DOES SOCIAL MEDIA IS AN EFFECTIVE MARKETING TOOL? A STUDY ON FASHION APPAREL BRANDS.

Abstract

Social media is one of the modern tools to connect people around the world, make relationships regardless of the region as well to marketing products and services. Social Media platforms as Facebook play a vital role within Sri Lanka to pass the message to consumers regarding new trends and products offered by marketers. Traditional modes on marketing still contribute a significant portion from the budget even though the modern technologies let consumer attractions in different angels. The objective of this research to assess impact of firm generated and user generated communication on purchase intention referring the Facebook. The research focused on fashion apparels brands market through the social media platform. Sample consisted with 100Facebook users that already liked at least one fashion apparel brand and standardized online-survey has conducted to collect the primary data. Results revealed the User Generate Communication and Firm-Generated Communication have a positive relationship with brand equity and Brand equity has positive relationship with purchase intention. Accordingly findings revealed user generated communication exhibits higher impact on brand equity compared to firm generated communication. Hence the Social Media Marketing could be used as an effective marketing tool in fashion apparel brands that market in Sri Lanka. As recommendations, the fashion apparel marketers need to develop social media platforms to generate more user contents, combining traditional marketing tools with social media, create a dialog between consumers and potential consumers and open for online purchasing platforms through Social Media platform and online payment systems could be highlighted.