To outsource or self-manage social media interactions: An exploratory study

Social media tools have made quick communication and free speech a reality, and yet many organizations still do not understand what social media tools are or how to deal with such phenomena. To help organizations deal with this new fast-spreading media a new breed of companies has come into existence; for example, 'socialeyez', 'meltwater', 'mccolins media', 'phenomena' and 'shareable brands'. These new companies provide services such as: media monitoring, listening analysis, newsletters, newsfeed and brand marketing etc. The main aim of this research is to answer the following question: Is it strategically better to use social media management tools or to hire a social media company to manage an organization's social media interaction? The objectives of this study are: 1) to explore the available social media tools that could be used to manage and utilize social media interaction; 2) to investigate the nature of the new breed of social media companies: how successful are they?; what tools do they use?; what kind of services do they provide?; 3) to find out how organizations are utilizing social media: do they have social media policies?; what tools do they use?; are they hiring social media companies to work for them?; if they are, then what are the benefits of employing such companies?) To achieve the research objectives, multi-method research was conducted, which comprised: 1) a literature review (journal, conference papers); 2) an examination of the social media companies' websites (and other online resources); 3) a short survey on the social media companies (sent by email); 4) a short survey on the private/public organizations (also sent by email).