Twitter and Brand Crises

The next ECREA 2012 paper is presented by Nina Krüger, and focusses on brand communication activities during corporate crises. Enterprises are increasingly using social media for communication with their customers, of course, but to some extent still regard social media as black boxes; much more development – and research – needs to be done here.

Research on brand communication covers both day-to-day communication and issue-related communication, but much of this is still in its infancy; the patterns of communication around brands are still poorly understood. It seems that tweets containing URLs are retweeted more widely than others, for example; also, the reach of brand tweets seems to be higher than user participation seems to indicate – many users are simply passive followers rather than active tweeters.

Brand communication variously follows b2b, b2c, and c2c models; social media communication must be managed in each case. Companies must scan and monitor social media continuously, must aggregate and analyse the information exchanged, and must develop appropriate response strategies for such communication activities, communicating either proactively or reactively.

Nina's paper explores brand communication around Adidas, Toyota, and Qantas; the latter two were affected by brand crises during the research periods. Adidas had a clear social media strategy using established hashtags, and operates a range of dedicated Twitter accounts; Toyota experienced a product recall crisis, and peaks in activity are related to new press releases, but these peaks are driven by new users entering the discussion rather than by greater per-user activity; Qantas was affected by two brand crises (one due to volcanic ash, one due to self-inflicted industrial action), and these crises unfolded differently (the former was focussed on news sharing, the latter on political discussion) – lead users played pivotal roles in communication here. The peakiness of the Toyota and Qantas crises is comparable.

So, interactivity changes according to the type of crisis experienced by a brand; enterprises need to develop appropriate responses, and in fact appropriate early warning measures, for each case. Such systems could use continuous monitoring and keyword tracking, for example, and communicative behaviours of the brands must change accordingly. Communication on Twitter is complex, and remains a challenge for brands; a more comprehensive framework must be developed.