Social networking as tool for global communication for fashion brands

Abstract

The emergence of new information technologies, development and exploration of the digital platforms and social networks in recent decades, have caused major changes in lives of individuals, as well as in the business sphere, opening up new opportunities and challenges, and changing consumption behaviours on a global scale. This paper presents a research of customer participation to the footwear brands community network, depending on the brands involvement level, since footwear sector places its importance to the Portuguese economy, through significant and stable growth within this recent decade. With the increasing use of digital platforms, such as social networks and website, as communication channels used in marketing strategies for fashion brands, it became necessary to empirically analyse the impact of these digital platforms to the brands. The major findings of this longitudinal research showed that brands, that are new to market, have a better performance in social media, with rapid growth of its communities and already surpassing the established companies.