Dr Brendan Keegan

School of Business, ALL Institute

Lecturer/Assistant Professor
Principle Investigator (PI) for Go Green Routes Project

349
(01) 474 7530

Biography

Brendan is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Marketing at Maynooth University, specializing in digital and social media marketing analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning applications in marketing and digital placemaking. 

Brendan works on numerous funded projects from international and national funding bodies: 

  • GoGreenRoutes (2020-2024): A €10.4 million EU Horizon funded project building digital placemaking strategies for nature based solutions in six EU Cities.
  • Cross Border Communications Project (2023): Irish Department of Defence All-Island Disaster Risk Reduction Shared Island Research. Reviewing existing practices of local public safety messaging; extent of cross-border coherence in public safety and emergency management messaging.
  • Net Zero Cities - Drammen (2023): A €2.5million EU Horizon funded project working with key community stakeholders and municipal planners, generating substantive knowledge in the area of human-nature interfaces, where digital placemaking initiatives have been utilised.
  • Digital Blue Health, (2021-2024): Maynooth School of Business Seed Funded project investigating health and wellbeing impacts of community swimming groups in rural, isolated communities in Ireland.

Research Interests

My research comprises of three interrelated strands, bound together through the role of digital analytics in decision making, namely: 
  1. the role of digital analytics in marketing decision-making;
  2. application of artificial intelligence in marketing, and
  3. the interlink between digital placemaking and health and wellbeing
My PhD research examined the influence of social media analytics upon marketing agency-client relationships.

My ongoing research has examined how analytics techniques play a role in the development of business intelligence, such as: big data analytics, social media monitoring, quantitative sentiment analysis, tie-strength analysis, semiotic analysis, semantic content analysis, text- based data mining, Twitter trend extrapolation and meme mapping. 

