A conceptual stages-of-growth model for managing a social media business profile

The earliest four-stage model was developed by Gibson and Nolan (1974). It was further refined as a six-stage model by Nolan (1979). The model emphasises the need for management strategy to be consistent with the organisation’s stage with respect to technology (Galliers and Sutherland, 1991). McFarlan and McKenney (1982) proposed a four-stage model, arguing that it is not necessary to work through all elements of all stages, implying it is possible to select which aspects of IS management to move forward on. Rao et al. (2003) found empirical evidence to support the validity of McFarlan and McKenney’s (1982) SoG model but could not support the specific stages. Earl (1989) proposed a five-stage model, arguing that organisations would have different learning curves for different ISs. However, Galliers and Sutherland (1991) criticise the model, suggesting that it only places an organisation at a certain stage without actually suggesting how the organisation moves to a more mature stage. Galliers and Sutherland (1991) propose a model that describes the stages through which an organisation evolves with respect to use of information technology (IT) and indicates how organisations can move from the initial stages to an advanced stage of maturity. However, Brugha (1998) disputes this approach and suggests that it is more beneficial to focus on activities rather than outputs, as they are less contextual and because activities provide decision makers with better indicators of what to do at each stage. Numerous other authors have proposed theoretical stages of IS growth models based on these models for a variety of purposes, including end user computing (Huff et al., 1988; Jayasuriya, 1993), information centres (Magal et al., 1988), technology-based new ventures (Kazanjian, 1988), IS planning (King and Teo, 1997) and IT portfolio management (Jeffery and Leliveld, 2004), and for the most part, empirical testing of the stages proposed in these models has been positive.

The advent of e-business has heralded the development of several new SoG models. McKay et al. (2000) propose a model of e-business implementation called the SoG-e, which integrates Galliers and Sutherland’s (1991) SoG model to depict activities based on an organisation’s Internet technologies, as well as its traditional IS. The SoG-e presumes a progression of levels as the organisation accumulates knowledge, experience, qualifications, and expertise in e-business. By contrast, Rayport and Jaworski (2002) suggest a four-stage model of the evolution of business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce, but the model is now considered flawed (Ghachem, 2006). Rao et al. (2003) also propose a SoG model for e-commerce, comprising four phases. Similar to McFarlan and McKenney (1982), Rao et al. (2003) propose that organisations do not need to accomplish each stage successfully; organisations can begin in any phase, skipping certain stages; and, an organisation that is increasingly aware of IT and e-commerce could begin with a later maturity phase. While some researchers such as Lingling (2011) and Rocha (2012) support the notion that organisations can select which aspects of the technology to move forward on, Lingling (2011) argues that stages cannot be skipped because the experience learned from the previous stage is necessary for the next stage. Chan and Swatman (2004) found that only two growth types, namely, (i) strategy and objectives and (ii) focus of the implementation, were consistent when examined empirically across several cases. SoG models have also been adopted by Hinrichs (1997), KPMG (1997), Damsgaard and Scheepers (1999), and Duane and Finnegan (2003), to explore the evolution of Intranets in organisations. Similar to McFarlan and McKenney (1982), Damsgaard and Scheepers (1999) suggest that progression can be made even though not all elements are strictly in the same phase, and stages can be skipped. Duane and Finnegan (2003) found that Intranets develop organically in early stages, evolve rapidly to become critical for day-to-day operations, extend to integrate the external value chain and, similar to the Galliers and Sutherland (1991) SoG model, finally become institutionalised in the organisation. Watson et al. (2001) developed a data warehousing SoG model based on Nolan (1979), asserting that by understanding the stage, management would be better able to plan and would be better positioned to avoid any pitfalls. Gottschalk and Khandelwal (2004) developed a four-stage knowledge management technology (KMT) model, which was followed by de Bruin et al. (2005), who developed a six-stage (Levels 0–5) Knowledge Management Capability Assessment (KMCA) model, and Nikhil et al.’s (2007) five-level SoG model. SoG models have also emerged in e-Government and IS in healthcare and education. Layne and Lee (2001) developed a four-stage e-Government SoG model, and similar work by Janssen and van Veenstra (2005) focussed on a five-stage SoG model for information architectures in local governmental agencies. Janssen and van Veenstra (2005) suggest that organisations sometimes concatenate stages, and the number of stages may expand as technological advances are made, or discontinuities occur, and a new SoG model may be required. This perspective is similar to that of Watson et al. (2001), who reveal that advances in data warehousing led to revision of their SoG model. e-Government SoG models were later extended into a seven-stage model by de Brí (2009), who recommends the stage adoption once there is consensus that there is value in moving forward. The model also suggests that stages may be skipped. Rocha (2012) devised a SoG model to manage the evolution of IS in healthcare. García et al. (2013) developed a five-stage SoG model for IT service outsourcing in higher education. Arguably, the model builds on Adelakun’s (2004) five-stage and Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2006) three-stage maturity models for IT outsourcing, but neither model was tested.

