Future trends in social media use for strategic organisation communication: Results of a Delphi study

This article examines current uses of social media for communication by enterprises, political organisations and non-profit organisations (NPOs) and identifies likely future trends. Based on a quantitative online survey among 860 communication professionals in Germany and a follow-up qualitative Delphi study with 32 identified experts from the organisational communication profession and academia, it explores the status quo and aims to identify future directions. While organisations show more advanced structures for social media communication compared to earlier research findings, the empirical data also identifies many shortcomings. The potentials of social media communication are not fully exploited due to missing prerequisites including governance structures, rules and resources. Looking into the future, the Delphi panel suggests that dedicated budgets, social media guidelines and other structural aspects will increase in the near future. However, many organisations will find specific ways to deal with the issue and common strategies are rare. At the same time, according to the qualitative findings, social media evaluation and cooperation across the boundaries of departments and organisational functions are likely to stay underdeveloped.

Public Sphere Dialogue in Online Newspapers and Social Spaces: The Nuclear Debate in Post Fukushima France

The meltdown at the Japanese Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant (March 2011) provided a trigger to contribute this research about the ways in which French newspapers facilitate (or not) a public dialogue on the issue of nuclear energy. Nuclear power not only generates over 75% of the electricity in France but also sustains a healthy domestic job creation program and drives nuclear technology exports. Hence, the absence of public debate amongst the French in nuclear energy over the long term is not surprising. Against this backdrop of French nuclear interests and post Fukushima, this paper presents a French language computer-mediated discourse analysis on nuclear debates and discussions taking place online in the hybrid public sphere. This space straddles user-generated content in the public comment spaces of newspapers embracing the spectrum of political persuasions (Le Figaro, Le Monde and Liberation) and social media. Qualitative and quantitative research methods uncover citizen interactions within the online public sphere comprising newspapers. Findings illuminate the progress of deliberations on nuclear power in online newspapers following a process of agenda setting through news stories, providing space for public dialogue and the digital curating of social media commentary. Furthermore, the research reveals the relevance of the Habermasian public sphere concept within the context of online newspapers. Key learning for the role of the media in fostering the democratic process using social media and insights for the political communications landscape within the context of the nuclear debate compliment the research.

A 21st Century Manifesto for the end of business as usual

At the end of last century in 1999, the Cluetrain Manifesto (cluetrain.com) messages herald the end of business as usual for companies discovering the web and point corporates strongly towards the notion “markets are conversations”. Over a decade later, companies are participating in business online but are still none the wiser this century when trying to deal with connected customers as real people and often have no long term plans for social media activities. In light of this, the End of Business as Usual is not only a timely book in 2012 but also a potential compass for business leaders and communications professionals feeling disorientated by the proliferation of social media technologies. Of course, some might rightly believe “business as usual is an oxymoron” (a hat tip for the book publication by Hugh MacLeod of gapingvoid).

"Three Attitudes to 140 Characters The Use and Views of Twitter in Political Party Communications in Sweden"

Digital media in general, and social media in particular, are a distinctive feature of contemporary election campaign strategies. This article adds to the on going discussion of the political power of social media by exploring political party strategies behind the usage of social media. In this study we specifically focus on Twitter (a micro blog) during the latest National Election Campaign in Sweden in 2010. The study exams the degree and character of Twitter usage among parties and prominent party members, and relates content to the declared communication strategies regarding the role of Twitter in the campaign. Methodologically, the paper is based on a quantitative content analysis of all party tweets and on personal interviews with all party campaign managers. The results show campaign purposes. However, the content analysis confirms only a modest party use of Twitter messages and Twitter patterns where messages are most often related to current news media activities and are of a one-way character, with more focus on information dissemination than on interactive dialogue with voters.

Relating Word-of-Mouth to Corporate Reputation

This paper explores the relationship between customer-generated word-of-mouth and corporate reputation. After a concise literature review, we present several insights from a multiple case study of 3 organizations. Our main finding is that customer dissatisfaction and negative word-of-mouth (NWOM) are thought to have strong downside consequences for corporate reputation. Positive WOM does not appear to have equivalent upside significance for corporate reputation. NWOM often occurs as customers express dissatisfaction because of substandard customer service. However, it is when these issues or other negatively connoted stories find their way into the public domain that reputation suffers. Fear of reputational damage causes great anxiety to the organisations' senior management. Reputations are shown to be fragile. Damage limitation strategies are implemented in all three organisations.

