Social Media Storms: Empowering Leadership Beyond Crisis Management 2021010672, 2021010673, 9780367425302, 9780367425272, 9780367853297

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“This book is a brilliant piece of work that is a must-read for this era of exponential swells and dynamic change – not just for marketing and communication executives, but also for general managers and CEOs. The key insights are so timely: social media storms need to be reframed as regenerative opportunities rather than crises, and managing them will increasingly be part of everyday normal management practice!” “…This is the most strategic probe and thoughtfully useful analysis of social media storms that I have seen. It is one of these rare books that is able to take advantage of scholarly insights, illustrative examples, thoughtful sensemaking and mindset reconceptualizations – while simultaneously giving us practical ways to act as managers and leaders. The book gives us the why, the what, the how, and the what’s next of social media storms. The international team of authors brings examples and viewpoints with global implications and multiple perspectives that go beyond consumers and brands, but that also address societal issues and multiple stakeholder concerns. The treatment of reflective and resilient leadership of social media storms is invaluable, as are the sensemaking ways of managing stakeholder interactions. It is a most compelling narrative for this dynamic age.” Omar El Sawy, Stonier Chair in Business Administration, Professor of Information Systems, USC Marshall School of Business, USA “To never let a good crisis go to waste, you need to prepare. Guided by rigorous research, insightful cases, and actionable strategies, this book serves as a powerful guide to understand, prepare for, and weather the storm.” Christian Daugaard, Nordic Social Media Lead at Boston Consulting Group “This book is a must-read book for anyone who wants to be successful in business in the 21st Century. And it comes at a critical time. Although most people think they know about social media and consumer relations, it is painfully clear, that very few know enough about the rapidly changing consumer-company interaction landscape to avoid the serious pitfalls as well as benefit from the new opportunities that this aspect of business represents.” Torben Riise, MBA ExecuTeam & Kaizen Management Phoenix, Arizona, USA “An insightful and impressive analysis of social media storms. What should brand managers do when huge quantities of messages containing negative word-ofmouth circulate in social media? Read the book to understand the phenomenon and how to respond.” Ayşegül Özsomer, Professor of Marketing, Koç University, Turkey

“This is a highly useful text and resource for dealing with the contemporary issue of social media storms. There is an excellent flow of contents in the book and several outstanding cases enhance the reader’s understanding of SMSs. The book is written in an engaging style and melds together scholarly research and on the ground experiences. In the new normal era of greater customer power and the added pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic, this is an essential read for all managers of communications.” Alastair M. Morrison, Research Professor, University of Greenwich, UK “This is an important and timely book. It addresses a major digital age phenomenon – social media storms – that has vital implications for marketing practitioners and academics. Based on strong theoretical foundations, the authors demonstrate how managers and organizations should engage with stakeholders not only to weather social media storms, but also to take advantage of them and to strengthen customer engagement. The book is full of real-life examples and useful case studies. It should be an interesting read for everyone who wants to understand what social media storms are and how they should be managed.” Josko Brakus, Professor, University of Leeds, UK

SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS

This fascinating new book explores the benefits and dynamics of social media storms and identifies the possible opportunities that they present for further engagement with customers. It provides actionable managerial advice on planning for, measuring, and innovatively navigating social media storms. Based on a sound theoretical background and illustrated by vivid real-life examples and case studies throughout every chapter, this book combines thorough explanations of the elements of business decision-making, market interaction, consumer psychology, branding, and business communication. In comparison to the existing literature, the book departs from the classical, but insufficient crisis communication management approaches to suggest novel frameworks and tools for empowering businesses, consumers, and broader societies in the digital age. Social Media Storms: Empowering Leadership Beyond Crisis Management provides advanced undergraduate and postgraduate digital marketing, marketing communications, strategy, and crisis management students with a comprehensive understanding of the social media storm phenomenon and helps marketing and communications professionals to leverage the opportunities that social media storms are bringing. Pernille Rydén is Dean of Education at the IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Muhammad Ismail Hossain is Professor of Marketing at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Efthymia Kottika is Assistant Professor at the Prague University of Economics and Business, Czech Republic. Vatroslav Škare is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zagreb, Croatia.

SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS Empowering Leadership Beyond Crisis Management

Pernille Rydén, Muhammad Ismail Hossain, Efthymia Kottika, and Vatroslav Škare

First published 2022 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2022 Pernille Rydén, Muhammad Ismail Hossain, Efthymia Kottika, and Vatroslav Škare The right of Pernille Rydén, Muhammad Ismail Hossain, Efthymia Kottika, and Vatroslav Škare to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Rydé n, Pernille, 1969- author. | Hossain, Muhammad Ismail, 1979-author. | Kottika, Efthymia, 1982- author. Title: Social media storms : empowering leadership beyond crisis management / Pernille Rydé n, Muhammad Ismail Hossain, Efthymia Kottika, Vatroslav Š kare. Description: New York : Routledge, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Subjects: LCSH: Social media‐‐Economic aspects. | Internet marketing. | Communication in management. Classification: LCC HM742 .R93 2021 (print) | LCC HM742 (ebook) | DDC 302.23/1‐‐dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021010672 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021010673 ISBN: 978-0-367-42530-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-42527-2 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-85329-7 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by MPS Limited, Dehradun

CONTENTS

Author biographies Acknowledgement 1 Introduction The concept of social media storms 1 A historical outline 2 The rise of eWord of mouth 3 Crisis communication 4 Crisis communication: why to communicate 5 Crisis communication: how to communicate 7 Emotional route 8 Rational route 8 Social media storm as an opportunity 10 Concluding discussion 11 Structure of the book 12 2 Understanding preconditions of social media storms Do we really understand the properties of social media? 18 The emergence of new media 18 Defining social media 19 Features of social media platforms 20 Six major types of social media platforms 21 Switch of power between brands and consumers 24 Consumer power in the digital age 25 A new (dis)order 26

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Consumer empowerment/disempowerment paradox 27 Social motivation for change 28 Sustainability, social justice, and woke movement 29 The role of motivations and emotions in consumer behavior 31 The complexity of anger 33 Constructive and destructive nature of negative emotions 33 Anti-branding practices: Antecedents & consequences 34 Croatian Railways Passenger Transport case 36 The trigger for the social media storm 36 Analysis 37 Takeaways from the storm 39 Concluding discussion 39 3 Insights into social media storms What is the role of data in social media storms? 42 Data and human life 43 Medium that generates data for humans 43 Impact of social big data on companies 45 Characteristics of data shaping up social media storms 47 Volume of the generated contents 48 Variety of media and sentiments reflected in the contents 49 Virality of the generated contents and their impacts 51 Visuality of the generated contents 52 Veracity of the contents 53 Categorical variations of social media storms 54 Trigger based variations of social media storms 55 Intention based variations of social media storms 56 Activities based variations of social media storms 57 Speed and duration based variations of social media storms 59 Location and participant based variations of social media storms 61 Constituents/Properties of social media storms 62 An issue that doesn’t seem to be right 62 Issue relevance 63 Support drawing power 63 Media relevance 64 Product scope 65 Brand loyalty and equity 66 Concluding discussion 66

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Challenges of a changing marketing landscape Challenge #1: Drop your traditional marketing management tools 75 Organizations function in large, interdependent ecosystems 76 Market control through planning efforts makes less sense 76 Social media reflect a whole new business paradigm 77 Challenge #2: Understanding and managing the social media runaway train 78 Challenge #3: Managing crisis triggered by consumer anger 80 Social media storms in an emotional coping perspective 82 Challenge #4: Managing individual and organization frames 83

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5 Managerial framing of risks and opportunities What is a mental frame? 87 Opportunity or threat? That depends on the manager’s framing 88 Managerial reflections 90 The origin of resistance and resilience 90 Resistance towards social media storms 92 Resistance rooted in managerial assumptions 93 Resilience towards social media storms 94 Telenor case 95 Risk impact assessment 98 The international mining corporation case 101 Concluding discussion 106