Social media has become a very important research topic in both personal and corporate contexts (Aral et al., 2013; Levina and Yavetz, 2013). However, to date, very little research has been conducted on organisational use and management of social media (Parveen, 2012). This may be because organisational adoption of social media is slow compared to the growth of social media for personal purposes (Baltatzis et al., 2008). Barnes and Lescault (2011: 2) even suggested that adoption of social media by organisations ‘has levelled off or fallen’. However, the SoG literature has been extended by the emergence of two new models that pertain to the field of Web 2.0 and social media in particular. Jacobs and Nakata (2010: 6) propose a SoG model for social media adoption to ‘provide a roadmap for improvement’ for the planning and development of social media strategy. Heavily influenced by Earl (2000), the six-stage model includes a description of the focus at each stage, but it is a simplistic, non-specific approach to modelling. The model does not identify any mechanism by which progress can be measured, and its paths of evolution are unclear. The model does not identify the management challenges or problems to be overcome at any of the stages, unlike Rao et al. (2003), who identified ‘Barriers’ and ‘Facilitators’ at each stage. Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010) argue that all SoG models should identify ‘benchmark variables’ and ‘dominant problems’ at each stage. The model is conceptualised on one single SoG model and does not consider the contributions of any other SoG model. Even Earl (2000: 7) describes his proposed model as ‘highly idealised’, and neither Earl, nor Jacobs and Nakata, have empirically tested their models.

Forrester (2012) propose a five-stage social media maturity model, namely, (i) dormant; (ii) testing; (ii) co-ordinating; (iv) scaling and optimising; and (v) empowering the workforce. However, while Forrester’s SoG model and findings are interesting, the model is also confusing, particularly with respect to the ‘Dormant stage’, which in essence is not a stage at all, as no social media activities occur. The final stage, ‘Empowering’, is also poorly developed, which may be a symptom of the few organisations that are positioned at this stage, if indeed there are any. In some instances, the model reveals a necessity to separate one variable into two or more variables, such as ‘measurement’. Thus, while the Jacobs and Nakata (2010) and the Forrester (2012) models provide stages from which to explore SoG models for managing social media, both models have limitations and need improvement before they are of benefit to organisations. More importantly, the dark side or dominant problems of social media are not adequately addressed in the existing SoG models for managing social media. According to Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010), it is essential for a SoG model to conceptualise the dominant problems. Thus, the paper continues to the next section, wherein the dominant problems associated with social media adoption in organisations are explored.

Dominant problems are varied, change from stage to stage and can shift from a lack of skills, to a lack of resources, to a lack of strategy (Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther, 2010). Aral et al. (2013: 5-6) reveal how social media can have ‘powerful’ and ‘surprising effects’ on product use and individual and community outcomes, and that ‘our intuitions may not always correctly predict social media’s consequences’. Often, the consequences are negative as inappropriate postings have unimaginable and unintended consequences for the organisation’s public persona and bottom line. Organisations struggle to manage negativity (Aggarwal et al., 2012; Barnes, 2012; Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010; Weber, 2011) directed at it through its SMBP. However, evidence from a multitude of sources (e.g. Aggarwal, 2011; Barnes, 2012; Helms, 2010; Jacobs and Nakata, 2010; Munene and Nyaribo, 2013; Piskorski, 2011; Weber, 2011) suggests that organisations have not developed strategies to manage social media. As social media adoption matures, organisations must ‘integrate social media strategies with their overall strategy’ (Aral et al., 2013: 8).

Organisations must also be aware that strategies should focus on participation, sharing, and collaboration, rather than just advertising and selling (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Otherwise, goal incongruity and process disconnect occurs as the SMBP fails to match strategic goals, business needs and audience desires (Bradley, 2010; Weber, 2011). Uncoordinated efforts also reduce effectiveness and cause confusion (Forrester, 2012; Piskorski, 2011). Monologue also occurs if stakeholders are not involved in ideation or co-creation (Huang et al., 2011). Ambiguity regarding social media strategy also has a negative impact (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010), and failing to manage efforts ‘may not portray the image the company would like or worse cause damage to their reputation’ (Jacobs and Nakata, 2010: 3). Aguenza and Mat Som (2012: 49-50) warn of the ‘embarrassment’ and ‘damage’ to reputation by staff misuse of social media. Thus, all stakeholders must learn to use social media to meet their respective objectives (Aral et al., 2013).