Research Projects

Title Role Description Start date End date Amount
AI-DREAMS_EICS PI 28/11/2023 27/11/2024 10012
Digital Blue Health Project (2021-2025) Principal Investigator Total Budget: 14,000 (2021, €5,000; 2022, €5,000; 2023, €4,000) This project involves a longitudinal study of the health and wellbeing impacts of community swimming groups in rural, isolated communities in Ireland. Funding from the School of Business Seed Funding has been secured over three years to support data collection and analysis of data collected with Open Water Swimming Groups using the innovative swim-along method. 01/09/2021 31/08/2025 14000
Drammen Pilot City 2023 PI Net Zero Cities – Call for Pilot Cities Drammen Pilot City 2023 As stated by the EU Mission Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities Implementation Plan, "The main obstacle to climate transition is not a lack of climate-friendly and smart technologies, but the capacity to implement them. The present silo-based form of governance, designed and developed for traditional city operations and services, cannot drive an ambitious climate transition. Therefore, a systemic transformation is urgent." There is a need to understand how to effectively integrate innovative solutions within existing systems, strengthening inter-departmental, inter-institutional, and inter-disciplinary cooperation within and beyond the municipality. Over the past three decades, through long-term planning and cooperation among politics, commerce, and civil society, Drammen saw an extensive nature-based regeneration that brought major environmental and social impacts, lifting the city from its status of a highly polluted industrial city to its current identity as a green and highly livable city. Drammen City continues investing in the green transition, formalizing a cross-political commitment and vision to become Norway’s greenest city –a circular and climate-robust, low-emission community where sustainability is a natural choice. In this scope, Drammen City aims to explore and test pathways to accelerate change toward its 2030 climate reduction goal and to generate evidence-based learnings that can inform subsequent replication and scaling efforts in all other EU cities. The pilot activities presented in this proposal, which include municipality-driven projects as well as scientific studies led, under the prism of a municipal-university agreement, by the University of South-Eastern Norway (USN) will generate foundational knowledge, identify systemic barriers and opportunities relevant to the concerned emissions domains, and tackle complex systemic challenges along the path toward decarbonization, producing an evidence-based blueprint for other cities to follow. We will engage relevant stakeholders and represent a broad spectrum of citizens, expertise, and experience in the Drammen region. We want to see transformational change - system change - rather than incremental change in individual parts, to achieve our goal of reduced emissions within 2030 for the good of all European citizens. 01/09/2023 01/08/2024 4000
ICLRD Cross-border Public Safety Messaging Co-Investigator There are four key objectives to this study funded by the Department of Defence - Office of Emergency Planning under the All-Island Disaster Risk Reduction Shared Island Research on Emergency Planning Cooperation, 2023, namely: To build a better understanding of existing practices of local public safety messaging; To assess the extent of cross-border coherence in public safety and emergency management messaging; To draw learning from international good practice; and To develop recommendations for improved cross-border public safety messaging. 03/02/2023 29/03/2024
GoGreenRoutes MMU Transfer PI 21/07/2021 31/08/2024 157241.3
GoGreenRoutes Principal Investigator Total Budget €10.48 Maynooth Allocation €219,000 GOGREEN ROUTES aims to improve the health and well-being of people living in cities across Europe. The project will involve 40 partners across 18 European countries and will explore the roles of nature-based solutions, urban design and digital placemaking techniques in encouraging more people in cities to engage with outdoor spaces. My PI role involves extensive work in the collection and analysis of survey data from citizen panels, interviews with municipal planners, leading to the development and dissemination of digital placemaking toolkits for Six Seed Cities in the EU. Three years of work on this project has commenced and resulted in the production and publication of the WP6.2 Deliverable, published in November 2023. 01/09/2020 31/08/2024 219000
AI-B2B Project Principal Investigator Budget £5,000 Manchester Metropolitan University SeedCore Funding This project sought to investigate the challenges of artificial intelligence and machine learning applications in B2B marketing. Funding supported data collection and transcription which led to a rich dataset that presented opportunities and challenges of artificial intelligence and machine learning applications in B2B marketing. 06/05/2018 31/07/2019 5000
Get In Nature Principal Investigator & Work Package Lead (Communications) (Unsuccessful at 2nd Round of Review) Budget, €6.5million GETinNature seeks to advance our understanding and application of nature-based therapy (NBT) by innovating a more accessible, inclusive and sustainable model of practice. An evidence-based approach, supported by digital and technological nature (i.e. while nature in the physical world is preferable it may not always be accessible), will evaluate NBT as a pathway for the prevention and treatment of mental health issues, by identifying best practices, determining modes of interaction, quantifying risk and mediators, to ensure more effective application. 01/09/2023 6552473
LookDown Co-Investigator (Unsuccessful after 1st Round) Total Budget Requested €3.6million Maynooth Allocation €260,000 HORIZON EUSPA, Innovation Action The project aims to develop a more robust and user-friendly tool to quantify the impact of mobility measures on air quality to better engage citizens in actions and facilitate the construction of a coherent urban policy. By further exploiting existing mobility-related data, measurements from air quality sensors in combination with data from CAMS products, impact information will become mainly observation-based and thus more robust. 01/09/2022 260000
Drammen River Parks Project Principal Investigator (Unsuccessful) Total Budget €250,000 Maynooth Allocation €15,000 Norwegian Regional Research Fund With an ageing population, alongside the increasing burden of non-communicable diseases and ill mental health, there is an increasing need to find sustainable and cost-effective preventative and health-promoting solutions to tackle such major societal challenges. As urban population is growing worldwide, cities development is seen as key. In particular, SDG#11 calls for “a future in which cities provide opportunities for all”, while SDG#3 states that “Ensuring healthy lives and promoting the well-being for all at all ages is essential to sustainable development”. Drammen saw an extensive city development, which included the re-purposing of industrial buildings and revitalization of several city areas. This included, among others, the creation of public parks and walking trails that extent for over 14 km along Drammen river, connecting central locations such as the city centre, the train station, and the University Campus. These infrastructures are an excellent example of nature-based infrastructures (NBS) to promote mobility, health, and satisfaction among the citizens. Drammen Municipality was awarded with the “Norway’s best outdoor space” award in 2008 and the “Green park of the year” award in 2014. The planned main project will aim at integrating digital placemaking solutions within Drammen’s “river parks”, a social marketing strategy that capitalises on a local community’s assets, inspiration, and potential, with the intention of creating public spaces that promote people’s health, happiness, and wellbeing by using location-specific digital technology to create more meaningful destinations. To implement effective digital placemaking solutions, there is a need to gather foundational knowledge that will allow the creation of meaningful solutions specific for the context of Drammen. However, there is virtually no scientific or systematic knowledge on the impact of Drammen’s regeneration on the community’s wellbeing. 04/04/2022 15000
Green Travel and Exercise Showcase Principal Investigator (Unsuccessful) Budget £15,000 The project aimed to run a Green Travel and Exercise Showcase for UK Towns, showcasing innovations from the GoGreenRoutes project for a UK audience. This application was made to obtain ‘pump-prime’ support for innovative knowledge exchange projects which address genuine industrial or public service requirements, or new products and services. 02/09/2019 15000
Pinecone Ltd. Innovation Voucher PI This project was part of a Knowledge Transfer Project which worked in partnership with a local business to establish, build and develop a digital marketing footprint. The project built a website and associated digital presences on social media to use digital marketing to raise awareness and increase sales amongst target leads. 05/07/2010 17/12/2010 5000

