Abstract

The interactive nature of social networking sites contributes to reinforce the engagement between consumers and brands in terms of cocreation of shared values. In this context, Twitter - the most popular microblogging service in the world - seems to act as a new frontier for viral marketing strategies and offers great opportunities to promote a brand as reference point and as a trusted partner among his followers. In a social network is possible to identify strategic and central nodes - the «influential» nodes - able to activate information and influence spread. These nodes could be influential persons as well as influential brands which intend to communicate and interact with their consumers promoting messages consistent with their brand personalities. The ultimate aim of influential brands is to increase brand awareness and brand engagement among their followers . However the conception of Twitter as a tool to promote brand engagement is far from being mature, both in management practices and academic research, and it is not clear how to best take advantage of this new marketing and communication channel. In light of what we have shown up to this point, in this paper we intend to develop a preliminary analysis of dialogic, interactive and relational conditions that turn a brand into an engaging and influential actor on Twitter. More specifically, we explore three main case histories of brands which have considered Twitter as main viral marketing tool.