Media management and social media business: New forms of value creation in the context of increasingly interconnected media applications

Abstract

Media companies are facing the problem of modeling the increasingly volatile and complex forms of emergent media use and of channeling them through their services in order to create a sustainable business model. Anticipating these patterns and converting them into stable forms of use allows for companies to identify new ways of value creation. The authors argue that concepts other than the value chain are necessary to model this type of value creation. Although it has seldom been used with regard to media as of yet, especially the value network is considered to be relevant in this context. In times of digitization and convergence, media companies become increasingly granular and depend on strategic co-operations within networks, e.g. regarding production and marketing. Moreover, the consumers become an active part in value creation as “prosumers”. This chapter attempts to investigate the manifold points of contact between media use and corresponding concepts of value creation in networks of micro business models. For that purpose, the authors combine approaches from media management and media studies.