Peer Reviewed Journal

Year Publication
2024 Maria Fernandez-Osso Fuentes; Brendan James Keegan; Marc Jones; Tadhg McIntyre (2024) 'Conceptualizing Digital Placemaking in Nature for Wellbeing'. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, .
2024 Fernandez de Osso Fuentes, Maria; Keegan, Brendan; Rowley, Jenny; Esther Worboys (2024) 'Big Trouble in Little Places: Understanding the Complexities of Place Micro-Brands'. Journal of Place Management and Development, . [DOI]
2023 Brendan James Keegan; Ian P. McCarthy; Jan Kietzmann; Ana Isabel Canhoto (2023) 'On your marks, headset, go! Understanding the building blocks of metaverse realms'. Business Horizons, . [Link] [DOI] [Full-Text]
2023 Brendan James Keegan; Sophie Iredale; Peter Naudé (2023) 'Examining the dark force consequences of AI as a new actor in B2B relationships'. Industrial Marketing Management, . [Link] [DOI] [Full-Text]
2023 Ana Isabel Canhoto; Brendan James Keegan; Maria Ryzhikh; (2023) 'Snakes and Ladders: Unpacking the Personalisation-Privacy Paradox in the Context of AI-Enabled Personalisation in the Physical Retail Environment'. Information Systems Frontiers, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2023 Maria J. Fernandez de Osso Fuentes; Brendan James Keegan; Marc V. Jones; Tadhg MacIntyre; (2023) 'Digital placemaking, health and wellbeing and nature-based solutions: A systematic review and practice model'. Urban Forestry &Amp; Urban Greening, . [DOI]
2022 Keegan B.J.; Dennehy D.; Naudé P. (2022) 'Implementing Artificial Intelligence in Traditional B2B Marketing Practices: An Activity Theory Perspective'. Information Systems Frontiers, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2022 Mc Carthy, J; Rowley, J; Keegan BJ (2022) 'Social media marketing strategy in English football clubs'. Soccer and Society, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2022 Calogiuri G.; Keegan B.J.; Birkheim S.L.; Rydgren T.L.; Flaten O.E.; Fröhlich F.; Litleskare S. (2022) 'A mixed-methods exploration of virtual reality as a tool to promote green exercise'. Scientific Reports, 12 (1). [DOI] [Full-Text]
2022 Keegan B.J.; Canhoto A.I.; Yen D.A.W. (2022) 'Power negotiation on the tango dancefloor: The adoption of AI in B2B marketing'. Industrial Marketing Management, 100 :36-48. [DOI] [Full-Text]
2021 Keegan, Brendan James (2021) 'Shedding the pounds by quitting the cookies'. Applied Marketing Analytics, 7 (1):4-5. [Link]
2021 Alex Fenton; Brendan James Keegan; Keith D. Parry; (2021) 'Understanding Sporting Social Media Brand Communities, Place and Social Capital: A Netnography of Football Fans'. Communication & Sport, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2021 Hanna, S; Rowley, J ; Keegan, BJ (2021) 'Place and Destination Branding: A Review and Conceptual Mapping of the Domain'. European Management Review, 18 (2). [DOI] [Full-Text]
2020 Jennifer Rowley; Brendan James Keegan; (2020) 'An overview of systematic literature reviews in social media marketing'. Journal of Information Science, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2019 Rachel Stringfellow; Brendan James Keegan; Jennifer Rowley; (2019) 'The use of Facebook in the recruitment of foster carers: A dialogic analysis'. Journal of Public Affairs, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2019 Brendan James Keegan, James Taylor (2019) 'Are You Local (SEO)? Understanding The Challenges Of Local SEO Strategies'. Journal Of Digital And Social Media Marketing, .
2017 Brendan James Keegan; Jennifer Rowley; Jane Tonge (2017) 'Marketing Agency-Client Relationships: Towards A Research Agenda'. European Journal of Marketing, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2017 Brendan James Keegan; Jennifer Rowley (2017) 'Evaluation and decision making in social media marketing'. Management Decision, . [DOI] [Full-Text]
2012 Robin Johnson, David Edmundson-Bird, Brendan James Keegan (2012) 'Making digital literacy a success in taught marketing courses'. Enhancing Learning in the Social Sciences, . https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.11120/elss.2012.04020002 [Full-Text]

