To Evaluate the Impact of Online Customers Reviews via Social Media on Brand Awareness, Product Choice, and Customer Retention: A Case of Restaurant Industry in Twin Cities of Pakistan”

Abstract

Digitalization is growing rapidly through-out the globe including Pakistan. More and more businesses are getting digitalized or have been involved with digital world. This reason made me write a qualitative thesis focuses on evaluation and analysis of online customer reviews and its impact upon brand awareness, product choice and customer retention specifically focusing the restaurants businesses in Pakistan. Since food industry is also flourishing so I chose it to make research on. Moreover, this thesis also explores how the respondents were referred to the social media groups, pages and evaluating the information gathered through comments and reviews by other customers help them to create brand awareness, restaurant selection and retention. A total of 10 interviewees were selected on the basis of judgment and snowball sampling and the criteria for selecting them was having an experience in online (social media) marketing and online shopping. Semi structure interviews were conducted and through these interviews, themes were developed to analyze the data thoroughly. This research concludes that online reviews providing information and credibility create brand awareness and product choice. These reviews are also associated to increase customer loyalty and to retain them.