Thriving in a shifting landscape: Role of social media in support of business strategy

Contemporary organizations need to communicate with their customers in order to know them better, so that they can learn how to better satisfy their needs, provide better customer service and in so doing improve their commercial performance. Social media are one type of communication channel that organizations currently use to support these strategies. The purpose of this paper is to study how different types of organizations employ social media to support their business strategies, and how this affects the organizations’ performance. To achieve this goal, this study collects information from several organizations in Tehran, the Capital of Iran, and 58 managers, marketing experts, social media experts and university faculty. This study uses questionnaires to collect data and employs descriptive-inferential statistical methods to analyze the data. The results show that social media play an important role, yet differing role, in supporting prospector, analyzer, reactor and defender business development strategies that are key elements in business performance improvement.