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6 Reflective and resilient leadership of social media storms The Copenhagen Zoo case 111 A reflective approach to media storms 112 What emotions does the social media storm evoke in you? 114 Managing emotions is also managing the social media storm 114 Value customer voice and emotion 116 The concept of Emotional Intelligence (EQ) 119 Practice value thinking 120 Resilient leaders – riders on the storm 121 Leadership involves sensemaking – sensemaking involves emotion 122 Reflective exercise: assess your thoughts, emotions, and responses 123 Concluding discussion 125

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7 Business-Stakeholder interactions during social media storms Stakeholder interaction and social media strategies 128 “Promote and Sell” social media sensemaking 129 Social media sensemaking: listen and learn 131 Social media sensemaking: connect and collaborate 133 Social media sensemaking: empower and engage 134 Managing social media storm across cultures 136 Concluding discussion 137 8 The next frontier – social media storms as a marketing tool Brand activism 140 Targeting in the era of brand activism 141 Risks of brand activism and the role of authenticity 143 Green brand activism and social media storms 145 Green brand activism – The case of Patagonia, Inc. 145 NGOs and social media storms 147 Social media storms as communication tools – The case of Greenpeace 147 Concluding discussion 151 Index

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AUTHOR BIOGRAPHIES

Pernille Rydén is Dean of Education at the IT University of Copenhagen. She holds a PhD from Copenhagen Business School in Strategic Cognition, a Management Diploma (Metropol, Denmark), and a Master’s Degree in Economics and Business Administration from Roskilde University, Denmark. Her more than 25 articles and book publications cover the fields of Strategic Management and Marketing and Organizational transformation involving digital technologies. Her research has been published in, e.g., California Management Review, Industrial Marketing Management, and Journal of Interactive Marketing, and she authored the book “Disrupt your mindset to transform your business with big data”. Pernille also works as a business consultant and public speaker. Muhammad Ismail Hossain is currently working as a Professor at the Department of Marketing, Faculty of Business Studies, University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. He received his PhD in consumer behavior from Monash University, Australia. He is an MBA from the University of Dhaka and also has a Master’s degree in International Business from the University of Melbourne, Australia. He has more than 41 publications, including research monographs, book chapters, journal articles, conference papers. His research interests lie in the fields of consumer behavior, supply chain, and tourism. His work has been published in many journals such as Sustainability, Current Issues in Tourism, International Journal of Tourism Research, Journal of Marketing Channels, Journal of City, Culture and Society, among others. As a consultant, he worked for both not-forprofit and for-profit local and international organizations. Efthymia Kottika is Assistant Professor at Prague University of Economics and Business and she specializes in strategic marketing management and global digital marketing phenomena. She conducted her undergraduate and postgraduate studies in marketing at the Athens University of Economics and Business in Greece. Her research has been published in leading journals such as the Industrial Marketing

xii Author biographies

Management, the Journal of Business Research, and the International Journal of Tourism Research and has been included in the proceedings of numerous renowned international conferences with peer review system. She has worked as an academic and researcher in three countries (Greece, United Kingdom, and in the Czech Republic), and throughout her career, she has been nominated for and/ or awarded several teaching and research awards and scholarships. She has been involved in projects for the automotive industry. Vatroslav Škare is an Associate Professor at the Marketing Department of the Faculty of Economics & Business, University of Zagreb, Croatia. He received his Master’s degree and PhD in marketing from the University of Zagreb, Croatia. His research interests include digital marketing, product and brand management, and country image. Vatroslav has published contributions to books and articles in national and international journals, e.g., Journal of Business Research, Online Information Review, Electronic Commerce Research and Applications, and International Journal of Tourism Research. His academic activities also include active participation in academic and professional organizations and teaching at executive education programs by using business simulations. As a consultant, he has been involved in numerous marketing projects in different industries, including Tourism, Retail, Publishing & Media, ICT, and Real Estate.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We would like to acknowledge the EMAC Climber’s Community and its organizer Professor Sylvia von Wallpach, for bringing our team together and Professor Alastair M. Morrison for inspiring us to write this book based on our social media storms research. Furthermore, we would like to thank our mentors Professor Torsten Ringberg, Professor Omar El Sawy, Professor Harmen Oppewal, Professor Prem Chhetri, Professor Durdana Ozretic Dosen and Professor Vlasis Stathakopoulos for their guidance through all those years.