Book Chapter

Year Publication
2022 Keegan, B. J. and Schifanella, R. (2022) 'Social Media Data in Digital Placemaking' In: The SAGE Handbook of Social Media Marketing. London : SAGE Publications Ltd.
2021 Brendan James Keegan (2021) 'Keeping Pace with the Digital Transformation of Place' In: A Research Agenda for Place Branding. London : Elgar. [DOI]
2020 Brendan James Keegan; Lee Smorthit (2020) 'Ethics and New Media, A Double-Edged Sword: A Case Study of Digital Marketing Adoption in the Charity Sector' In: The SAGE Handbook of Marketing Ethics. UK : SAGE.

Conference Publication

Year Publication
2023 Fernandez de Osso Fuentes, Maria; Brendan James Keegan; Jones, M; MacIntyre, T (2023) 2023 Academy of Marketing Science World Marketing Congress Achieving Consensus on Digital Placemaking for Nature & Wellbeing through a Modified Delphi Study. An Abstract [Link]
2022 Brendan James Keegan, Sophie Iredale, Peter Naudé (2022) 38th Annual IMP Conference AI in the Realm of AI [Link]
2022 Brendan James Keegan; Sheila Malone (2022) Academy of Marketing Digital Blue Health: Examining the role of digital placemaking in community well-being amongst Blue Health (open water swimming) groups
2019 Jeff McCarthy; Jennifer Rowley; Brendan James Keegan (2019) Football Collective 2019 Football club social media strategies in a tribal and polarised climate
2018 Jennifer Rowley; Brendan James Keegan (2018) Academy of Marketing Looking back, Going forward: the role and nature of systematic literature reviews in digital marketing: a meta-analysis
2018 Brendan James Keegan; Jayne Rodgers (2018) Academy of Marketing Slave To The Algorithm: Are Keywords Killing The Creativity Of SMEs?
2017 Brendan James Keegan (2017) Association for Learning Technology Annual Conference Education 2.1? Continuing The Search for Digital Platforms Supporting Learning Technology
2017 Brendan James Keegan (2017) International Marketing Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility Symposium, University of Notre Dame The Ethical Implications of Social Media in Marketing
2016 Dee Goldstraw; Brendan James Keegan (2016) 29th Bled eConference Instagrams #fitspiration Trend and Its Effect on Young Womens Self-Esteem
2016 Brendan James Keegan; David Edmundson-Bird; Robin Johnson (2016) Use of Twitter Data for Research. National University of Ireland Galway The Use of Twitter in Taught Digital Marketing Modules
2016 Dee Goldstraw; Brendan James Keegan (2016) EUPRERA Congress Social Media As A Media Relations Tool?
2016 Cathy Parker, Simon Quin, Nikos Ntounis, Steve Millington, Dominic Medway, Cathy Urquhart, Ed Dargan, Brendan James Keegan (2016) AR and VR Conference: Perspectives on Business Realities of AR and VR, Dublin Institute of Technology Improving the customer experience in retail locations: The Game of Towns
2016 Brendan James Keegan (2016) Academy of Marketing The evaluation of social media use: A longitudinal study
2014 Brendan James Keegan (2014) Developments in Marketing Science: Proceedings of the Academy of Marketing Science Co-creation in Social Media Marketing Strategy: Re-evaluating the Agency-Client Relationship, An Extended Abstract [DOI]
2014 Brendan James Keegan; David Edmundson-Bird; Rachel McLean (2014) Academy of Marketing e-Marketing SIG Conference The Red Thread: An exploration of The Silo Effect in Digital Marketing
2011 Keegan, Brendan James; (2011) Academy of Marketing, Southampton Exploring The Impact of Agency Client Relationships in Digital Marketing
2011 Keegan, Brendan James; (2011) Doctoral Symposium Counting Comments: A critical appraisal of the evaluation of social media campaigns by UK digital marketing practitioners

