After reading the journal article by Geerts & Veg-Sala, assess and critique it with respect to its value and usefulness for business executives. How would you change the purpose, focus, and research methodology of the article if you were asked to examine the relationship between luxury brands and communication strategy again today?

2. Businesses are beginning to realize that it may be risky to ignore social media (SC) and its underlying opportunity. Fan & Gordon apply a life-cycle framework to explain how social media analytics can address top concerns of managers regarding identifying ROI and creating effective strategies. According to the authors, what types of opportunities do social media analytics offer during the product utilization stage?

Explain! Use one specific example (from your professional experience and/or business viewpoint) to illustrate SC business opportunities.

3. After reading Alaimo (2016), Dutta (2010), and Powell (2015), answer the following questions:

a) Why should senior leaders be heavily involved in understanding and using social media? b) Which SC platforms should leaders be focusing on and why? c) Which communication strategies or tools should leaders use in the social media environment? d) How can SC be exploited during crises?

4. Company leaders realize that customer advocates are extremely powerful marketing channels since people trust and listen to what their peers say. Use the Fan & Gordon paper and the Johnson and Johnson case to elaborate (in several concise paragraphs) on the following question: How can company leaders link social media objectives to their company’s strategic objectives?

5. Research a luxury brand of your choosing (you can choose a brand from any industry – service, manufacturing, and others.) Succinctly explain the brand’s business model (1 product, 2 customers, 3 pricing model). Use three of Fan & Gordon’s key techniques (e.g., sentiment analysis, topic modeling, social network analysis, visual analytics) to analyze how effectively the company uses social media.