Fashion industry” of clothing and make up items has emerged with many retailers undertaking global expansion for operating internationally. “Fast fashion” is indicated to be the change of “Fashionable designs” into “Articles” that could be bought by the “Public”. As per Manneh (2017), “Social media” is being a “General marketing” and “Communicating strategy” that was estimated to increase at a rate of 34% annually. As per Sands, Harper and Ferraro (2011), by 2014, the usage would have stretched to USD$3.1 billion. The data analysis by those researchers also suggest that approximately 70% of consumers who visited social networking websites collect information of product and 49% consumers buy commodities on the basis of data collected with the help of social media.
The total amount of e-sales in recent years in case of fashion industry has enhanced along with higher number of Online buyers. As per Sismeiro and Bucklin (2004), approximately 70% of the “Internet user” browed, “Compared products” and examined in social websites in 2000. However, more than 65% of the sampled people did not utilised the internet for making a proper purchase. It has been discovered that the rates of change are less than 2% for the estimation of 70% of the commercial sites surveyed and varied in the range of 1% to 4%.
As per Bulut and Dogan (2017), it has been investigated that 58% of the samples taken under consideration use one of the social medias available online. There are 56% of the users visit “Facebook”, 14% of the users visit “LinkedIn”, 11% of the users visit “Twitter” and 9% users visit “Google+” websites. A total of 1.5 billion people uses “Facebook” and 200 million users use “Tumblr”, “Baidu”, “Twitter”, “Instagram” and “Google+” applications in their mobiles.
For online shopping brand, celebrity and bloggers are the most influential factors. The dependent variables for online shopping are “Recognition”, “Information search”, “Choosing of alternatives”, “Purchase decision” and “Post purchase behaviour”. As per Dr. Nasseraldeen (2017), brand image of the products and customer satisfaction has strong positive significant association with Social media marketing.
As per comments and feedback, online shopping websites are enhancing the purchase of customer loyalty and satisfaction (Ali and Sankaran, 2010). As per Koivulehto (2017), significance of “SMM activities”, “Value equity”, “Relationship equity” and “Brand equity” have significant linear association with Social media marketing.
The research analysis aims to regulate the influence of “Social media” marketing on the “Fashion industry”. It is also a fact of investigation how beneficial it is for the “Fashion industry” to execute “Online platforms” in the “Marketing strategies” of the reputed brands. In order to have the better understanding, the secondary data is collected on the basis of questionnaires. The questionnaire involves a total of 14 closed-ended questions and out of these 2 closed-ended questions are demographic questions. The findings in the result section refer that most of the responders either agree or strongly agree that social media is necessary for online marketing. The popularity and necessity of social media is also unquestionable. Customers prefer the social media marketing and mobile applications for surfing various popular brands of fashion products. They believe that social media is enhancing the effectiveness and popularity of the outlets of various fashion products. According to them, the government is also taking initiatives for improving the connectivity of social media and common people. The designers, consumers and publishers of fashion industry are getting benefitted due to the social media marketing in fashion industry. Not only that, the customers are getting satisfaction due to reliable quality of the fashion products. They are happy with the variety and quality of the branded products advertised in the social networks (McCarthy, 2013). These are attracted towards the advertisements of the fashion product brands. Fashion product brands are also focusing on the enhancement of customer experience and social media marketing. The findings of the results obtain that “Social media” and “Fashion industry” are dependent to each other. Not only that, “Social media” and “Fashion industry” have a weak but significant association between themselves.
The outcomes of the current research are same as the previous research. This explanatory research reveals customers prefer generally traditional marketing. However, these days, they have a natural feeling about fashion profile with the help of social media. Customers, these days, are getting more informed about fashion brands through social media like Facebook, Instagram or Twitter than traditional media such as TV and radio. The social media is also more active than press media alike newspaper or magazines. Some articles refer that traditional marketing is still vibrant these days. The reason is that generation of brand consciousness among customers as “Social media” platforms can achieve a “Particular target market”.
Because of the familiar business model, the fashion brands use the “Social media” as a tool of their “Marketing Strategy”. “Social media” is found in every place in the world of marketers, whereby their increasing standing was rapidly comprehended by the trading of fashion brands. Fashion brands have a strong consideration of what “Social media” can do for their trades, whereby the brands have established a pure strategy of process of improving the experience of consumers and opinions of fashion brands.
Hence, the significant association of Social media marketing and customer satisfaction was found. The moderating variables in the field of fashion world is found to be purchase decision and purchase intention of the customers. The social media marketing of the chosen brands comprises the distinctive constitutes with respect to the performances of traditional marketing. To assess the customer experience and customer satisfaction, the positive indicating variables are found to be purchase intention, purchase decision-making, trend of trusts and interaction. The acceptance and approach towards purchase decisions also depends on advertisements visualised by the social networking websites. All the reputed fashion brands in current times understand the significance of mobile application development. The fact is extracted that loyalty-based dynamics could be the proper selection of augmenting fashion experience by including the customer emotionally by installing the values in their minds.