1 INTRODUCTION

The concept of social media storms Social media have revolutionized the way businesses and customers interact. They have emerged as a game-changer by empowering consumers to collectively approve or oppose various organizational behaviors, including wrongdoings, in the public space. A growing number of professionals have realized that a recent central managerial challenge is to understand and meet stakeholder expectations on social media (Aral et al., 2013), and, in particular, be inclusive when expectations are not met, the customers get angry and share their thoughts and emotions at an uncontrollable pace via social media. Managers recognize the strategic value of social media as nearly 3.8 billion people use social media (We are social, 2020). But they also fear organizational stigma (Carberry & King, 2012) that can be caused by critical customer masses that protest, boycott, and attack companies on social media (Grégoire et al., 2015). These manifestations of negative word-of-mouth (nWOM) may lead to customer flight (Kim et al., 2016) and boycotts (Lindenmeier et al., 2012). For example, notorious are the cases of airline companies that had to navigate through extreme reputation turbulence. In more detail, the removal of a passenger for speaking Arabic by Delta Airlines in 20161 and the violent re-allocation of a passenger by United Airlines in 20172 led to global negative reactions on social media. In such cases, when consumers rise together and rally against organizations, this might result in the creation of social media storms (SMS) (Rydén et al., 2020). But what exactly is this phenomenon and how is it defined? Various terms emerged for labeling this type of storms that companies, organizations, and even individuals might face on social media. German blogger Sascha Lobo in 2010 initially used the term “shitstorm” to describe the potentially devastating effects of the rapid dissemination of negative sentiment of people on

2 Introduction

social media platforms. Also, scholars introduced various terms that are somehow overlapping in their scope, such as firestorms, storms, social media storms, collaborative brand attacks, etc. Researchers have defined the collaborative brand attacks as “…joint, eventinduced, dynamic, and public offenses from a large number of Internet users via social media platforms on a brand that are aimed to harm it and/or to force it to change its behavior” (Rauschnabel et al., 2016, p. 381). While Pfeffer et al. (2014, p. 118) define online firestorms, referred to in this book as social media storms, as “the sudden discharge of large quantities of messages containing nWOM (negative word-ofmouth) and complaint behavior against a person, company, or group in social media networks”, i.e., an external force of rapid social media dissemination of negative consumer sentiment that can seriously endanger a company. In this book, to refer to this phenomenon, we adopt the term social media storms. It reflects where the storms are usually generated “social media”, and the metaphor of “storm” accurately reflects the dynamic nature of this phenomenon. The use of this term is also in accordance with recent trends in bibliography (e.g., Phippen & Bond, 2020; Rydén et al., 2020). But the people’s need to openly express their opinion regardless of whether it is positive or negative and join forces to bring some change is not something new. As we will see, although social media storms are considered a contemporary and growing phenomenon that now companies have to start dealing with, their roots actually lie deep in the past.

