Question

Social Media Marketing. What is "big data"? Please find a definition from the web and provide the link to the reference. Why does big data create more options for identifying and targeting customers? Please provide resources from the book.

Answer 1

The main purpose of any business Firm today is to seek advantages of the available data based on the financial transactions or customer interactions with the business, in order to increase the efficiency of the business performance and thereby building a competitive edge over others in a given marketplace. The availability of data especially that of the consumer trends and preferences, help in offering relevant products to the various market segments thereby increasing the chance of the business to survive and grow in the long run.

Big data is therefore important because it comes to the picture here where, in the era of digitization, when availability of electronic data plays an even more important role. There is scope for cloud storage of huge data and further facilitates the analysis of the same. Unlike earlier, the trend is not to trade in data. The usage of big data is now evident everywhere. Studies have shown that the Companies that are using Big data in whichever form, have the potential to perform far better than its competitors in the industry.

                                        

Big data create more options for identifying and targeting customers because it enables the Firms to make better decisions in the following ways:

• There is a boost given to the market opportunities owing to the creation of Big data. Decisions on the front of introducing new products or tapping a new market could be sought with the help of Big Data.
• The customers’ willingness to share their data especially on the online platform unlike their reluctance in the previous times, have aided the success of Big data which relies highly upon the responses of the customers and their information. This has in turn helped the Firms to understand the customer as a whole rather than just knowing the customers as a demographic study in their decision making process.
• It has enabled an efficient flow of two-way communication system from the customers to the Firms and vice-versa. The customers in fact, also respond to the activities of the Firm by way of using the social media or internet media to voice their opinions. Accordingly, it has given an impetus to the Firm, to understand the responses of the customers in a major way and accordingly place their products in the market. This is the Firm’s way of responding back to its customers.
• It has especially help the online Firms such as Google or to even the social networking sites like Facebook to avail the advantage of Big Data in order to convert the same into an attractive form of business. A lot of decision making is aided on this platform using Big Data.
• Customizations of online campaigns have become more feasible due to Big data. Customizations are the decisions of personalizing services or products for the clients which is facilitated through the use of Big data in decision making.
• It gives an overall picture of the consumer trends based on the real-time data base.

For example, for various kinds of shipping needs, FedEx offer customized integration solutions to its clients. They avail the web services in order to streamline different forms of operations, improvise its visibility in the logistics market and with the view to offer more options to the clients where the information availed from the Big Data helps in aligning the activities efficiently.