The role of social media marketing in digital transformation and its significance in digital business within the food and beverage industry during Covid-19 , Social Media Marketing & Digital Business, Dissertation, SU,UK

The role of social media marketing in digital transformation and its significance in digital business within the food and beverage industry during Covid-19: 

Introduction

The provided research proposal will discuss the role of social media marketing in digital transformation and its significance in the digital business within the food and beverage industry during COVID-19. The proposal of the research study includes the background of the research accompanied by aims, objectives and the research question, summary of the literature review, a methodology section, outcomes or results, research findings, discussion and conclusion of the research study.

Background

A background of a research study is a well-written section of the introduction chapter, which marks the tone of the research study, which grabs the interests of the audience and effectively communicates the hypothesis or the thesis statement of the research study. , people use social media to promote their own business from their homes given the social distancing norms during the pandemic. Moreover, online delivery of food has gained significant popularity during the pandemic as more and more people preferred to order their delicacies from the comfort of their home and more because of fear of catching the virus (Coates  et al.  2019). Hence, social media marketing might have contributed to a large revenue generation for the food and ve4age industry and therefore, it would be interesting to look at the role of social media marketing in bringing digital transformation during pandemic.

Aims

The aim of this research is to determine the role of social media marketing in digital transformation and its significance in digital business within the food and beverage industry during COVID-19.

Objectives

This research aims to fulfil the following objectives:

• To critically evaluate the role of social media marketing in digital transformation for digital Business within the food and beverage industry.
• To critically examine the effectiveness of digital transformation through social media marketing in digital business during covid -19.
• To make recommendations for stakeholders to optimise impact.

Rationale   

The strategic rationale model helps to get a better knowledge of marketing and helps to increase the sales of the product to get their desired profit margins. Successful and well-known companies add their value for the customers by selling the proper products and services.  For food and drink, social media plays an important role. Because it reduces the chances of ease of payment and delivery, it helps in media promotion and the quality of the goods(Bala 2018). This type of outbreak encourages people to work more from home, and do the work online, which was previously done offline. To increase the product selling, the sellers need to maintain the hygiene of the product and the packaging, and the prices of the product would be competitive, and the delivery system also is strong, and the trending product availability is also important for digital marketing to get more profit.

Summary of the literature review

Role of social media marketing in digital transformation in the food and beverage industry

According to Novikova (2021), Social media is a platform that is based on computer technologies. This platform helps people to find their best option for the business. This network helps the distributor, dealer, and producers come close to each other. In recent years, social media has become a large platform to explore their product; they sell their product to the customers directly and can extend their business worldwide. According to(Chen et al. 2021), the food and beverage industry made its product and uploaded it for digital marketing. Social media is beneficial because of its two-way communication. In this platform, the sales and customers directly communicate with each other, and there is no third party, so both the people get more profit from this digital marketing. The food and beverage business gets more benefit during this covid 19 situation through the social media platform. People get pictures of their favourite food from social media and know the best place for them. The people get the full information about the food and the place where they wanted to go for food, and it enhances the people. The businessman also gets benefits for their business.

Significance of social media marketing in digital business during covid-19

According to (Rathi et al. 2021), the pandemic changed the way of living of the people. The pandemic situation gives an important lesson to the people that they use technology to make their livelihood. If people use social media to explore their talent, that will be helpful for their livelihood. Social media marketing is a more profitable platform for the people. In the covid 19 pandemic

When all the platforms are closed, and the small scale businessman suffers for their business, then social media become the best option to start the business. According to(Akyazi 2021), Social media helps the seller to directly contact the customer and promote their business. The most significant effect of social media is that it helps to reach the people in every country of the world from one place. Through this social media, the seller sells their product in any part of their own country as well as the other country of the world.

Methodology

Research design

The quantitative research design helps to examine the phenomena considered in the research question in a rigorous and controlled manner using precise measurements. Research designs are of two types, and those are qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis. The qualitative analysis uses the variety and the classification of the considered factors to draw the conclusion (Acosta et al. 2020). However, in the case of the quantitative method, it allows the researcher to quantify the parameters against the qualitative data and allows the statistical analysis of the counted data to draw the conclusion. For example, Hidayah, Rohmah, and Saifuddin (2021 )carried out a qualitative study for determining the effectiveness of digital platforms in the food and beverage industry during covid;

however, there remained some limitations to their study such as lack of sufficient data due to interview of small samples.Hence, this present research study will follow the quantitative research design. This research will follow positivism research philosophy which will allow in gathering factual data through observation and interpret the results. Though the situation improved and the common people are allowed to go out to collect their necessary goods, the online option is still being availed by the customers who got habituated with the system (Rutberg and Bouikidis, 2018). So, specifically in the food and beverage industry, this quantitative research on the usage of digital media is quite relevant to the present scenario.

Data collection   

Many subjects demand field surveys to understand the entire concept. The survey refers to the techniques involved in the close observation of an area or a site and the collection of data accordingly to quantify the data in order to draw the conclusion.Close ended questionnaires will be created in order togather the survey data as close ended questions are those which can be answered by only selecting limited options thereby preventing confusion (Chen, Bakar and Lam, 2020).

The present study needs to know the benefits of online marketing in the food and beverage industry (Mandelli, Fassi, Perfetti and Polari, 2017). So, it is very important to talk to the relevant people to understand the practical scenario. For that reason, the managers of the companies who deal with the online marketing facilities need to be interviewed to know their point of view, which is most important to answer the question.

Sampling

Sampling refers to the collection of representative data from a large area or a large population to interpret the data to answer the research question. If the sampling is being done by questioning a group of people, then the aim of the sampling should be the opinion of the targeted population regarding a specific matter and quantifying the data to analyse it. The sampling method will follow convenience sampling which is method in which the research selects a sample for research which can allow them gather the most convenient results to fulfil their research objectives.

Here, a group of total 80 managers is the target population who will be surveyed to collect the sample, and after the sample collection, the collected data will be analysed accordingly.

Data analysis

Descriptive statistics is the method that allows the researchers to summarise all the collected data to know the exact features of the selected parameters. Descriptive analysis refers to the statistical process which gives the data for quantification along with it provides the proper information for quantification. Descriptive statistical analysis will allow the analysis of the responses to close ended questions from the participants.

Here, the research is intended to draw the conclusion through the quantitative method only. Moreover, want to analyse the factors which favour the online business of food and beverages during the covid 19 pandemic. Hence it is very much needful in this context to analyse the collected data by the descriptive statistical method.

Limitations

In this survey technique, as it is based on the interview, maybe all the managers are not willing to participate in the survey and may feel reluctant for that. Hence, the sample size may be reduced, and if it is reduced drastically, then errors may come to the data.

Expected outcomes

The research wants to discover the utility of digital marketing in the food and beverage industry during the covid-19 pandemic situation. The study aims to evaluate the role of the transformation of the offline business to online social media. Furthermore, the study wants to evaluate the effectiveness of digital transformation during this pandemic situation. In this lockdown period, the people were house arrested for a long time, and to date, many of them are afraid to go out frequently to buy the necessary daily goods. Hence in this condition, the digital marketing or business through social media is very helpful, and all the customers prefer these facilities only to avoid the spreading of further infection. Moreover, the study will reflect the available literature to evaluate the scenario.

Qualitative data

The survey questions regarding the research problem will be considered as the qualitative data for the analysis (Apuke, 2017). The variety of opinions from the managers will reflect the variety of mentality of the common people towards digital marketing. Considering the variety only, the data will be regarded as qualitative data. Hence, for this analysis, both the qualitative as well as quantitative data both are equally important and need to be concerned in this regard.

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