Failure to formalise usage policies for internal/external social media use also has unintended consequences (Aggarwal et al., 2011; Bott et al., 2009; Forrester, 2012; Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010; Munene and Nyaribo, 2013; Piskorski, 2011; Ward and Ostrom, 2006). Social media has a ‘dark side’ that leads to ‘abuse, addiction and misuse’, reducing productivity, as well as an increasingly ‘strained computing and network resource’ and ‘misrepresentation’ due to staff failure to distinguish between personal and business use (Munene and Nyaribo, 2013: 149). Training is a possible solution, but it is a long-term commitment (Bott et al., 2009). Social media also poses significant technological threats (Hong, 2012; Li et al., 2013; Nesbit, 2011), and brand hijacking, squatter accounts and lack of control over content are additional issues (Jacobs and Nakata, 2010). Adoption may also be hindered by a lack of management support (Forrester, 2012). Another problem is a perception that the SMBP does not require additional resources (Bott et al., 2009; Forrester, 2012; Piskorski, 2011). These problems may dissipate as social media matures and organisations overcome the newness factor (Bott et al., 2009). Thus, it may be in the later stages of growth that such a formalisation may occur, which may be because the management is unaware of the extent of use and the negative consequences of misuse, or because of a decision to allow social media use to develop organically at the early stages to establish it as a viable business system. However, it is possible to conceptualise in which stage(s) these problems occur only through empirical analysis (Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther, 2010). In advance of this empirical work, Table 1 summarises the dominant problems emerging from the literature.

Table 1

Dominant problems with organisational use of social media

Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010: 280-282) five-step stage modelling process represents a theoretical and an empirical research procedure ‘where the object changes its status from a suggested stage model, via conceptual and theoretical stage models, to an empirical stage model, and finally to a revised stage model’, as shown in Figure 1. This paper focusses on the development and empirical analysis of a suggested stage model (Step 1) and a conceptual stage model (Step 2).

Figure 1

Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010) identified four key topics to analyse a SoG model:

Number of stages: Organisational phenomena undergo transformations in their design characteristics that can be defined in terms of discrete stages of growth.

The authors apply these topics in Table 2 to analyse the SoG models in the extant literature. This enables identification of the key characteristics of SoG models, which when integrated with extensive reviews of social media research and practitioner insight across multiple domains, enables the authors to ground the study and develop a suggested stage model.

Table 2

Applying Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther s (2010) four key topics to the extant SoG literature

Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010: 284) proposed that the suggested stage model is ‘the initial stage model’ in SoG modelling as it integrates ‘ideas from both research and practice’ and is derived from existing research and insights gleaned from practitioners. Using this approach, Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010) developed a suggested stage model for e-Government operability. In the context of this study, the authors apply this technique to this study and following extensive reviews of 4 decades (1974-2014) of SoG research, as well as a review of social media research and practitioner insight across multiple domains, develop a suggested stage model for managing an SMBP, as shown in Table 3. While Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010: 284) based their practitioner insights on ‘informal discussions with researchers and practitioners in the government sector of Norway’, the authors decided to use social media to gain a broader spread of practitioner insight from webinars (Bradley, 2010; Langlois, 2011), blogs (Goffi, 2011; Hamnett, 2011), YouTube interviews (Kawasaki, 2013) and practitioner reports (Bughin et al., 2011; Fenwick et al., 2010; ISACA, 2010; Williams et al., 2010). Four benchmark variables (strategy, focus, structure, and management) derived from the analysis of extant SoG models, as shown previously in Table 2, were applied to define management strategies at each stage.

Table 3

A suggested stage model for managing a social media business profile (SMBP)

According to Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010: 284), empirical testing is essential to ensure that the ‘contents of stages are developed in an iterative cycle involving dominant problems that seem different at various stages’. Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010) suggest that empirical analysis of stage models ultimately results in revised stage models. Thus, the suggested stage model only forms a platform for empirical testing and further refinement. While Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010: 285) only use ‘two cases to test their suggested stage model for e-government interoperability’, the authors of this study adopt a mixed methodology consisting of four data collection methods to develop the conceptual stage model, including the following:

An online survey was conducted; 103 Irish organisations from 20 industries responded. The targeted industries included Financial Services, Banking and Insurance; Retail; Manufacturing and Engineering; Health and Pharmaceuticals; ICT Hardware, Software and Telecommunications; Government and Public Services; Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries; human resources (HR) and Recruitment; Professional and Scientific Services; and Transportation, Logistics and Warehousing.