A historical outline Without freedom of press, social media storms would not be able to live and thrive, which makes social media storms an expression of a democratic right. For centuries, people have fought for their right to speak out and use their voice in the public debate. The first historical accounts of this phenomenon date back to 1770, where the Danish King Christian VII decided to abolish censorship, and as the first state in the world, Denmark-Norway introduced unrestricted freedom of the press, including the discharge for utterances (Horstbøl et al., 2020). In the past, the public media of this region were dominated by a group of scholars – especially theologians – who wrote on specific topics, and they wrote mostly to each other and thus knew exactly who their audience was. But with this freedom, a market for new writers and readers rapidly emerged, leading to diversity and radicalization of writings that constantly fed the new public. What was significant was that many of the new writings were small and short, like we see with social media today. This means that they could be printed very quickly (at that time “real time” meant in a few days), and the printing plants adapted to the fast production with cheap, low-quality prints. Another important thing to mention is that the majority of the pamphlets were published anonymously, which ensured a discharge used to make insulting and defamatory allegations. The subjects were rarely named in person but were portrayed in such detail that no one could doubt who they were. In concert, this led

Introduction

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to debate threads that spread at lightning speed. Despite a high illiteracy rate, reading was at that time to a large extent also a social event as these new writings would arrive at pubs and public places and be read aloud or sung if there were shows, after which people then commented on them in a physical oral public which responded to the written one. The obvious parallel to social media storms today is that we find ordinary people who have access to express themselves completely without editorial intervention. With their new voice, they could share their opinion, and the freedom of press and new media empowered them to question and challenge the practices of formal institutions and powerful organizations. Like on social media today, a lot of uneducated writers entered the arena, and they could get very quick responses from a vast – and in some cases – random audience. This historical glimpse also reflects the collapse of the gatekeeping system with the emergence of the Internet, a new medium that could not be controlled by the old media powers, namely newspapers, television, and radio. The freedom of the press 2.0 seems to trigger certain behaviors. In Denmark and Norway, the era of freedom of press ended when censorship was reintroduced in October 1773. Today, the “kings” are replaced by the big tech companies. Their platform algorithms control Internet traffic and crack down harder on unwanted communication, hate speech, extremism, conspiracy theories, and fake news.

The rise of eWord of mouth Before the 1970s, very few researchers focused on the issue of customer satisfaction, and little was published about this topic that today is so central in the marketing literature (Richins, 1983). However, after a few years, due to the consumer movement and the advocation of consumer rights, the interest in this area increased with some of the first studies focusing on the measurement of satisfaction levels (Andreasen, 1977, cited in Richins, 1983) and the most common causes of customer dissatisfaction (Diamond et al., 1976, cited in Richins, 1983). Today, consumer empowerment is realized by openly sharing opinions, attitudes, and emotions towards products, services, brands, and companies (Grappi et al., 2013). As more consumers have started to share their positive or negative experiences with other consumers, more research took place to shed light on the dynamics and consequences of those behaviors. However, the findings regarding whether people are more attentive to negative or positive information are contradictory. Some studies suggest that people focus more on negative information (Ito et al., 1998; Yang & Mai, 2010, cited in Martin, 2017) as they are more concerned about potential losses compared to potential gains (Kahneman & Tversky, 1984, cited in Martin, 2017). Whereas, other researchers have found that very positive information has a greater impact on consumers’ product evaluations than very negative ones (Gershoff et al., 2003, cited in Martin, 2017). Besides the contradictory research outcomes, it is a fact that when buying products or services, most consumers often look for information given by other

