My keynote lecture at the 11th European Conference of the Association of Business Communication, May 30-June 2, 2012, Nijmegen, the Netherlands

1. Talking to customers:
characteristics of effective
social media conversations
Peter Kerkhof
p.kerkhof@vu.nl
@peterkerkhof

2. 2007
 1st iPhone
 12 million Facebook users
 Daily 5000 tweets worldwide
 4000 tweeps in NL

3. 2007
 1st iPhone
 12 million Facebook users 2011
 Daily 5000 tweets worldwide  130 million iPhones
 4000 tweeps in NL  Half million new Android devices
daily
 62 million iPads
 1.7 million tablets in NL
 800 million Facebook gebruikers
 Daily 250 million tweets
 1.3 million active tweeps in NL

4. Brands on Twitter
 19% of all tweets is brand related
 20% of all brand related tweets contains positive or
negative sentiment
 55% positive, 33% is negative
 2011: 10 million brand experiences per day
(Source: Jansen et al., 2009)

8. The Yelp effect
= +4.5% revenues

9. Business communication 2.0
 Less about advertising
 Using editorial content for business purposes
 Engaging in public conversations with consumers

10. The decline of advertising
 Advertising:
 Growing irritation
 Declining credibility
 Declining
effectiveness

12. The decline of advertising
Advertising elasticities 1962-1981
Old estimate 1962-1981 New estimate 1940-1979
New estimate 1980-2004
0.22
0.13
0.10
Advertising elasticity: % growth in sales after +1% growth in advertising expenditures
Source: Sethuraman, Tellis & Briesch (2011).

13. The rise of content marketing
 “the art of communicating with your customers and
prospects without selling. It is non-interruption
marketing. Instead of pitching your products or services,
you are delivering information that makes your buyer
more intelligent. The essence of this content strategy is
the belief that if we, as businesses, deliver consistent,
ongoing valuable information to buyers, they ultimately
reward us with their business and loyalty.”
http://www.junta42.com/resources/what-is-content-marketing.aspx

14. The rise of content marketing
40 billion dollar, 26% of US marketingbudget (Custom Content Council,
2012)

15. Content marketing in print

16. Content marketing on TV

17. Digital content marketing
 Video  Microblogs
 Websites  Utilities
 Apps  E-mail newsletters
 Online magazines  Communities
 Blogs  ………..
 Brand pages in SNS’s

20. Hennig-Thurau et al. (2010): The Impact of New Media on
Customer Relationships, Journal of Service Research, vol.
13(3), pp. 311-330.

21. Social media
 Less control
 Empowered consumers:
 A skeptical crowd
 Access to information about
product quality from trusted
sources
 Instant access to own media
 Instant acces to company
social media sites

24. Overcoming skepticism &
distance
 1-to-1 relational communication, with a skeptical audience
 Create relevant content & conversations that……..
 Help
 Solve problems
 Inform
 Educate
 Entertain
 Establish immediacy & closeness in conversations

25. Immediacy
 Immediacy in business: be fast
 Immediacy in psychology /communication:
“communication behaviors that enhance closeness to
and nonverbal interaction with each other” (Mehrabian, 1971)
 Teacher immediacy: the degree of perceived closeness
between teacher and student (Gorham, 1988; Christophel, 1989)

26. Mediated immediacy
(O’Sullivan, Hunt & Lippert, 2004)
 Mediated immediacy: “communicative cues in
mediated channels that can shape perceptions of
psychological closeness between interactants” (O’Sullivan,
Hunt & Lippert, 2004, p. 471)
 Mediated immediacy behaviors: approachability and
regard for other
 approachability: you can approach me
 self-disclosure, expressiveness, accessibility, informality, similarity, familiarity,
humor, attractiveness, and expertise
 regard: I am approaching you
 personalness, engagement, helpfulness, politeness

28. Effects of mediated immediacy
 Higher course motivation, more teacher liking (O’Sullivan, Hunt
& Lippert, 2004, Study 2)
 Linguistic immediacy cues exert stronger effects than
presentational cues (O’Sullivan, Hunt & Lippert, 2004, Study 3)
 More self-disclosure on a health forum, more social trust,
more positive outcome expectations (Lee & LaRose, 2011)

29. Relational maintenance in online
PR (Kelleher & Miller, 2006; Kelleher, 2009)
 Corporate blogs:
 Being open to dialog
 Using invitational language
 Providing prompt feedback
 Leading to higher credibility & trust through ……
 conversational human voice
 communicated relational commitment

30. Conversational human voice
“an engaging and natural style of
organizational communication as
perceived by an organization’s publics
based on interactions between
individuals in the organization and
individuals in publics” (Kelleher, 2009, p.
177)

31. Communicated relational
commitment
 “a type of content of communication in which members
of an organization work to express their commitment to
building and maintaining a relationship” (Kelleher, 2009, p.176)