According to Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010: 284), the conceptual stage model should clearly ‘illustrate the content characteristics of each stage, as well as significant differences between stages where preceding and following stages have different kinds of dominant problems’. A common method to empirically test the stages is to form a ‘description of the stages of growth’ and to request management to ‘indicate which stage most closely describes the present situation or status in their company’ (Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther, 2010: 284). Using this technique, the authors used the stage descriptions from the suggested stage model (Step 1) to test for the existence and characteristics of the stages before developing the conceptual stage model (Step 2). To identify the dominant problems associated with the stages, the authors adopted the same approach as Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther (2010) and Kazanjian (1988), whereby survey respondents and interviewees were requested to consider the dominant problems and identify the stage(s) at which they occur.

Having reflected on the research into SoG models and after a review of existing social media research and practitioner insight across multiple domains in the literature review, the authors hypothesise that an organisation’s SMBP evolves through five distinct stages, as shown in Table 3, namely, (i) experimentation and learning; (ii) rapid growth; (iii) formalisation; (iv) consolidation and integration; and (v) institutional absorption.

Verheyden et al. (2010) reveal that social media was only recently adopted and is still evolving, and that its diffusion is restricted to external communication and public relations (PR). Levina and Yavetz (2013) report that 58% of organisations are in the early stages of adopting social media. Social media adoption in most organisations is a grassroots effort, which is often just as effective as a formal pilot programme (McKinsey, 2007). Typical activities at this stage involve creating a basic SMBP on one or two social media platforms, announcing the organisation’s arrival in the social media space, posting a number of comments, images and videos, and providing some product/ service information (Forrester, 2012; McKinsey, 2007). The experimentation and learning stage may initially be departmental/function driven or the work of a single individual in the marketing or PR team (Aral et al., 2013; Jacobs and Nakata, 2010), or it may be outsourced (Aral et al., 2013).

Social media adoption experiences rapid growth, and organisations have difficulty adapting to the pace (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). Organisations may have been induced to use social media by pressures from competitors, trading partners and customers (Parveen, 2012). Use may expand from marketing to enhancing customer relationships, reputation management, value and brand equity, digital advertising, ideation (Kim and Ko, 2011) and establishing networks with business partners, while product/service innovation may also emerge (Meske and Stieglitz, 2013). As ‘social media provide an efficient and accessible means of encouraging and supporting team members working together on shared objects’ (Zeiller and Schauer, 2011: 1), staff may focus on task-driven processes and on implementing early processes to manage them (Forrester, 2012). Internal communication can emerge, enabling teams to share tasks, information and knowledge (Zeiller and Schauer, 2011). However, organisations may be wary of using social media to share in-house information (Verheyden et al., 2010).

As adoption matures, the need for organisations ‘to integrate their social media strategies with their overall strategy’ becomes more important (Aral et al., 2013: 8). However, responsibility is a problem at this stage because of the varying tools, ease of use and creation, duality of workplace and personal use, and lack of a strategic plan (Jacobs and Nakata, 2010). Thus, Munene and Nyaribo (2013: 149) contend that organisations need to ‘develop vibrant, participative and agreeable policies to guide social media participation at work when trying to deal with challenges that arise from such participation so as employees understand implications of their actions concerning the boundary between personal and work boundaries’. Verheyden et al. (2010) also found that developing a social media policy is positively linked to staff attitudes towards social media adoption.

Significant process improvements can be achieved through efficient social networking and organisational connectivity (Chivee et al., 2008). Thus, organisations are increasingly deploying social media internally to enhance their knowledge management and intra-firm collaboration efforts (Benbya and Van Alstyne, 2010; Zeiller and Schauer, 2011) and to transform the relationship and norms of behaviour among organisations, staff and consumers (Aral et al., 2013). This environment represents a shift that requires the development of new strategies and tactics (Godes et al., 2005). Social media may also transform how organisations engage with staff, enabling them to create dynamic relationships with remote experts (Archak 2010), to crowdsource new ideas (di Gangi and Wasko 2009) or to engage in micro-outsourcing (Goldman et al., 2011; Paolacci et al., 2010).

Organisations can use social media to develop new business models when they reach a higher level of maturity (Jacobs and Nakata, 2010), enhancing and transforming virtually every business process and function (Gossieaux and Moran, 2010). Social media enables a systematic approach to improving business processes, which becomes a key priority (Forrester, 2012). As the organisation becomes more experienced and the technology matures, the usage pattern shifts, and social media becomes the de facto application of choice for performing certain key business tasks (Forrester, 2012). At this stage, staff integration reaches a point where organisations implement enterprise-wide social media for the entire workforce, empowering staff to regularly use social media (Forrester, 2012).

Thus, having adopted Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010) five-step stage modelling process and having conducted a thorough review of the literature and reflection on practitioner insight in order to develop a suggested stage model (Step 1) for SMBP implementation and management, the authors were in a position to empirically test this model in order to develop a conceptual stage model (Step 2).

