Social Media resourcing of an entrepreneurial firm network: Collaborative mobilisation processes

Research addressing how social media (SM) is mobilised in interaction with other network actors is rare. The aim of this paper is to identify the micro-processes of SM resource mobilisation at resource interfaces in a collaborative entrepreneurial network. Using a sample of three entrepreneurial firms and their connected networks, the authors inductively analysed 12,491 B2B SM related interactions and 66 h of interview data to identify six foundational micro-processes that underpin SM resource mobilisation: (i) connecting, (ii) matching, (iii) sorting, (iv) managing, (v) divergence, and (vi) contraction. The study contributes to process studies in network-based research by focusing on how SM resources are mobilised at the boundary between firms in a network. In practice, the six micro-processes identified can be used by entrepreneurial firms to purposefully mobilise SM as a resource for collaborative business-to-business network activity.