Explain how Dunkin' Donuts' utilization of a Facebook page is an example of marketers making effective use of social networking

What will be an ideal response?

By October 2008, Dunkin' Donuts counted more than 175,000 fans on its Facebook page. Many of the page's fans actively participate in the online community Dunkin' Donuts has created by posting comments to the page's wall and taking part in discussion threads on the page. They also take polls and post photos of themselves and friends consuming Dunkin' Donuts products and enjoying the chain's facilities. In addition to this fan-generated content, the firm also provides updates on products and special offers, plus calendars of events and videos and photos produced by the chain.

According to one of Dunkin' Donuts' own MPR professionals, social networking has allowed the firm to engage with its customers in brand new ways and participate in an online conversation among brand-loyal consumers and newcomers to the brand. Facebook has become a highly cost-effective approach to communicate with consumers in ways traditional advertising is not capable of. Facebook permits the company to inform and interact with customers in a flexible, informal and genuine communication environment. Consumers, according to the firm, appreciate this level of contact with a familiar brand. Such consumers are unlikely to sit through product commercials on television, yet they are willing to be engaged in non-traditional ways.

Brand-loyal consumers in a social network environment can become brand ambassadors. Dunkin' Donuts saw the opportunities that social networking presented to leverage word-of-mouth communication. Social networking morphs conventional interpersonal communications into a one-to-many model of communicating, allowing messages to travel among hundreds and thousands of consumers instantaneously and permitting the company to derive feedback about products without the costly expense of conducting certain types of qualitative marketing research such as focus groups.