Editorial

Editorial Welcome to this special issue of Public Communication Review themed ‘Social Media – Social Organisations – Social Interests’. Much has been said and written about the digital (r)evolution and the transition from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0, particularly the rise of what are widely termed social media. Looking beyond technological determinism and technological transformism that inevitably accompany such developments, scholars are increasingly focussing on the ‘sociology of technology’ – the social changes that both influence and arise from such developments, as well as changes in the practices of media and communication that occur. This issue was created to particularly explore notions of the ‘social organisation’, a concept advanced by Gartner and other business consulting firms which suggest that organisations are becoming more open, interactive, dialogic and responsive to their stakeholders and publics through use of social media. In turn, this suggest that social media and social organisations are more openly recognising and reflecting social interests – rather than being organisation-centric focussed on achievement of their own ‘strategic’ objectives. The potentiality of social media, reflected in discourses of media democratisation, prosumerism, and the global public sphere is much celebrated. Social media ostensibly afford two-way dialogic communication, opportunities for user-generated content, networking and even ‘communication without borders’, according to some papers presented at the 2012 World Public Relations Forum held in Melbourne in the same month as this issue. But what of the reality? Accepting that social media are now recognised as part of the media environment and the public sphere and need no introduction, this issue focuses particularly on the two perspectives that are highlighted in the theme: how organisations are using and being affected by social media, on one hand, and how social interests are being served through social media – or not – on the other. The new communication environment offers many opportunities for organisations. One is the ability to extend word of mouth communication to what some refer to as ‘word of mouse’ or, more formally, eWOM. Through the internet, the face-to-face limitation of word of mouth is removed and messages that once reached a few can reach millions through social media such as Twitter, causing some to refer to eWOM as word of mouth on steroids. The potential for social media to create and extend positive and negative word of mouth messages, which in turn effect corporate reputation, is explored by Martin Williams, Francis Buttler and Sergio Biggemann in their article ‘Relating word-of-mouth to corporate reputation’. Nevertheless, social media bring challenges to organisations to which they need to adapt, such as expectation of faster response, a breakdown of communication ‘control’ through single authorised spokespersons and PR departments and a shift to widespread online discussion by employees, resulting in calls for governance, as discussed by Anne Linke and Ansgar Zerfass in their examination of current practices among organisations and future trends in Europe. Also, we are pleased to present a review by Suresh Sood of Brian Solis’ new book, The End of Business as Usual. This reflects on changes taking place, the principles of social media communication and how these challenge organisation-centred thinking and traditional public communication practices. On the other side, three articles explore social interests and how these are being served through social media – if indeed they are. Ann Louise de la Poype and Suresh Sood examine the role and uses of social media in the public sphere through the example of the nuclear debate in Post-Fukushima France in their article ‘Public sphere dialogue in online newspapers and social spaces’. From a political communication perspective, Marie Grussel and Lars Nord analyse the use of social media for national elections in Sweden in their article ‘Three attitudes to 140 characters’. These contributions to discussion reflect on whether social media enhance the public sphere and afford citizen voice, or whether it is ‘business as usual’. A further valuable perspective challenges the persistent myth that social media are only for the young. Beyond the world of ‘digital natives’, Daniel Schultheiss examines how ‘silver gamers’ – elderly people – turn to online games for entertainment, stimulation and social interaction – in his article, ‘Entertainment for retirement’. The use of online games by the elderly and their entertainment functions are not trivial. Some health experts suggest that interactive social media and online games can provide stimulation that slows down dementia and other age-related illnesses, as well as providing pleasurable activities for an increasing segment of the population in many societies. We thank the contributing authors and reviewers for their support in producing this special issue and we encourage all scholars in the public communication field to consider Public Communication Review in 2013. Anne Linke, Guest Editor, University of Leipzig, Germany Jim Macnamara, Editor, University of Technology, Sydney

“Entertainment for Retirement?”: Silvergamers and the Internet

In recent years, Internet video gaming has grown exponentially amongst a non-traditional and non-targeted group of gamers: those over 50 years of age. In the United States alone, elderly gamers have grown from nine percent of all gamers in 1999 to over 25 percent of all gamers as of 2009. The current study specifically examines elderly peoples’ usage behaviors with Internet-based video games. Such participation has been aided by the fact that games are social in nature and are accessible in terms ownership and operation. The process of becoming an Internet gamer therefore requires little more than a simple computer, an Internet connection, and a desire to be entertained. Results show that so-called “silvergamers” prefer casual games as opposed to more complex and persistent games. In addition, this paper raises further insights into their behaviour as users, including usage time and expenses for game usage, and situates them within the context of elderly gamers as an economic potential group to be targeted more.