4 Introduction

consumers online. This can significantly influence their purchasing decision and the success of those products and services on the market (Chu et al., 2020). Electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) refers to informal communication accessible online about businesses, services, and products (Litvin et al., 2008). It refers to information generated by consumers and entails opinions about products and services that are shared online (Chiosa & Anastasiei, 2017). The two significant differences from regular word-of-mouth (WOM) are user anonymity and online accessibility. It is evident that eWOM is a far more powerful form of WOM due to its immediacy, higher reach, and easy accessibility through networks (Jansen et al., 2009) and presents a major corporate challenge. For many consumers, eWOM has become the main source of product information even though it can have varying credibility levels on different platforms. For example, research has demonstrated that the most influential source of negative word of mouth (nWOM) is the negative testimonials on review sites and their impact increased with the increase of their number (Bachleda & BerradaFathi, 2016, cited in Chiosa & Anastasiei, 2017). Despite those variations, eWOM can considerably influence consumers’ purchasing behavior, which has led the majority of companies to allocate several resources to manage it (Tsao, 2014; Utz et al., 2012). In fact, the negative impact of nWOM on purchasing intention and brand equity seems to be more significant for high-involvement products (Beneke et al., 2015 cited in Chiosa & Anastasiei, 2017). Indeed, research has provided alarming results for companies as it has shown how nWOM dissemination can lead to customer flight (De Matos & Rossi, 2008; Kim et al., 2016) or even boycotts (Lindenmeier et al., 2012). Also, it has revealed that particularly attribute-based nWOM can have an aggravating effect on dissatisfied customers (Chan & Cui, 2011). Therefore, scholars tried to provide some guidance on how organizations could try to manage communication crises and nWOM (Herhausen et al., 2019; Ranaweera & Menon, 2013), for example, by using advertising to restore trust and recover from “product-harm crises” (Cleeren et al., 2008) or encouraging customers to complain directly to the company instead of posting negative reviews online (Bachleda & Berrada-Fathi, 2016, cited in Chiosa & Anastasiei, 2017). Following, we will delve further into the crisis communication issue.

Crisis communication Communication is the main mean of interaction in society which is also true for business entities. Communication encompasses a spectrum of activities undertaken by a business entity. It is not unfair to say that communication is the primary tool of interaction with customers and other stakeholders for an organization. If we take out the task of communication, the meaning of a business organization primarily gets lost. This is because unless and until a business organization reaches and interacts with customers and stakeholders, they cannot validate their existence in the society. Using communication as a lens for understanding organization, we

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find that reaching and interacting through communication is a continuous process that lasts so long the organization lives and at times even after. We also see that communication and communicating are bound to organization and organizing. Although it is a continuous process and the organization has to do it for their operation and existence, the necessity of undertaking communication activities in terms of reach, frequency, impact increases several folds when a negative event or situation occurs in the life of a company. That negative incident may or may not be directly caused by the products or activities of the company; however, the stakeholders – including customers – perceive that the company has to do entirely or something with the negative event or situations. In general, companies characterize these events or situations as crisis situations, and the communication activities undertaken by the company in such situations are tagged as crisis communication. There are a plethora of motives for communicating in crisis situations, and companies can take different routes to achieve these motives. The following subsection sheds light on these.

Crisis communication: why to communicate The term “crisis” is defined from multiple angles. One school of thought defines crisis as an event (Coombs, 2007, 2015; Fearn-Banks, 2011; Sohn & Lariscy, 2014). Another school of thought regards crisis as something different from an event (Pauchant & Mitroff, 1992; Shrivastava, 1993). It is the symbolic impact of an accident as well as the resulting challenge to the currently held norms (Billings et al., 1980; Eberwein, 1978; Pauchant & Mitroff, 1992; Turner, 1976, 1978). So, the issue that distinguishes crisis from accident is – the challenge it imposes on individuals’ core assumptions (Elliott & Smith, 2006). Accommodating this school of thought’s assertions crisis can be conceptualized as part of a process (RouxDufort, 2007). This line of thought led Coombs (2015, p. 3) to define a crisis as “an unpredictable event that threatens important expectancies of stakeholders and can seriously impact an organization’s performance and generate negative outcomes”. Regarding the source of the crisis Turner (1976, 1978) was among the first to coin the issue that organizational factors are the primary sources of crisis due to some of their faulty assumptions. These held assumptions impact the control and management systems and consequently create man-made crises. Along this line prior crisis management researchers focus on the causes of crises (Hynes & Prasad, 1997; Miller, 1990; Pauchant & Mitroff, 1988, 1992; Perrow, 1984; Shrivastava, 1987; Smith, 1990; Turner, 1976, 1978; Wicks, 2001). While exploring the causes of crises, quite a few researchers highlight the issue that some organizations incubate crisis potential in the form of organizational practices, behaviors, structures, plans guided by the individually and collectively held beliefs and values of people working in the organization (e.g., Pauchant & Mitroff, 1988, 1992; Reason, 1990, 1997; Shrivastava, 1987). In general, these organizations resist change, and if they have to bring change, it mostly occurs at the superficial structures and plans rather than at the deep-seated beliefs and assumptions (Pauchant & Mitroff 1988, 1992).

