Message strategies in content marketing - How companies drive consumer engagement on social media

Abstract: The world is now digitized with an increased use of different social media platforms and infinite new ways for marketers to engage consumers. With the increased use of online marketing and the tough competition in an online environment, a challenge for companies is to differentiate their brand and stand out. What type of message strategy and content that companies use in their marketing will affect the behavior of the consumers and can help them reach their target audience. The purpose of this study was to investigate how companies use different message strategies in their designing of content for social media to drive the most engagement from consumers. The research was made with a qualitative methodology with a deductive approach by gathering theories and conducting three semi-structured interviews which were then analyzed to help answer the research questions. The qualitative interviews showed the importance of using different strategies and adapting the content for social media to fit the target audience. The research indicates that it can be difficult to pin down one specific message strategy for companies to consistently follow over time, but instead need to focus on building customer relationships and the importance of interacting with customers since this can make them feel more engaged.