Crisis Communication Characteristics & Errors: A Case Study

In 2006, events surrounding the University of Geneva led to the resignation of its executive board, and a political reform of the institution. This case constitutes a typical example of where a crisis is strengthened, and even created, by inappropriate information-management. Such situations, in which material damages and personal harm are generally quite limited, are increasingly frequent and have a particularly important impact on public trust in political and administrative institutions. The main aim of this paper is to identify the characteristics of this type of crisis, and errors linked to it from a media-communications perspective. This will be done through an analysis of publications in four different newspapers, as well as of official documents and statements from the period during which the crisis took place and in the months that followed.

Editorial

Welcome to the first issue of Public Communication Review for 2012. There have been some delays in publishing this second volume because of changes to roles and the teaching and research commitments of editorial staff, which academics will understand. We apologise to authors whose work has been delayed and we are working on speeding up the review and publication process. This issue did not have a pre-planned theme, but two important perspectives on issue management and crisis communication are provided. In the first, we have given more space than the usual article length to an analysis of a major crisis at a university in Europe. While this occurred a few years ago, the article by Martial Pasquier and Etienne Fivat from the Institut de Hautes Études en Administration Publique (the Swiss Graduate School of Public Administration – IDHEAP) provides a forensic analysis of a crisis unfolding, the actions taken by management (and desirable actions not taken), and the repercussions and effects that continued long after the initial incident. The article provides a ‘thick description’ of actions and thinking inside a crisis, as well as media and public reactions, and is informative for organisations and their communication staff. The second perspective on this theme is provided by an experienced Australian practitioner in a professional article. Tony Jaques has a long career working in issue management consulting, along with some academic teaching, and he provides salutary reminders of how crises often arise out of issues that are poorly handled or not addressed at all by management. Tony also explores the future of issue management including evolution from reactive responses to a proactive form of agenda-setting and framing by governments and policy-makers, the impact of social media, the relationship between issue management and crisis management, and the positioning of issue management within organisations. Before these two thematically related articles, this issue presents an analysis of a recent health communication campaign. In our lead article, Deborah Wise and Melanie James from the University of Newcastle in Australia use discourse analysis to examine one particular element of the communication campaign to promote use of a vaccine that prevents the development of Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) Types 16 and 18 which cause 70 per cent of cervical cancers. In a similarly detailed approach to that of Pasquier and Fivat, Wise and James analyse one brochure using discourse analysis to explore its text and visual content, paying attention to framing, presuppositions, register, modality, foregrounding and backgrounding of particular issues or themes, as well as omissions (what is not said). Their sentence-by-sentence analysis contributes understanding of the techniques of discourse analysis and illustrates the role and importance of deep knowledge to achieve effective communication through an information resource such as a brochure. This issue also includes an article based on a paper presented to the Third International PR History conference in Bournemouth, UK in 2011 by Robert Crawford and the editor. While being circumspect about publishing our own work, this article addresses an important gap in Australian PR scholarship – the lack of a comprehensive localised history of the development of public relations practice and the role and influence of PR socially, culturally and politically. Hence, the title refers to an ‘outside in’ perspective, noting that most PR histories to date have been written about PR for PR. This article examines a significant national cultural event, Australia Day, to identify how it was established, maintained in spite of opposition over many decades, repositioned to adapt to a changing social, cultural and political environment, and finally institutionalised with the Bicentenary celebrations of European settlement (1988) and celebrations for the new millennium. This article prompts us to issue a reminder to our readers to submit articles, tell your colleagues about Public Communication Review, and refer your students to the free online site – http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/pcr. As a ‘young’ journal, we do need to attract more quality submissions to achieve our goals of promoting scholarship across the diverse field of public communication and contributing to the dissemination of research in Australia and Asia Pacific. So please spread the word. And we hope you find the work of authors published in this issue informative and stimulating. Jim Macnamara Editor March 2012

An ‘outside-in’ PR history: Identifying the role of PR in history, culture and sociology

Historical, social and cultural understanding of public relations in Australia is limited because most histories of PR examine practices specifically labelled ‘public relations’ and almost all study PR from ‘inside out’ – that is, from the subjective perspective of PR practitioners. This article reports an alternative approach to PR history which applies historical analysis of major events, icons, and institutions in society to identify the methods of their construction politically, culturally and discursively. This article specifically reports historical and critical analysis of the creation and celebration of Australia’s national day, Australia Day from soon after the British flag was hoisted in Sydney on 26 January 1788 to the sophisticated pageantry of the nation’s bicentenary in 1988 and its entry to the new millennium in 2000. This research challenges a ‘blind spot’ in social science and humanities disciplines in relation to public relations by showing that the practices of PR are deeply embedded in the social and cultural construction of societies. This study confirms Taylor and Kent’s claim that “all nation building campaigns include large communication components that are essentially public relations campaigns”.