Brand Communication in Social Media: A Research Agenda

This article provides an agenda for future research on brand communication in social media. Based on an overview of the current state of research, a discussion of the theoretical and conceptual challenges of brand communication in social media, and a survey about the expectations of the media and advertising industry, I present six key directions for future research. These six key directions include research on (1) social media influencers, (2) personalized brand content in social media, (3) ethical concerns about the nature of social media content and consumer empowerment, (4) platform characteristics rather than on Facebook, (5) the integration of social media in the media mix and the consumer journey, and (6) using real social media data. Together these six key directions help to shape the social media research agenda.