Marketing Communication in the Social Media as a Sign of Digitalization

Abstract

The development of computer and information technology, including the Internet, has con-tributed to the creation of new ways enterprise's communicate with the environment, especially with customers. The main purpose of this paper is to present the definition of social media (SM), their basic types and examples of using social media in marketing communication. While prepar-ing this study, the author referred to literature in the field of social media, marketing communica-tions, and Internet sources which describe the discussed issues. The article presents the content associated with the use of social media in marketing communications. As the starting point, the author define the term social media and related concepts such as Web 2.0 and User Generated Content. Next the author describe basic types of social media (classification by Kaplan and Haenlein), such as: collaborative projects, blogs, contentcommunities, social networking sites, virtual game worlds, virtual social worlds and Social net-working sites. The development of social media resulting from digitization has contributed significantly to the improvements in activities related to communication between market entities and their customers. Due to that market entities are able to create a positive image in the environment, strengthen brand awareness among customers and build communities focusing on content generated by them. The social media, further, offers a new opportunity for consumers to evaluate the products and share their experience with other online users.