Conference Contribution

Year Publication
2024 Canhoto, A; Keegan, Brendan J (2024) UCL School of Management Decoding the Metaverse: A Framework for Assessing the Research Potential of Metaverse Data London, .
2024 Fuentes, Maria J; Keegan, Brendan J (2024) People and Planet – from Theory to Solutions Conference 2024: Towards Transformations Reaching a Modified Delphi Study Consensus on Digital Placeamking for Nature and Wellbeing – A working Paper Helsinki, .
2023 Cormac Walsh; Brendan J. Keegan; Caroline Creamer; Tadhg McIntyre (2023) Annual All Island Disaster Risk Reduction Conference Advancing a Focused Cross-Border Approach to Public Messaging in Emergency Management Dublin, .
2022 Giovanna Calogiuri; Brendan James Keegan; Sigbjørn Litleskare; Siv Lena Birkheim; Tore Litlere Rydgren; Ole Einar Flaten; Fred Fröhlich (2022) 17th European Congress of Psychology Virtual nature to promote visitation of actual natural environments – An exploratory mixed-methods study Ljubljana, Slovenia, 05/07/2022-07/07/2022.
2022 Fernandez de Osso Fuentes, M., Keegan, Brendan James, Jones, M. V., MacIntyre, T. (2022) The Nature Of Cities Festival Can digital placemaking improve mental health through nature? https://airtable.com/shrAeI4H2zngGp6iz/tbl1VwQXd6kQd7SuR/viwmUpkWoWrfITOJU/recsyA4XECtl8XHUj, 29/03/2022-31/03/2022.
2022 Magda Marchowska-Raza, Jennifer Rowley & Brendan James Keegan (2022) CBR 2022 (7th International Consumer Brand Relationship Conference) Consumer and brand value creation and co-creation in cosmetics social media brand communities Florida, .
2022 Maria Fernandez de Osso Fuentes, Brendan James Keegan, Marc Jones, Tadhg MacIntyre (2022) The Nature of Cities Can digital placemaking improve mental health through nature? Online, .

Published Report

Year Publication
2023 Fuentes, Maria J.; Keegan, Brendan J. (2023) GoGreenRoutes Project Deliverable Report 6.3: Digital Placemaking tool-kit for Cultivating Cities. European Union HORIZON (Grant No. 869764), . [Link]
2022 Brendan James Keegan (2022) GoGreenRoutes: Terms of reference for urban well-being labs and associated local task forces in each of the Cultivating Cities. Horizon 2020 European Commission, . [Link]

Magazine Article

Year Publication
2021 Brendan James Keegan (2021) Are You Social Media Savvy?. Retail News: [Magazine Article]

Magazine Article

Year Publication
2013 Brendan James Keegan (2013) Disgruntled customers waging a social media war. The Conversation: [Magazine Article] [Link]
2013 Brendan James Keegan (2013) Twitter app stops you Breaking Bad news to good people. The Conversation: [Magazine Article] [Link]
2013 Brendan James Keegan (2013) Twitter data puts music moguls back in the game. The Conversation: [Magazine Article] [Link]

Other Journal

Year Publication
2022 Fernandez de Osso Fuentes, M. J., Keegan, B. J., Jones, M. V.,& MacIntyre, T. (2022) 'How can digital placemaking impact health and wellbeing of citizens through green and blue space connections? A systematic literature review protocol' PROSPERO International prospective register of systematic reviews, . [Link]
Certain data included herein are derived from the © Web of Science (2024) of Clarivate. All rights reserved.