As shown in Figure 2, 78.64% of the 103 organisations that responded identify with the stages as portrayed in the suggested stage model. However, 21.36% did not identify with any of the stages. As previously discussed, it is essential for a stage model to conceptualise the dominant problems and empirical analysis is required to conceptualise in which stage(s) these problems occur (Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther, 2010). Thus, Figure 3 outlines the top six dominant problems reported by organisations that identified with Stages 1–4. Only two organisations indicated they were in Stage 5, thus the authors believe that the evidence is insufficient to robustly identify Stage 5 or its dominant problems. The authors believe that as this longitudinal study progresses through Steps 3–5 of Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010) stage modelling process, an increasing number of organisations may emerge that are consistent with Stage 5, thus enabling future clarification of this stage and its dominant problems. Further exploration of these findings in follow-up telephone and personal interviews with senior managers and senior staff members in 60 organisations (58.25% of 103 organisations who agreed to participate further in the study) revealed a number of additional insights into organisational adoption of social media.

Figure 2

Figure 3

Respondents from 14 of the 22 organisations (21.36%) that did not recognise any of the stages of growth in the suggested stage model contend that their organisation is in a stage that precedes Stage 1 (experimentation and learning). In effect, the respondents contend that there is a Stage 0. Follow-up interviews with all of the respondents reveal that many of the organisations first learn of social media from members of staff or, sometimes, a senior manager who uses social media for personal purposes. Some of these respondents even suggested that they had first learned of social media from their children prior to their own personal use. This personal use then evolved over time into considering ways in which it could be used for business purposes. This was then typically followed by online research of the types of social media being used in a business context, how they are being used by other organisations and to what effect. Some of the respondents suggested that increased personal use of the Internet, Apps, Web 2.0 and social media over the past decade has blurred the lines between personal use and organisational adoption and learning when it comes to emerging technologies, and that in many cases, it is personal use that leads to organisational use, as evidenced by Facebook personal profiles leading to the development of Facebook business pages.

Interestingly, the dominant problems in Stage 0, which are in reality inhibitors to adoption, are very similar to the dominant problems experienced by organisations in Stage 1, as shown in Figure 4, with one exception: the organisation’s need to identify clear metrics for return on investment (ROI) prior to adoption. Although Stage 0 organisations cite the lack of time, skills, expertise, budget, understanding and staff as dominant problems, the lack of clear metrics appears to be a significant inhibitor (third-ranked dominant problem) to the initial adoption of social media in these organisations. According to one sales manager, ‘I’m well aware of the possibilities with social media, but this is considered to be an extremely time consuming activity and if we can’t show clear metrics for ROI, it won’t get approval on a business level’. This is an important finding when one considers that the lack of clear metrics for ROI does not rank very highly in the top six dominant problems until Stage 3 (ranked first) in organisations that have already adopted social media. Although lack of clear metrics for ROI is also identified as a dominant problem in Stage 2 in organisations that have already adopted social media, it only ranks as the fifth most dominant problem. Thus, the findings reveal that the stage model for managing an organisation’s SMBP should be revised to include a Stage 0 entitled Exploration, which considers personal use as a possible precursor to organisational use. However, the authors conclude that this Stage 0 is not like the ‘Dormant stage’ proposed by Forrester (2012: 4), which is overtly negative, only focussing on ‘resistance to any use of social technologies due to unwillingness to participate or analysis paralysis’. Interestingly, interviewees in Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010: 286) study suggested the inclusion of a ‘conceptual planning stage’ preceding Stage 1, which was never adopted in their stage model of e-Government operability. However, a Stage 0 in SoG models is not entirely unusual as it has been previously noted in SoG models proposed by Jeffery and Leliveld (2004) and de Bruin et al. (2005).

Figure 4

As shown in Figure 2, the majority of organisations (51.45%) indicate that they are in Stage 1 or Stage 2 of the suggested stage model. Further discussions with the respondents reveal that rapid growth is not an appropriate descriptor of Stage 2. Instead, respondents suggest that Stage 2 is better described as ‘direction and coordination’ as it is through these types of management activities that rapid growth is enabled. Thus, the authors of this study undertook to revise the stage description in the conceptual stage model.

With respect to Stage 1, the majority of respondents indicate that initial development of the SMBP is driven by the Marketing Department or by an individual in the marketing function. It is then unsurprising that the top five uses reported by organisations at Stage 1 and Stage 2, as shown in Figure 5, relate to marketing (87 organisations), information sharing (73 organisations), advertising (67 organisations), PR (65 organisations) and communication (65 organisations). This is similar to the findings of Meske and Stieglitz (2013), who found that marketing-related activities drive early adoption of social media.