As per Golafshani (2003), it is crucial for any “Qualitative researcher” to contemplate the “Validity” and “Reliability” of the researcher when the researcher enterprises the “Study”, analyse the “Outcomes” and judges the “Quality”. Brink (1993) informed that numerous quantitative researchers attempts for avoiding the term of reliability and validity and utilise the terms alike trust, credibility, consistency, trustworthiness, confirmability and trust. The data set is fully reliable and up to the mark of reliability and validity of the data set.
As per Laura Elizabeth (2011), the “Social media” is linking the “Fashion brands” on a “Personal level” that that as revert is hampering the “Fashion retail industry” in various paths by giving a platform to communicate with customers and promote their commodities. The association with “Social media” generates link between “Brands” and “Consumers” for driving “Sales” in future. Not only that, the utilization of “Social media” over these years throughout all “Demographic regions” has dramatically enlarged. The data gathered with the help of “Subject survey” proposes that the “Fashion brands” should endure to use “Creative Online Marketing” policies to engross consumers “Directly and more personally” with “Fashion brands”.
The establishment of internet has supported numerous number of fashion brands for using “Social media” as the “Trading strategy”. The enhancement of “E-commerce” trading in each kind of business dimensions have enhanced across the previous few years. Inauguration of online outlets for trades have become a preferable way for e-commerce companies. This process dictates the vital trading strategy of the fashion brands. The e-trading of fashion brands should be positively criticised as the fashion brands will try to make their consumers happy for avoiding the negative comments in the forthcoming future. Tsaiminos and Dimistriadis (2014) stated that social media does not permit companies of fashion industry to interact their consumers to share information among themselves. It naturally increases the satisfaction level of the customers. The respondents have mentioned the consumers to purchase their fashion products by online websites. The items that are displayed in the analysis can influence the purchasing decision of the consumers. The communication between customers and fashion brands with the link of social media influences the purchasing decisions of fashion products. The satisfaction of the products is the ultimate point of focus of the fashion brands. The variety, amount, quality and delivery time are the deciding factors for decision making that might improve the customer loyalty (Bruce & Daly, 2006).
The usability of social media for fashion industries could be an effective method for increasing the credibility of trading by revealing beneficial information and for creating trades. As per Kirtis and Karahan (2011), “Social media” is found to be beneficial for both customers and fashion brands.
5.2 Recommendations:
The most significant interpretation and conclusion of the research report refers that different types of “Social Networking Websites” such as “Facebook” and “Twitter” are very influential for social media marketing and customer satisfaction in fashion industry. It takes virtually no time for a consumer to generate an impression about promoting business that can be effective.
Research limitations:
The limitations of the research face the deficiency to have the “Perspective managers” in case of “Social Media”. The research work could have been enhanced if the researcher may be capable to be linked with the public for having better reliability and validity of the research. Not only that, there exists inadequate sources or publishers that have significantly covered the impact of “Social media” on the “E-commerce” industries of “Fast fashion” and the way the people operate. It may be regarded as an “Research gap”. The limitation of the whole research depends on the entire study about enough resources precisely covered the impact of “Social media” on “Fashion sense” according to the “E-commerce” industries. The only source that could be found is the common idea about how the trading companies of fashion products with the help of social media is being trended with the help of “E-commerce” trades (Kim & Ko, 2012). This is not an exploratory research design; it is the explanatory research design. This is the only article that are involved either in “Fast fashion” or “E-commerce” but no other previous articles have collaborated these two simultaneously. On the basis of the reflection of the “Research study”, the research report concentrates on the conduction of “Qualitative research” rather than “Quantitative research”. The deep understanding of the qualitative and quantitative variables may also enhance the credibility of the research design. The perspective of customers is not also included in this research design too. If the research would have done this, then the researcher would have also known few information about their mentality according to the views of the managers. With the addition of the viewpoints of the consumers towards the “Research study”, additional data with more factors could be collected and several opinions can be gained how “Social websites” impact the “Fashion companies” of “E-commerce business”.
Scope of Future Research:
This “Research study” only includes the impact of “Social media” on “Fashion industry” and the satisfaction of customers with the view point of trading. Further research could be executed on the viewpoint of “Fashion e-commerce” approach of the customers. Besides, a larger sample of respondents can be gathered rather than only gathering information from some people from each “Fashion brands”. There may be a probability if the selected sampling would have been larger, the researcher may have been more stable and solid in the “Research study”.
Task |
Week 1 |
Week 2 |
Week 3 |
Week 4 |
Week 5 |
Week 6 |
Week 7 |
Week 8 |
Week 9 |
Topic selection and justification |
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Literature development |
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Choosing relevant methods |
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Data collection |
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Data analysis and interpretation |
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Judging the results |
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Conclusions and recommendations |
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Submission of the final draft |
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Printing and final submission |
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