Identification of influence in social media communities

Individual usage of social media is expected to have a growing impact on the corporate reputation of organisations. Influential users of social media can disseminate positive or negative information and opinions about products, services, brands or businesses among members of their online networks in the social media spaces. The impact of such actions can often be substantial; negative information and opinions posted in social networks, blogs, online communities and forums has the potential to reach large numbers of people and substantially impact on the organisation's image and reputation. It is important for organisations to identify the online influencers -customers with important social networking impact -and identify ways to interact with them in order to respond efficiently to bad publicity or customer attacks. This study, based on extensive literature review and experts panel study based on the Delphi method, we construct a model identifying the social media influencers and the impact of these influencers on the corporate reputation.

Radical Marketing, Academy of Marketing Annual Conference Proceedings, 2016

This paper addresses the topic of the impact of social networks on companies’ reputation. Before a consumer with new aptitudes, access to new technologies and, above all, to a wider and more dynamic range of alternative communication sources, companies must pay attention to all that is written about in social networks, and should be especially careful about what to publish and the answer they give to their customers' publications. Social networks have become, in recent time, one of the most developed, simple and accessible means of communication. Herewith, even more companies pay attention to their reputation because one simple comment or opinion about a product/service of a company/brand could influence the decision making of other users/consumers. With regard the work’s methodology, after a literature review, a questionnaire to the users/consumers was applied in order to analyse the use of social networks, the opinions transmitted and how the company’s reputation may get out impaired in order to raise awareness of the factors that can influence the reputation of companies on social networks. So it is important to plan and work effective business communication strategy in a radical marketing perspective.

Business Horizons, 2014

TRANSFORMATIONS IN BUSINESS & ECONOMICS, 2016

The influence of social media on contemporary technology based society is undeniable: it forms communication habits, changes social norms, provides various opportunities for businesses, and affects society in other ways. It is especially the organizations that benefit from the social media provided communication platform, which enables to engage with several stakeholders at once, provides space for advertising and public relations; however, despite all the positive opportunities provided by the social media, there are still many risks involved. One of the main issues, which is faced, is how the organizations should manage their reputation in the social media. Hence, the aim of the article is to analyse how to create positive organization’s reputation in the social media by emphasizing organization’s content creation and sharing in the social media. This article analyses social media definitions and taxonomies and presents the traditional input process-output model used for the management of the organization’s reputation in the social media. According to the inputs of the model, an investigation, which evaluated social media content creation and sharing of the Lithuania’s national cultural organizations, was performed.

Vikalpa: The Journal for Decision Makers, 2018

Establishing and maintaining favourable reputations is the bedrock of corporate communication.-J. Cornellisen W ith this assertion as its cornerstone, Corporate Communication through Social Media by Asha Kaul and Vidhi Chaudhri paints the changing landscape of corporate communication after the advent of social media. Creating and maintaining a robust corporate reputation has always been daunting. More so in the digital age when social media has led to stakeholders being in an 'always on' mode. The very characteristics of speed, reach, and visibility that make social media the stuff of dreams for users turn it into a nightmare for organizations that are trying to communicate with stakeholders to enhance their reputation while still struggling with the unexpected loss of control and exposure of their minutiae in the public domain.

With the emergence of the Interactive Web or (Web 2.0), social media applications gained enormous popularity among Internet users forcing businesses to adapt their marketing strategies and engage the social media as part of their marketing toolbox. The social media has empowered the public and weakened the position of businesses by exposing them to negative publicity, customer attacks and reputation damage. This study analyzes the threat of social media to the corporate reputation that can be damaged by three different actors: the customer, the employee and the corporation itself. We review the literature about the impact of each of these actors and assess the findings by means of real-life cases. Based on the findings, social media reputation threats are discussed in light of corporate response strategies. The results indicate that organizations need to develop a portfolio of response strategies with several approaches specifically relating to each of the three actors of reputation damage; the best policy of businesses to successfully manage their reputation is to create an organization capable of managing the risks to corporate reputation arising from employees and the corporation itself. The real-life cases indicate a lack of organizational knowledge on how to effectively manage social media risks, highlighting the need for businesses to update their knowledge on using the social media as part of their marketing toolbox. Finally the various response strategies are classified according to the source of the reputation threat.

With the emergence of the interactive web (or Web 2.0), social media applications gained enormous popularity among internet users, forcing businesses to adapt their marketing strategies and engage with social media as part of their marketing toolbox. Social media has empowered the public and weakened the position of businesses by exposing them to negative publicity, customer attacks and reputation damage. This study analyses the threat of social media to corporate reputation, which can be damaged by three different actors: the customer, the employee and the corporation itself. We review the literature on the impact of each of these actors and assess the findings by means of real-life cases. On the basis of these findings, social media reputation threats are discussed in light of corporate response strategies. The results indicate that organizations need to develop a portfolio of response strategies with several approaches, specifically relating to each of the three actors of reputation damage — the best policy for businesses to successfully manage their reputation is to create an organization capable of managing the risks to corporate reputation arising from employees and the corporation itself. The real-life cases indicate a lack of organizational knowledge on how to manage social media risks effectively, highlighting the need for businesses to update their knowledge on using social media as part of their marketing toolbox. Finally, the various response strategies are classified according to the source of the reputation threat.

Academy of Management Review, 2019

The rise of social media is changing how evaluative judgments about organizations are produced and disseminated in the public domain. In this article we discuss how these changes question traditional assumptions that research on media reputation rests upon, and we offer an alternative framework that begins to account for how the more active role of audiences, the changing ways in which they express their evaluations, and the increasing heterogeneity and dynamism that characterize media reputation influence the formation of organizational reputations.

TEST Engineering & Management, 2020

This study seeks to analyze the communication model of social media public relations in building the reputation of agencies in the industrial era 4.0 by using new theories in communication science. By using an observation approach in several companies that implement digital PR and utilize technology to deliver messages appropriately through conventional communication channels and social media, and are supported by library research, as well as descriptive analysis, this study found that digital public relations is considered to have a close relationship the type of media used is social media. The role of digital public relations in this case is not only demanded to be able to establish good relations and cooperate with traditional publics, but also to be directly involved with a group of unintentional new influencers, in establishing relationships with customers directly through social networks, wikis, macromedia communities, forums online, groups and blogs. Thus, among all communication tools available to public relations practitioners, online communication is uniquely equipped to enable the organization and its constituents to engage in twoway communication. The importance of the focus on this online tool reflects the essence of digital public relations as a two-way communication process that comes with interactivity.