Social media marketing: game theory and the emergence of collaboration

Abstract

Does social media marketing signal the death of advertising, or its rebirth? Or is it merely the trend of the moment, destined for over-saturation and burnout? The current mania for social media clouds the marketer's vision with both overheated hype and dire predictions, none of which brings us closer to understanding how and why social media has emerged as a driving force in contemporary marketing. The science of game theory provides the toolset for the marketer and the marketing scholar to see past the bubble trends to the deep structure of marketer-consumer relationships. Originally developed to guide Cold-War geopolitical maneuvering, game theory illuminates the conflicting and overlapping interests of marketers and consumers in marketing's long and contentious evolution toward cooperation. Social media marketing is revealed as an evolutionary stage in a movement that began with the Web itself. Its future depends on the decisions marketers make today.