Figure 5

Forrester (2012) suggests that clarity of the social media strategy and objectives is essential for effective organisational adoption. Thus, the authors engaged in a thematic keyword analysis of each organisation’s stated objectives for their SMBP, as clarified in Stage 2. This analysis reveals that increasing brand awareness (63 organisations) and driving sales (43 organisations) are the overwhelmingly stated key objectives. Only three organisations identified communication as part of their objective for using social media, and only one organisation identified customer feedback. Further analysis reveals that despite widespread use of the SMBP in Stage 1 and Stage 2, only 30 organisations (29.1%) use social media to gather customer feedback. There also appears to be significant shortcoming with respect to analysis of customer feedback as shown in Figure 6, as only 17 organisations (16.5%) do so, which is only 56% of the 30 organisations that actually gather feedback in the first instance. Overall, these results are a concern, as they seem to indicate that organisations still do not grasp (i) the enormous potential of using social media to better understand and engage with customers and (ii) the benefits of analysing customer feedback for better product/service design and delivery. This also lends support for Aral et al.’s (2013: 7) assertion that ‘another important and, as yet, under researched area relates to the optimal social media tactics for consumers’. Organisations clearly need support to develop consumer-focussed social media strategies.

Figure 6

As shown previously in Figure 3, lack of time, skills, expertise and understanding of social media are the top three dominant problems in both Stage 1 and Stage 2, accounting for >60% of the dominant problems in both stages. Interestingly, the lack of time, as well as lack of skills and expertise, increases in significance as dominant problems in Stage 2, while the lack of understanding diminishes, as organisations become more familiar with the technology. This lends credence to the proposition that Stage 1 is about experimentation and learning. Curiously, interviewees also indicate that this lack of knowledge, skills and expertise was a factor in the organisation’s decision to participate further in this study: 60 organisations (58.25%) agreed to participate further. Responsibility is also an issue at this stage, as many of the interviewees who worked on the initial adoption of social media believe it adversely affects their workload, and they no longer want the responsibility for it. This suggests that at this stage, social media requires dedicated knowledge experts to advance its adoption. This is also evident in the survey, as lack of time is the highest-ranked dominant problem and a lack of staff is the fourth-highest-ranked dominant problem in Stage 2. Respondents also suggest that this hinders any development of a social media strategy formally, or even informally, as staff know there is a lack of budget to implement it. In Stage 2, most organisations appear to overcome the difficulties experienced in growing the audience in Stage 1. However, the lack of clear metrics for ROI begins to become a problem in Stage 2, ranking as the fifth most dominant problem.

Interestingly, a number of organisations that indicate they are at Stage 2 of the suggested stage model reveal they are starting to develop social media strategies. However, many of these organisations are experiencing difficulties in devising strategies. In fact, 21 organisations have empowered just one person to devise the strategy for the entire company. This is not best practice according to Munene and Nyaribo (2013), who recommend a team/ group-based approach. This view is also expressed by one interviewee, who suggests that this approach results in a very one-dimensional perspective (i.e. solely based on marketing). According to the interviewee:

Similarly, another interviewee remarks that lack of resources is a problem at this stage, stating: ‘we have a clear strategy but we lack the ability to give it the full attention it requires due to lack of staff’. Lack of coordination may also be a significant issue at this stage, as one interviewee reveals that ‘our company only reviews our social media presence once a year and it is largely managed by volunteers rather than being the sole responsibility of any individual or group’. One organisation had already outsourced its social media management, while an interviewee from another organisation suggests that ‘we do not have the in-house skills so we are considering outsourcing our social media profile’. Incongruity and lack of coordination appear to a be a common theme in organisations that indicated they were in Stage 2 as many interviewees described their SMBP as ‘patchy and incoherent’, only ‘updated sporadically’ and ‘ad hoc’. There also appears to be ambiguity and uncertainty over the purpose of the SMBP, and one interviewee suggests ‘we are finding it difficult to keep coming up with relevant content’. These findings are consistent with the findings for Stage 1 and Stage 2 from the survey, as shown in Figure 3.

Evidence from the literature of previous SoG models indicate that use of technology is often a reliable indicator of the level of maturity (Chan and Swatman, 2004; Earl, 2000; Rao et al., 2003; Watson et al., 2001), and the authors believe that this evidence of use of the SMBP, coupled with the associated dominant problems, seem consistent with the organisations’ maturity stages, as indicated by the respondents, i.e. respondents have accurately indicated the stage of maturity for their own organisation with respect to management and dominant problems of the SMBP in Stage 1 and Stage 2.