6 Introduction

On the contrary, there are some organizations (although relatively few) that consider crises as a learning pathway (Fortune & Peters, 1995; Smith, 1995, 2001, 2004; Turner, 1976, 1978) which consequently reduces the vulnerability of the organizations at a crisis. These organizations embrace crisis and generally do not resist change, and if required, they are open to change strategy, structure, systems, and even their individual and collectively held beliefs and assumptions. Meanwhile, crises are generally not desirable; however, it is at times unavoidable. Crisis creates unstable, vulnerable situations for each and every company irrespective of size, motives, strategies, beliefs, values, etc. Communication is stated to be one of the primary means of the restoration effort of the companies from such vulnerable and stressful situations. According to cognitive dissonance theory, consumers generally feel uncomfortable or stressed when they experience a cognition that conflicts with their existing one. For example, consumers would experience dissonance upon experiencing the conflicts between the generally held cognition (the firm should have provided quality products) with the real-time cognition (instead, the firm manufactured harmful products). Zheng et al. (2020) propose that a new cognition can be instilled through positive corporate response, which can help customers restore cognitive equilibrium at a crisis that conflicts with their expectations of the firm. Prior research suggests that effective corporate communication is an efficient mean to reduce the vulnerability that emerged from negative consumer communications (Coombs, 2015). Due to its reach, frequency, impact, and interactivity, social media has become a primary mean of consumer negative communication. This form of negative communication against a company or brand, which is often referred to as consumers’ secondary crisis communication, has a broad negative impact on a wide range of stakeholders. It is much more intense, spreads exponentially within minutes, and attains much more attention when compared to the regular form of random and discrete negative word of mouth or consumer communication (Noguti et al., 2016; Utz et al., 2013). Any form of perceived wrongdoing by the company and its products (real or imagined) that emerged from a product, service failure, corporate action, or inaction generally creates a crisis situation for a company when communicated openly by others. A clash of opinions leads to the next step of escalating a potential crisis. The communication perspective is vested in a scientific paradigm that acknowledges subjectivity and communication as a medium for materializing subjective views and opinions at the interactional level. The linguistic turn across the social sciences argues that language and communication constitute all meanings, experiences, and descriptions in social life (Gadamer, 1975; Rorty, 1967). Being a subjective element of individual motivations and symbolic action, a social media post has intentionality built into that text, image, or sound clip, and as such, a social media storm can be defined as a reproduction of that intentionality. Authoring a social media post is basically a political process that claims the power of the subject (see Foucault, 1982). The concept of truth only makes sense in an

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objective world (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995), so what is true, right, or wrong is negotiated and socially constructed in the narrative interaction through vocabularies that we use to orient ourselves in the world and these change over time. Understanding social media storms also involves paying attention to the power of texts, and to do so, we need to understand the network of elements getting together (including texts) and the impact of subjective interpretations (see Giddens, 1979) asking what resources does a virtual room like social media offer to the organizational capacity of multiple voices, opinions, and emotions? This is how these linked conversations become a phenomenon called social media storm. Therefore, the magnitude of crises now gets much bigger as social media boosts the means of traditional consumer negative communication. In general, companies respond to crises to restore their previous image; however, the urgency and speed of response towards social media boosted crises has to be quick, more intense, and impactful. Consequently, marketers have to experiment with different strategies and means to communicate with the stakeholders in today’s social media boosted crisis communication context.

