Nowadays people tend to recollect on their physical needs as health is given again a high priority. Thus, it is no surprise, that the demand and supply for health offers constantly increase – online and offline. An industry that thereby profits from, is the health tourism industry. Therefore, it is no surprise that also the competition in Austria is tough and it thus plays a key role to stand out and attract potential guests. Thereby, it is of specific interest to generate brand awareness and be set in customer’s mindsets. An instrument, that thereby offers great opportunities due to its possibility to communicate with people worldwide without hardly any boundaries, is social media. Therefore, this master thesis strives to develop a social media concept for the health tourism industry on the example of the Gesundheitsresort Königsberg to increase the supported brand awareness in the target market Hungary. The first part of the thesis strives to gain know-how about the health tourism industry, brand awareness as well as social media and concludes with the theoretical social media concept to increase the supported brand awareness. The second part initiates with a short secondary analysis about the differences between the target market Hungary and the home market Austria. Further, within the practical part, a social media concept with the objective to increase the supported brand awareness was developed based on a primary research. The thereby conducted online survey questioned 130 Hungarian social media users with special interest in health / healthy lifestyle inter alia about their health as well as social media behaviour. The concept commences with a situation analysis as well as a SWOT analysis, followed by strategical decisions regarding positioning and SWOT norm strategies. Based on the findings and decisions of the research, the recommendations for the implementation were given with special focus on social media channels, content and resources needed. The last step of the concept defines necessary KPIs for the company that should be tracked to reach the objective. The master thesis concludes with a summary about the recommended actions that need to be followed and later controlled to reach the objective to increase the supported brand awareness with social media.

A fast internationalization process is of special interest for small businesses in the field of B2C, as the operating income can be increased faster through operating in various markets with a rather small and suitable for the massmarket product portfolio. Especially young brands in the F&B industry often start directly with online marketing activities and direct e-commerce, which is not bound to traditional geographical borders. Thus, speed in processes is required, which often leads to missing conceptual approaches in social media marketing. In order to successfully support a fast internationalization process, a concept for a brand’s social media appearance and to maximize reach is required. Such a concept is relevant for the beverages brand waterdrop, as the brand is currently planning to enter the market of UK. The goal of the concept is to accelerate the planned turnover target gathered out of social media in UK through the use of a conceptual approach aiming to reach virality with the brand’s social media activities. Hence, the theoretical part of this thesis deals with latest insights from literature, which delivers the basics for a strong social media appearance. On the one hand, important drivers of consumer behavior and e-commerce requirements, as well as market conditions in the F&B industry are discussed. On the other hand, the strategic framework for a social media concept is outlined in the theoretical section. Above that, crucial aspects and the meaning of channels, community, influencers, and content requirements for social media are discussed. In order to differentiate on a cost-effective scale through social media, mechanisms of virality are of special interest for the respective social media concept. Theoretical pillars of a SMM concept lead over to the practical section of this thesis, which researches success factors for a social media concept with virality aims through case studies and 17 expert interviews. The findings from theory represent the basis for the market research. The findings from the market research are summarized in topic-related sections, which lead to a customer-centric and internationalization-direct social media marketing concept for the brand waterdrop.