Of the 103 organisations that responded to the initial survey, only 17 organisations (16.5%) indicated that they have evolved to Stage 3 of the SoG model. This is quite surprising given the length of time that the respondents have been using social media in the organisation for business purposes, as shown in Figure 7. In fact, 69 organisations (66.99%) have been using social media for ≥2 years, and 28.82% have been using it for ≥4 years, yet only nine organisations (10.68%) have evolved to Stage 4 and only two organisations have evolved to Stage 5. This seems to indicate that SMBP adoption can stagnate or slows considerably at this point in its evolution. This lends credence to the assertion by Barnes and Lescault (2011: 2) that adoption of social media by organisations ‘has levelled off or fallen’.

Figure 7

However, one has to consider the dominant problems to shed some light on the reasons why adoption of the SMBP may stagnate in Stage 3. It is clear from interviews with senior management and senior staff in respondent organisations that once social media strategies are developed and linked to business strategies, metrics must be identified and measured. Interviews with respondents indicate that a lack of viable and reliable metrics to underpin the social media strategy greatly undermines efforts to secure funding and investment in the SMBP, as managements are unwilling to invest until the ROI can be measured. These assertions are underpinned by the results of the survey shown in Figure 3, which reveals that lack of clear metrics for ROI becomes a significant problem in Stage 3, ranking joint highest dominant problem. The other dominant problem in Stage 3, ranked as the joint highest, is that organisations report a difficulty in further growing the audience at this stage. It is thus clear that a failure to invest in social media adoption at Stage 3, due to a lack of clear metrics for ROI, has a significant negative impact on the organisation’s ability to grow its audience using social media. This indicates that social media adoption can stagnate in Stage 3 without investment.

Discussion with respondents reveals excessive control by management, which traditionally is reported to stymie adoption of IS in typical formalisation/control stages (e.g. Gibson and Nolan, 1974; McKay et al., 2000), is not an issue in social media adoption. In fact, lack of understanding of social media appears to become a problem again at Stage 3, as there appears to be a lack of understanding of how to move ahead with the SMBP adoption. Bradley (2010) and Forrester (2012) describe this as business process disconnect. This may also be related to the fact that survey respondents report that there is a difficulty in managing the overall user experience and there is an insufficient cross section of contributors in Stage 3. This may be what Huang et al. (2011) refer to as monologue and a lack of stakeholder involvement. While lack of time is also a problem in Stage 3, it is not ranked as high as it is in Stage 1 and Stage 2.

Of the 103 organisational respondents, nine organisations (8.74%) indicate they are in Stage 4. Each of these organisations are engaged in a mix of social media-based activities that have surpassed its use as a marketing and PR tool, transforming its use to engage established customers in the co-creation of new products and services. Social media is also used in project management and research and development (R&D), while also being used to source partners and suppliers. Interestingly, three of the organisations use social media for crowdsourcing, while one organisation is also engaged in crowdfunding. User-generated content (UGC) also features prominently in five of the organisations. The HR departments in seven of these organisations also use social media to identify skilled individuals for recruitment purposes. Six of the organisations also overhauled their website to embed social media content. An interviewee from one company, who indicated that they were at Stage 4 of the suggested stage model, suggests that different social media platforms attract different customers when revealing as follows: ‘our SMBP is broad, focussing on Twitter, Google Ads, Blogging and Facebook. We find that we have attracted different types of consumers on Twitter/Facebook, so it works well. Our use of social media has also prompted us to develop a new website in order to integrate everything’. However, while integration is clearly evident in these organisations, consolidation also appears to occur. One interviewee cautions about trying to do too much too soon on social media, stating that they had abandoned some social media platforms and suggesting that the organisation had ’learned the hard way that it is best to select only a few platforms once you have finished experimenting with the pros and cons. It is best to do these few well rather than to have too many and have no market penetration at all’.

The most dominant problem at this stage is a difficulty in positively engaging the audience (24%). Although social media is often touted as an ideal interface to engage customers in co-creation and ideation, some of the organisations in Stage 4 of the suggested stage model indicate that they experienced a difficulty in positively engaging the audience. According to one interviewee:

From another perspective, negative consumer feedback on social media can be interpreted positively as one interviewee describes how:

Lack of clear metrics for ROI (19%) continues to be a significant problem for organisations in Stage 4. It is clear that much remains to be done in organisations and by researchers to develop clear metrics to measure the social media ROI. One interviewee states ‘in our business we know we have to do social media but it’s a real challenge to quantify precisely why’. Another interviewee alludes to the problem ‘stemming from a lack of knowledge and skills in data analysis and social media metrics’. This lack of knowledge and understanding of social media metrics is also closely linked to the survey responses, which identify a lack of understanding as the sixth highest ranked dominant problem in Stage 4. Lack of management support is also identified for the first time as a dominant problem (ranked fifth highest) in the suggested stage model. Further discussion with organisations reveals that this typically pertains to ‘management being a little in the dark with regard to how to further integrate social media into business processes’, according to one interviewee.

