Introduction. Literature summary:

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1 Introduction Social media continues to expand exponentially. By January 2012, there were more than 800 million active users of Facebook (Facebook.com, 2012). LinkedIn has more than 2 million company pages and over 135 million active global members, 8 million of which are in the UK alone (LinkedIn.com 2012). Twitter users reached 300 million in June 2011, generating 300 million tweets and handling over 1.6 billion searches per day (wikipedia.com, 2012). In 2008 there were 70 million YouTube video uploads watched daily by 2 billion (Chapman, G. 2010). YouTube is now the world's second largest search engine. Over 77% of Internet users read blogs (Futurebuzz.com, 2009) and Odden (2009) reported blogging as one of the top digital marketing channels. The impact on marketing has been massive. Irrespective of size, business needs to adopt social media to engage with audiences. Zeckman, (2012) reported 58% of IT buyers use social media to make technology buying decisions. There is enormous pressure to adopt social media to keep ahead of the competition. As a result, businesses invest significant resources in social media. Despite the benefits, its random use does not always generate expected revenues. Many businesses followed the trends and spent huge effort predominantly on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Blogging. This paper investigated social media s impact on corporate communications and defined its role to understand the issues and provide best practice recommendations. Ultimately this will help its strategic adoption in corporate communications, add value, bridge the gap in current literature and provide further research in the field. The paper seeks to provide an understanding of the link between social media and corporate communications and develop an understanding of how it can be used effectively to meet corporate communication objectives, thus becoming a more cost effective tool for businesses. Literature summary: Current literature discusses definitions of corporate communications and the different aspects of corporate communications important to organisations. For instance, Jackson (1987) defines corporate communication as the total communication activity generated to achieve plans and objectives. Blauw (1986) described corporate communications as an integrated approach to communication, directed at relevant target groups, emphasising the corporate identity. Van Riel and Fombrum (2007) defined corporate communication as the set of activities that orchestrates internal and external communication with stakeholders on which the company depends. They believe corporate communications disseminates information by a variety of specialists /generalists with the common goal of enhancing the organisations ability to retain its license to operate. Based on this concept of corporate communications, a two-dimensional framework is developed by Grunig (1992) with four visions of communications including: Public information; Press agentry communication (propaganda); Two-way symmetrical and Two way asymmetrical communication. 1

2 Grunig (1992) viewed press agentry as undesirable one way communication. Organisations only promote information it wants to. Public information is also one way, but communicates facts. The third model is two way and is imperfect because business has to release reliable information. The fourth concept is ideal in that both parties reciprocate information effectively. Reid (2002), argued communicating brands and reputation requires a strategic approach by allocating limited resources. With the integrated approach it changes over time. Different technologies are available for business to respond to customer and market place needs. Increasing the use of social media in marketing communications offers unique opportunities to improve reputation and stakeholder relationships. Social media is constant, continuously changing and requires customer engagement 24/7 to enhance awareness and reputation. Interactive web 2.0 gives users two way communications when it suits the customer. In order to successfully measure corporate communications, Van Riel and Fombrum (2007) created three distinct levels, overall, specialist and coordinated accountability. Firstly, corporate accountability involves the core effects of corporate communication on building corporate reputation. Importantly it ensures communication is fluid across the business. Specialist accountability prescribes the criteria needed by function. In order to measure success, scorecards measure quantitative and qualitative output. Corporate communications needs to be effective to implement corporate goals. Therefore, the starting point for social media should be communicating corporate objectives through three areas: corporate strategy, corporate identity and corporate branding reputation. The appropriate social media can enhance communication and reputation, however if used inappropriately it would severely damage reputation. Business must demonstrate their activities effectively and draw together the unique elements of their own communications. This must ensure that communications derive from a core strategy which Van Riel and Fombrum (2007) called the strategy-identify-brand model. The basis of which forms the common starting points and creates communication plans and accountability. Research shows social media used in specific contexts, such as Twitter in education (Rinaldo, et al (2011), and blogging (Thevenot, 2007), PR use of social media (Eyrich, et al 2008). Wacka (2005) argued that blogging addresses three functions in corporate communications for employees, these are, becoming an expert: positioning the employee as a thought leader; Testing ideas: enabling employees to test ideas and Personalising relationships: using blogging to personalise relationships between employees and stakeholders. This provides an understanding of how blogging contributes to corporate communication. However, research focuses on social media at an operational level. Consequently, there is a lack of theoretical guidance for business, making it difficult for practitioners to integrate social media into their current business strategy. Unfortunately most businesses use social media without understanding the different functions social media can bring to their corporate communications. This brings issues when used incorrectly. The social media role is unclear for business, without defined strategies. Businesses use social media to meet various objectives, including online networking, external or internal marketing communications and media platforms where people exchange (send/receive) information. For instance, twitter is treated as a broadcast tool by many to advertise their message or attract attention. Facebook is more interactive and LinkedIn builds connections, whilst blogging, is used to disseminate information. 2

