CASE STUDY

How STARBUCKS leveraged the

power of social media in their
marketing strategy
 Introduction
Starbucks Corporation is an American
multinational chain of coffeehouses and roast-ery
reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. As
the largest coffeehouse in the world, Starbucks is
seen to be the main representation of the United
States' second wave of coffee culture.
Starbucks is a part of everyone’s daily life.
Starbucks was one of the first companies to offer
free Wi-Fi. Starbucks has used social media as
their best platform to communicate with its
customers.
 How STARBUCKS uses social media
platforms?
In the wake of the digital age we now live in,
virtually everything is online. From your
favorites recipes to that one supermarket
employee who became famous overnight, you
can find just about anything. That’s why
organizations and large, corporate brands
even use social media in the first place.
Some businesses are MADE for social media.
In Starbucks’ case, they can found online at
the following
Twitter (11.9M followers)
Facebook (36.7M likes)
Instagram (18.3M followers)
Google+ (4.9M followers)
Pinterest (410k followers)
YouTube (265K subscribers)
 AUDIENCE ANALYSIS
• The audience of the AGE GROUP
brand is distributed
among all age groups
with the majority
13-20
belonging to the middle 21-30
aged bracket. This is 31-40
40+
understandable with
respect to the product
concerned.
 OVERALL STRATEGY
• Starbucks India’s online strategy is extremely focused on
the product offered. They talk about what they sell. They
do not have dozens of chocolate brownies that make you
crave for desserts laden on their social media platform. In
addition to this, they stick to an agenda.
• So for the month of September, their area of focus was
the newly introduced Pumpkin Spice Latte whereas in
August, it was a ‘Passion for Coffee’ campaign. However,
they center only around Facebook and Twitter, being
ignorant of other social media platforms that are being
used rather actively by the brand’s competitors.
 STARBUCKS INDIA ON FACEBOOK

Starbucks India’s presence on Facebook, though not a highly

active one, promotes the brand just right. Majority of the
posts are images that elicit responses and involve user
engagement which is good for a brand that is almost a year
old.
The kind of content posted on the page is mostly images with
almost no text-only posts. Well styled images of drinks are
posted along with information of new services and newly
opened branches. The use of hashtags is there, though not
consistent. However, the choice of hashtags is not that
‘intelligent’. While a #PassionForCoffee can be used to create
buzz around a theme, #PSLIndia for a Pumpkin Spice Latte is
not that ‘innovative’.
One thing that’s lacking in this entire
exercise, however, is the participation at
Starbucks’s end. While they do respond to
negative feedback, positive feedback is
not appreciated on the page. This could
be done by sharing the feedback on the
page or by replying to and thanking the
community for their positive response.
 STARBUCKS ON TWITTER
Starbucks India’s Twitter strategy reflects
the brand’s undeniable presence in
India. However, the brand’s
responsiveness is much better on this
portal as compared to that on
Facebook. In addition to negative
feedback, positive feedback is
responded to as well. The frequency of
tweets is erratic though, with there
being days meant for Twitter followed
by several when the portal is ignored.
What Starbucks knows about social media?

Getting customers is good. Keeping customers is great With

over 21,000 stores in more than 65 countries, its a safe bet
that anyone with even a passing interest in coffee already
knows Starbucks exists. The company has reached critical mass
in terms of advertising so its challenge at this point is keeping
customers loyal so they're not swayed by competitors with
similar offerings.
The Starbucks social media team is great at offering the
customer service of local coffee shop on a grand scale over its
social media channels. Even though they're a huge company,
they still give customers individual attention, which no doubt
goes a long way toward keeping them coming back for more.
Consistent branding is key- No matter what Starbucks social
platform you visit, the Starbucks touch is evident. The company's
social channels all have the same look, feel, and tone as their
stores. Although the marketing team takes a slightly approach
from Twitter to Instagram to Facebook, the content is
consistently unified around the company's mission, message,
and goals.
Whether you're a fan of the Starbucks product line or not, their
social media success is undeniable. As with every other aspect of
the company, their attention to detail and customer-centric
messaging is what makes their social outreach some of the best
in the business.
 Conclusion
Starbucks India underperforms on social media on many
counts in India in spite of being well known for its social media
exploits in the west. The customer centric focus is missing with
they being reticent in their approach on social media. On the
whole even though their footprint in India is limited that is no
excuse for having a soft social media presence. They need to
be more forthcoming in addressing negative queries and also
help customers in their queries by simplifying information
access on their page. Twitter is an always on medium and
cannot be treated periodically if anything it should a daily
engagement medium. All this and more needs to be done to
get Starbucks presence upto speed.
NANDINI N YAVAGAL
BBA 2 semester
nd

B section B1921294