Limei Zhai
2 articles-
To Interact and to Narrate: A Categorical Multidimensional Analysis of Twitter Use by US Banks and Energy Corporations ↗
Abstract
<bold xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Background:</b> With the development of digital technologies, Twitter allows organizations to make better use of social media for impression management, advertising, and marketing. <bold xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Literature review:</b> As a recently developed register, Twitter has been researched as a personal-oriented communication method, but little research has been conducted on the register of corporate Twitter use. This study, exploring Twitter use by the 2020 US Fortune 500 banks and energy corporations, may be the first one to conduct register analysis of corporate Twitter. <bold xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Methodology:</b> This study used summary language variables of Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) as dimensions of register variation, and also conducted categorical multidimensional analysis (CMDA) of linguistic features and features specific to Twitter. <bold xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Research questions:</b> 1. What are the patterns of register variation in the tweets of US banks and energy corporations based on the results of four LIWC summary variables and the CMDA method? 2. Are there any differences between tweets of the two industries within each pattern of register variation? <bold xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Results and conclusions:</b> Results showed that tweets of both industries tend to display a categorical, confident self-regulating style, and a mixed tone. Tweets of banks are more formal, self-regulating, and oriented toward narrative (congratulatory, positive informational, and effortful), while tweets of energy corporations are more authentic and oriented toward interaction (advisory, routine, and affiliative). Tweets having narrative functions tend to be formal in style and positive in tone, while tweets having interactive functions tend to display corporations’ confidence and leadership. Corporate Twitter is characterized by the integration of interaction and informational narrative, or “registerial hybridity.” Overall, this study strengthens the idea that corporations use Twitter to facilitate corporate communication with a broadcasting strategy and narrative perspective, and to improve digital communication with an engaging strategy. Findings may shed light on promoting products and corporate impression management on social media.
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Abstract
<roman xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><b>Introduction:</b></roman> Social media have been widely used for corporation-generated narratives. Corporate communication entails a “storytelling process” and a narrative perspective. Corporate narrative has taken on new forms with the emergence of social media, which is the object of this study and called corporations’ owned social media narrative (COSMN). To our knowledge, however, no research has systematically investigated studies on COSMN. Our study provides a synthesized review on the strategies and functions of COSMN. <roman xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><b>Research questions:</b></roman> 1. What are the general characteristics of studies on COSMN? 2. What strategies are usually adopted by corporations via their social media narrative? 3. What functions do corporations intend to achieve by their social media narrative? <roman xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><b>Methodology:</b></roman> We conducted an integrative literature review of studies on corporations’ owned social media narrative based on journal articles from the database of the Web of Science Core Collection. After retrieving 25 articles in accordance with our research purpose, we conducted a qualitative content analysis to describe general characteristics of the literature and identify narrative strategies and functions. <roman xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><b>Results and conclusions:</b></roman> When corporations undertake advertising, branding, and social networking activities (among others) on social media, they tend to use form-based narrative strategies (technical strategy and formality strategy), content-based narrative strategies (broadcasting strategy, reacting strategy, engaging strategy, and emotional strategy), and medium-based narrative strategy (transmedia strategy) to achieve functions of market communication, technical communication, and public relations work (identity construction, impression management, stakeholder endorsement, corporate social responsibility communication, and crisis communication). This integrative literature review provides theoretical implications for corporate social media research and practical implications for digital marketing practitioners.