3 Social media can be both one and two way communication within corporate communications. For instance, Twitter is predominantly a broadcast method, whilst Facebook and LinkedIn engage in two way dialogue. Social media enables dialogue, either reactively or proactively. The use of blogging offers opportunities to connect with audiences and open debate. This enhances engagement and the customer experience. Research strategy and approach The research adopted an exploratory approach, using qualitative methods to collect data. Interviews were semi-structured to understand how businesses integrated social media into their corporate communication, thus informing a strategic view. The sample included 50 UK businesses that actively used social media between November and December 2011 and were identified through LinkedIn. Respondents were asked what social media they used, how they used it; what benefits they gained, the key issues and barriers or concerns it brought to their corporate communications. Finally we investigated if their social media use had been effective. Discussion and conclusions Social media attracts a lot of attention with organisations still exploring its potential. Most had adopted trial and error and realised it needed to be more structured and a better use of time and resources invested. Social media is seen as a low cost marketing channel that replaces traditional media. Businesses are starting to see the benefits social media brings, it; Gives their business exposure to new markets and offers a global presence Collects competitive intelligence Identifies potential customers and provides connections to new business networks Broadcasts latest offers and news As social media moves from nice to have to must have, businesses must acquire the necessary online communication skills. The lack of theory in social media and corporate communications enables our research to provide an insight on how social media could be used to achieve business goals, if adopted strategically. Our research found the most common social media tools used by practitioners were: Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube and Blogging. Different channels have their own purposes and businesses chose the appropriate social media tool to best fit their corporate communications. Our research showed three levels of engagement of social media in corporate communications; Level 1: Mass media such as Twitter, YouTube promote awareness of news to a mass audience. It s fast, quick and promotes brand. Level 2: Specific audience engagement and interaction for community building, such as Facebook and LinkedIn: these develop connections and share common interests through forums and groups, thus developing relationships within the community. Level 3: The leader and follower relationships media such as Blogging: this engagement shows that the broadcaster has some specific knowledge to share, and makes themselves an expert. They have people who follow their blogs to gain knowledge and information, this helps to build reputation for the company. 3

4 In terms of corporate communication, these three levels of relationship can be categorised as: level 1: Broadcasting function such as Twitter and YouTube: to create brand awareness; level 2: Interactive function such as Facebook or LinkedIn: to enhance relationship building level 3: Expert knowledge sharing function such as Blogging: to promote reputation building. These three levels of corporate communication functionality meet the characteristics of social media channels and its uniqueness, therefore bridging the gap of how social media could contribute to the functionality of corporate communication strategy. In terms of how businesses can benefit from using social media, our research found that businesses adopting it realise its fast and easy to share information with audiences. They are able to generate and connect with potential clients, open up global markets and save time and money. Paradoxically, they have been investing in social media without truly understanding the principles of how to use it effectively, blindly following the crowd. It was a common theme that business had insufficient understanding of the dangers of social media and the concerns of leaking competitive intelligence and the resulting impact on reputation. With the increased usage of social media by consumers, businesses have been adopting it because they felt pressure to catch up with competitors. However, lack of strategy, training and understanding of how social media could support their corporate communications may have damaged their corporate brand image. When social media is able to ensure communication effectively meets goals positively, it can be assumed it is effective and successful. Some businesses had no clear idea of who their target audience was or lacked strategy to utilise social media within their corporate communications. Social media was being unproductive and time and effort was wasted. There was no perceivable value to their corporate communications. Interviewees were pleased the power social media brings to making connections and engaging with online conversations. Competitively they can monitor latest trends and identify customer needs. However, there was concern about data security, business intelligence leaks, and privacy concerns. In terms of using social media as corporate communication channels, interviewees showed concern about the lack of support and understanding of how to use social media appropriately for corporate communication. Discussion in the use of social media within businesses is predominantly at a practitioner level. There is yet to be theoretical or conceptual models to guide business on how they should best use social media. Currently the myth of social media is that it continues to be the next big thing. This has made businesses predict what the most popular platform for the business will be and it seems that there was lack of best practice or recommendations that provide guidance and policy for businesses to follow. Our research found the need for business to define the role of social media in corporate communications and to integrate to achieve strategic business objectives, corporate communication and ultimately business reputation. The research showed that social media, corporate objectives and reputation should compliment each other. Any strategy that businesses adopt with social media should flow from this. Further research should be conducted to measure the effectiveness of social media and its contribution to corporate communication, such as its brand building, relationship building and reputation building. 4

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