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The Effectiveness of Social Media for Business Activities in Japanese Firms

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Abstract

A large number of firms use social media for various business activities. This paper clarifies how social media has become effective to sales in Japanese firms. To this purpose, the following are addressed: (i) whether social media is useful for company activities, (ii) what kinds of business activities are affected using social media, and (iii) how social media improves the final outcomes of sales for firms. This study uses data of business activities and social media conducted in 2014. Probit analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM) are employed. Probit analysis clarifies the relationships between the effects of social media and its use in sales. The SEM model clarifies the relationships among the effects of social media use in business. In the SEM, a model is examined by taking sales caused by use of social media as an explained variable, while the explanatory variables are the first and intermediate effects of social media. The results indicate that social media is effective for business activities such as promoting sales. This study may help to promote social media in Japanese firms.

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Acknowledgements

This paper is supported by JSPS grants titled, “Business Innovation Strategy by Social Media” (Grant Number c-24530435) and “Empirical Study on Social Media Use to Support User Collaborative Innovation” (Grant Number c-17K03910). This financial support has been gratefully acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Economics, Kindai University, 3-4-1 Kowakae, Higasiosaka, Osaka, 577-8502, Japan

    Hiroki Idota

  2. Faculty of Business Administration, Kindai University, 3-4-1 Kowakae, Higasiosaka, Osaka, 577-8502, Japan

    Teruyuki Bunno

  3. Faculty of Economics, Kobe International University, 9-1-6 Koyocho-naka, Higashinada-ku, Kobe, Hyogo, 658-0032, Japan

    Masatsugu Tsuji

Authors
  1. Hiroki Idota
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  2. Teruyuki Bunno
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  3. Masatsugu Tsuji
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Correspondence to Hiroki Idota.

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Idota, H., Bunno, T. & Tsuji, M. The Effectiveness of Social Media for Business Activities in Japanese Firms. Rev Socionetwork Strat 11, 33–45 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12626-017-0006-1

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