Marketing potentials of the social media tools in the banking market of an emerging country

Abstract

There are many facts that attest to the pervasiveness of social media applications in the current world of business. This communication medium is replacing the well-known emails and complimenting the likes of short message service (SMS) and instant messaging and chatting. As part of technology, which is revolutionising the way we do business and live, organizations worldwide are gearing up efforts to take advantage of this phenomenon. In South Africa, the story is the same. However, the Banks in South Africa seems to have problems selling this form of communication to their clientele to augment their service delivery. In view of this, the current study aimed to research into social media concept in South Africa, to highlight its trajectory pros and cons, and investigate why it is not being adopted by these clients, in addition to measuring the continuance intention of those who have accepted banking through social media. It was discovered that, social norm (β=0.579), perceived trust (β=0.510) and user satisfaction (β=0.332), in that order, stood out as the most influencing factors impacting on user acceptance and continuance intention (β=0.384) of social media usage for banking. Perceived behavioural control made no significant impact on users to adopt social media for financial services. As the banking industry keeps investing in the marketing potentials of social media tools for banking, in order to gain competitive advantage in customer service delivery, this social media usage could make a lot of difference when well researched into and managed. In some countries, banking customers are able to do their banking through social media sites, but little is known in South Africa (according to research), regarding the usage of this tool for banking purposes.