The Use of Social Media Tools in the Sales Organization: Individual, Organizational, and Customer–Related Antecedents

Abstract

There is ample recognition that social media tools (for example, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and LinkedIn) are being used by marketers to influence consumer preferences and purchase decisions and to generate word of mouth (Kumar and Mirchandani 2012). However, social media usage in the sales function and/or organization is still in an early stage, and research in this area is required. Previous related research has looked at some determinants of technology adoption by salespeople, such as sales force automation (SFA) or customer relationship management (CRM) tools (Jelinek et al. 2006; Richard et al. 2007; Speier and Venkatesh 2002). However, social media tools differ from SFA or CRM not only in their relative newness, but also in the sales purposes they can help to achieve (for example, prospecting for customers, obtaining market information, promoting products, and identifying candidates for sales positions, among others). In addition, most previous research has examined the individual salesperson’s adoption of technology, rather than the adoption of technology by the sales organization, which could be considered a more strategic issue for a company.