32. Our studies (w. Camiel Beukeboom & Sonja Utz, VU Univ.)
 Experimental studies
 Online customer care: customer complaint + various responses
 Study 1
 Immediacy low vs. high
 Apologies vs. redress
 Control group
 Study 2:
 Immediacy low vs. high
 Apologies vs. refutation
 Company size (small vs. Large)
 Crisis communication:
 Study 3: immediacy + content
 Immediacy low vs. high
 Apologies vs. denial

33. Study 1
 Low immediacy
 “Based on your story, we would like to offer our sincere
apologies for the inconvenience. We would like to get in
touch with you about this problem.”
 High immediacy
 “My name is Thomas de Vries. (…) Based on your story, I
would like to offer my sincere apologies for the
inconvenience. I would like to personally get in touch with
you about this problem.“.
 Apologies vs. redress
 Control group: no company response

34. Study 1
 Dependent variable:
 corporate credibility
 Mediators:
 conversational human voice
 communicated relational commitment
 underdog effect (Vandello, Goldschmied, & Richards, 2007)
 Control group: cognitive responses

35. Study 1
 Communicated relational commitment:
 (F(1, 118) = 14.45, p < . 001; Mlow immediacy = 3.81, Mhigh immediacy
= 4.61)
 Conversational human voice
 (F(1, 118) = 7.81, p < . 01; Mlow immediacy = 3.63, Mhigh immediacy =
4.12)
 Underdog effect:
 (F(1, 118) = 4.63, p < . 05; Mlow immediacy = 4.72, Mhigh immediacy =
4.30)
 (F(1, 118) = 5.65, p < . 05; Mapology= 4.74, Mredress = 4.28)

36. Study 1
 No other effects of apologies vs. redress
 No interaction effects
 Indirect effects of immediacy on corporate credibility
 (bootstrapping)

37. Study 1
 No other effects of apologies vs. redress
 No interaction effects
 Indirect effects of immediacy on corporate credibility
 (bootstrapping)

38. Positive cognitive brand
responses
60.0%
50.0%
40.0%
30.0%
20.0%
10.0%
0.0%
High immediacy /apologiesImmediacy, apologies immediacy /redress immediacy /redress
Low High Low No response

39. Study 2: What if distance is
already low?
 Include a manipulation of organizational size /closeness
 “Company A is international market leader in navigation-
and communication systems. Company A has offices on
every continent and about 7000 employees worldwide…”.
 “Company B is a small family company in navigation- and
communication systems. Company B is located in Eindhoven
and has about 40 employees at this location…”.
 Immediacy high /low; Apology vs. refutation of
complaint
 DV’s: Brand trust, communicated relational commitment,
conversational human voice

40. Study 2
 Conversational human voice & communicated relational
commitment
 Main effects of immediacy
 Interaction immediacy x company size
 Brand trust: Interaction immediacy x company size
4
3.5
3
2.5 Low immedicay
High immedicacy
2
1.5
1
Small Large

41. Study 3

47. Bloggers’ comments: low
immediacy
 It took too long
 H&M talked to journalists, not to fans
 Communication was highly standardized
 “You know whats funny? that you are just simply pasting the
same response to every comment about this shameful
situation you are in. Why dont you post something where
you actually admit and explain…”
 Corporate tone of voice
 No apologies were made

48. Study 3
 Participants read an online news story about the event,
followed by one of four responses
 Immediacy (low/high) & denial vs. apologies
 Denial vs. apologies:
 Apologies are less often used but are more effective since
they signal taking responsibility
 more effective in the case of integrity violations
 Denial is often used but less effective (Kim, Avery & Lariscy, 2009)

49. Study design (low immediacy/apology)

50. Study design (high immediacy/denial)

51. Study design
 Dependent variables:
 Negative /positive cognitive responses
 Communicated relational commitment
 Conversational human voice
 Attitude towards the response
 Corporate credibility
 Crisis responsibility

52. Study 3: Immediacy effects
4
3.5
Low immediacy
3
High immediacy
2.5
2
Conversational human voice Communicated Relational
(1-5) commitment (1-5)

53. Study 3: Immediacy effects
% Negative cognitive responses
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Personal Corporate

54. Study 3: Apologies vs. denial
6
5.5
5
4.5
4
Apologies
3.5 Denial
3
2.5
2
Credibility (1-7) Responsibility (1- Att. Response (1-
5) 5)

55. Predicting corporate credibility
Regression analysis: predicting corporate credibility
Corporate credibility
Prior brand commitment 0.31**
Conversational human voice 0.47**
Attitude towards the response 0.03ns
Communicated relational commitment -0.06ns
Negative cognitive responses 0.11ns
Positive cognitive responses 0.13ns
Crisis responsibility -0.01ns
R2(adj)=.37***

56. Conclusion
 Effects of immediacy
 Direct on credibility
 Indirect through
 Communicated relational commitment
 Conversational human voice
 Immediacy helps to narrow the gap between
organizations /brands and consumers