Professional Associations

Description Function From / To
Academy of Marketing (UK) Academic Member 01/06/2010 -
Digital Analytics Association Full Member 01/01/2014 -
Manchester Digital Development Association Academic Member 01/08/2008 -
Higher Education Academy (UK) Fellow 01/01/2017 -
Greater Manchester AI Foundry Advisory Board Member 04/01/2021 -
Academy of Marketing Science Academic Member 01/06/2015 -

Employment

Employer Position From / To
Manchester Metropolitan University Senior Lecturer in Digital Marketing 04/09/2007 - 30/06/2021
w00tmedia Digital Marketing Executive 04/06/2007 - 04/01/2008

Education

Start date Institution Qualification Subject
Manchester Metropolitan University Master of Science in Digital Marketing Communications Digital Marketing Communications
Manchester Metropolitan University Business School PhD Social Media Analytics and the Agency-Client Relationship
NUI Galway BSc in Marine Science Marine Biology
Griffith College Dublin PG Diploma in Journalism and Media Communications Journalism and Media Communications

Languages

Language Reading Writing Speaking
French Basic Basic Basic
Irish-Gaeilge Functional Basic Functional

Other Activities

Description
Examiner of PhD Thesis for Oxford Brookes
Examiner of PhD Thesis for Technical University Dublin
Examiner of DBA Thesis for University of Liverpool
External Examiner of M.Phil Thesis for University of Manchester Business School
External Examiner for D.BA Viva at University of Liverpool
External Examiner at Ulster University for their BA in Marketing Management
External Advisor at University of Middlesex. External advisor for validation event (BA in Digital Marketing MSc in Digital Marketing)
External Examiner for Technical University Dublin - MSc Digital Marketing and Analytics
External Examiner for Salford University - Business Information Technology Department (Undergraduate and Postgraduate)

Consultancy

Client Description
Pinecone Ltd. (Innovation Voucher) Innovation Voucher (Short-term Knowledge Transfer Partnership) to develop a digital marketing strategy in the promotion of an online system for managing school tours.

Editorial / Academic Reviews

Amount Role From / To
Journal Of Digital And Social Media Marketing Member of the Editorial Board -
Management Decision Reviewer -
Applied Marketing Analytics Member of the Editorial Board -
European Journal of Marketing Reviewer -
Journal of Place Management and Development Member of the Editorial Board -

Outreach Activities

Organisation Type Description
Digital Industry Awards Judge Industry I serve as a judge for a number of digital industry awards in the UK. The most recent awards which I have served as a judge for are as follows: European Agency Awards 2022 UK Agency Awards 2021 Northern Digital Awards 2021 Global Business Tech Awards 2021 Global Agency Awards 2021 - European Content Awards 2021 European Agency Awards 2021 Canadian Search Awards 2021

Teaching Interests

My teaching philosophy is research informed, an approach that provides a clear link between theory and practice. In doing so, I strive to underpin my teaching with both marketing theory and with up to date industry skillsets, which contribute greatly to graduate employability. 

I have been an educator of marketing at third level since 2007. Due to my specialism in digital marketing analytics, it requires me to use strong communication skills to conveying complex technical subject matter and analytical techniques into digestible course material. Given the fast pace and dynamic nature of the digital marketing environment, I am highly motivated to continually develop and adapt module content to ensure it is contemporary and aligns with industry trends.

I teach two modules in the field of social media marketing: 

MN329 - Social Media 

MI238 -  Managing Social Media

Current Students

Student Name Degree Supervision
MS. M.J. FERNÁNDEZ DE OSSÓ FUENTES RESEARCH PH.D. (10)

Internal Collaborators

Name Company Role Country
María José Fernández De Ossó Fuentes PhD Student
Tadhg Macintyre Co-investigator Ireland