Only two organisations (1.94%) indicate that they are in Stage 5. Thus, as previously stated the authors contend that there is insufficient data arising from this study to determine the existence or characteristics of Stage 5 or its dominant problems.

A conceptual stage model should clearly ‘illustrate the content characteristics of each stage, as well as significant differences between stages where preceding and following stages have different kinds of dominant problems’ (Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther, 2010: 284). Thus, having analysed the findings from the mixed-methodology research approach, the authors are better positioned to develop the conceptual stage model for managing an organisation’s SMBP, as outlined in Table 4.

Table 4

The conceptual stage model for SMBP implementation and management

Most organisations (51.45%) indicate that they are in Stage 1 or Stage 2 of the SoG model. This is similar to findings by Levina and Yavetz (2013), who report that 58% of organisations are still in early stage of social media adoption. The top five uses of social media at Stage 1 and Stage 2 relate to marketing, information sharing, advertising, PR, and communication. Increasing brand awareness and driving sales are the overwhelmingly stated key objectives of social media for the organisations. In an earlier study, Verheyden et al. (2010) found that diffusion was restricted to external communication and PR. This is a concern as it appears that organisational adoption of social media has failed to progress beyond basic use, and there is little evidence of the ‘growing importance of social media as a strategic tool among organisations’, as suggested by Parveen (2012: 3). Thus, it appears, as suggested by Aral et al. (2013), that organisations are still barely scratching the surface of the true capabilities of social media.

Only 16.5% of organisations indicate they are in Stage 3, while 8.74% indicate they are in Stage 4 of the SoG Model. This is despite the fact that 67% of organisations have been using social media for ≥2 years and 29% have been using it for ≥4 years. This indicates that social media adoption stagnates or slows considerably, leading to a levelling off in Stage 3. Furthermore, only two organisations indicate they are in Stage 5. This levelling off affects the organisations’ ability to grow the audience using social media, and hence this is a dominant problem in Stage 4. This confirms Barnes and Lescault’s (2011: 2) hypothesis that adoption of social media by organisations ‘has levelled off or fallen’.

Organisations clearly do not grasp the enormous potential of using social media to better understand and engage with customers, and the benefits of analysing customer feedback for better product/service design and delivery. Only 30% of organisations indicate that they gather customer feedback via social media and only 16.5% analyse customer feedback. This is clearly a vicious circle for many organisations, as a lack of metrics is a dominant problem in Stage 3 and Stage 4, and many organisations will not invest further in social media unless ROI can be measured. The failure to capture and analyse social media metrics may stem from the fact that organisations are beset by dominant problems such as a lack of understanding of social media, a lack of time, and a lack of skills and expertise of social media, which account for >60% of the dominant problems in the first three stages. Overall, there is an apparent lack of understanding of what to do with social media at Stage 3, which affects the progress to Stage 4, and it supports Aral et al.’s (2013: 8) contention that as social media adoption matures, organisations must ‘integrate social media strategies with their overall strategy’. The apparent centralisation of responsibility for social media in organisations with one or two individuals in marketing departments is undermining social media adoption. This refutes Bott et al.’s (2009) assertion that problems may dissipate as social media matures and organisations overcome the newness factor.

Social media is ‘a moving target’ (Aral et al., 2013: 4), and given the rapid development and ever changing technological capabilities of social media applications and the growing pervasiveness of smartphone-enabled social media access, the proposed conceptual stage model will be subject to change as social media technologies progress. This is similar to Watson et al.’s (2001) data warehousing SoG model, which was modified due to changes in the underlying technology. This is also consistent with Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010) assertion that execution of the stage modelling process results in a revised stage model.

Given that social media adoption is in its early stages and very few of the 103 respondent organisations appear to be in Stage 4 and only two in Stage 5, the authors are currently engaged in a 2-year longitudinal case-study research in 60 organisations. The primary purpose of this work is to continue to deploy Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther’s (2010) stage modelling process by developing theoretical (Step 3), empirical (Step 4) and revised (Step 5) stage models. In addition, the authors are completing a comparative study with two different Canadian sample groups (i.e. 70 organisations in the Ottawa business community randomly selected and 100 organisations listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange selected through stratified sampling). These two studies will enable the authors to further refine the model while also enabling comparative studies between Irish and Canadian organisations. The authors encourage other researchers to reflect upon the issues highlighted in this study and to consider SoG models as a valid approach to developing management strategies for social media adoption in organisations.