SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING AND PATRONAGE OF SELECTED PRODUCTS

ADVERTISING AND PATRONAGE OF SELECTED PRODUCTS

This study was carried out to examine social media advertising and its influence on audience preference of similar product in LASU. Specifically, the study to examine if customers have knowledge on transformative use of social media advertising. The study also examine if social media advertising is conceived to provide reliable and cost effective methods to reach out to stakeholders, durable business–customer relations. And also, examine if the new advancement of Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web provides a chance for consumers and advertisers to interact constructively and meaningfully to the benefit of each other. And lastly, to recommend ways social media advertising can influence a prospective customer on a similar product. The study employed the survey descriptive research design. A total of 141 responses were validated from the survey. From the responses obtained and analyzed, the findings revealed that student-customers have knowledge on trans-formative use of social media advertising. Also, social media advertising is conceived to provide reliable and cost effective methods to reach out to stakeholders, durable business–customer relations. And lastly, the new advancement of Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web provides a chance for consumers and advertisers to interact constructively and meaningfully to the benefit of each other. The study also recommends That Advertisers should accommodate consumer’s opinions and desires as it would greatly affect and benefit their product, as social media is evolving and changing the communication on brands. Also, Producers should know the kind of brand influencers they use in advertising their productSince the introduction of the internet, advertising
has gone from analog to digital in order to promote brands
and reach out to targeted widespread audience especially
those on social media platforms. The increasing rate at which
social media platforms such as Instagram have grown from
just an interactive platform where one can connect with
friends and loved ones as well as make new friends, post
pictures, videos and keep track of happenings around the
globe to now become platforms where people can advertise
their goods and services without being ignored by diverse
Instagram users and other business organizations all over the
world.
Nowadays, it is very important and crucial to be
closer to the customer at all times and this has become
possible through social media. Most of the clients are online
and use the internet, now they receive a product and are unsatisfied with it will go immediately on a social media and
leave a comment about that product. Hence we can see the
urge for the company to be online and respond immediately
to the customer, so that they can calm them before the
situation can grow and get out of control (Evans, 2010).
The rise of Instagram as an advertising channel has
been accompanied by that of brands both small and big,
investing their presence on this fast growing social media
network. Instagram has seen an emergence of a lot of
entrepreneurs and has become a hot spot for fashionable
people who follow the platform especially the fashion pages.
The platform is not only a getaway for people to buy
fashionable products, they look out for but also it provides
them access to a whole new range of products where they
can surf around until they stumble across other products they
find desirable.

The hotel industry is known to be the driving force of tourism development worldwide
(Akyeampong, 2007). Thus it is not surprising that Ghana is now experiencing gradual
proliferation of international hotel chains, small independent hotels from the bulk of the hotel stock
(Akyeampong, 2007; Mensah, 2009). Akyeampong (2007) and Mensah (2009) argue that Accra,
the national capital of Ghana is experiencing rapid rise in the number of hotels being developed to
cater for international arrivals. Ghana Tourist Board (2020) reports that the number of international
arrivals into the country increased from 5, 838, 210 in 2014 to 6, 980, 690 in 2019. In 2018, 10,
870, 000 tourists visited Ghana (WTTC, 2014). The number of registered hotels in the Volta
Region alone at the time grew by 23.2% from 295 to 595 (Ghana Tourist Board, 2018).
In this fast changing business environment where modern hotel chains operate, the main goal of
the business is to concentrate on improving services to end users, and enhance the business process
quality (Milovic, 2012). In today‘s competitive world, businesses need to think of new ways to
make their business processes more flexible to avoid being placed at a competitive disadvantage
(Leung &Bai, 2013; Pearson, 2013). This could be done through information technology initiatives
that can reduce cost of internal or in-house operations and generate a competitive advantage
(Teixeira, 2014). Pearson (2013) argues that organizations that can adapt to trends, preferences
and issues ahead of their competitors can create a defensible advantage. Peter Weill, Director of
the Centre for Information Systems Research, said that: In today‘s globalized, free-market
environment, the ability to satisfy customer expectations is core to profitability (Teixeira, 2014).
If hotel is not agile, you cannot do it, because customer expectations are never static. Pearson

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