Crisis communication: how to communicate An ideal scenario for an organization could be that they are free from any kind of crisis. This is an unlikely case even if the organization believes it is doing everything right. No organization can confidently say that it can successfully navigate all unpredictable crises and their accompanying damages. This reality led prior researchers to come up with crisis management strategies and action-based models or theories to help organizations eliminate and/or reduce the negative impacts of crises (Benoit, 1997; Bradford & Garrett, 1995; Coombs, 2007, 2015; Sturges, 1994). In regards to crisis communication strategies, Sturges (1994) talks about three broad, thematic type of strategies which are: instructing information (i.e., telling people – stakeholders the way to react physically to a crisis); adjusting information (i.e., helping people for their emotional coping with the crisis) and internalizing information (i.e., formulating an ideal and positive image of the organization). Compared to Sturges (1994), Bradford and Garrett (1995) suggested four specific types of crisis communicated strategies (i.e., denial, excuse, justification, and concession) embedded in four scenarios (i.e., commission, control, standards, and agreement), and they empirically showed that concession is the most effective crisis communication strategy. Meanwhile, none of these strategies can be considered comprehensive in repairing and restoring the damaged image in crises. Nonetheless, an assessment of the prior major crisis communication models or theories [e.g., Image Repair Theory (IRT) (Benoit, 1995, 1997; 2015); Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) (Coombs, 2007; 2015)] reveals that they either took a rational (scientific) route or an emotional (non-scientific) route while offering a goal-oriented roadmap of crisis communication.

8 Introduction

Emotional route The emotional route of the crisis management approach is evident if we critically assess the Image Repair Theory proposed by Benoit (1995, 1997, 2015). This theory is based on the symbolic approaches of “apologia” and “account”. According to Benoit, an attack on the company has two dimensions: an offensive act and an accusation of responsibility for the action. Benoit proposed five specific strategies to combat the attack and restore the image of an organization. These are denial, evasion of responsibility, reducing offensiveness, corrective action, and mortification. Denial resonates “the communicator can simply deny that the incident happened or shift the blame in hopes of absolution of culpability” (Benoit, 1995, p. 75). Evasion of responsibility is simply avoiding the responsibility of the crisis and can be applied in four situations (i.e., defeasibility, provocation, accidental and good intentions). Reducing offensiveness is the act of lessening the impact of the crisis and, as per Benoit, includes six subcategories, namely bolstering, minimization, differentiation, transcendence, attacking accuser, and compensation. The strategy corrective actions resonate with undertaking crisis altering actions, and the last strategy, mortification, relates to organizational apologetic action against the action that induced the crisis. If we consider the offered strategies, it seems that these are primarily embedded in whims without having adequate reasoning. For example, the strategy denial, why should a company deny their contribution in a crisis if their action really triggered that situation? (e.g., product harm crisis – Toyota had to recall its vehicles due to defective brakes, Warner, 2010). The same goes for the strategy of evasion of responsibility. Although the remaining strategies make a bit more sense, the specific subcategories suggested underneath the category are more aligned with the emotional route of crisis resolution (e.g., attacking accuser). Overall, it appears that although the image repair theory provides some useful perspectives, it fails to offer fact-based, causal, and scientific evidence that the suggested strategies are effective in restoring and/or repairing the image of a company in crises (Holtzhausen & Roberts, 2009). Furthermore, Image Repair Theory and its emotional route of crisis communication lack both specificity and generalizability when offering guidance to the public relations and marketing practitioners (Cheng, 2016).

Rational route The rational route of crisis management communication is primarily evident in Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) (Coombs, 2007) which was originally developed from IRT and its underlying assumptions: crisis communication strategies are symbolic resources, and the route of communication is fundamentally emotional. SCCT is one of the dominant crisis communication strategies and is widely used by different organizations in different crisis management contexts (e.g., Barkley, 2020; Claeys et al., 2010; Ham & Kim, 2019;

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Ma & Zhan, 2016; Sisco et al., 2010). One of the primary reasons for such wider acceptance of SCCT is its pursuance of the rational, scientific route of crisis communication. In particular, SCCT brought in the attribution theory (Weiner, 2006) as well as experimental study set-up to offer situation-oriented crisis communication strategy. The underlying assumptions of SCCT are: a) in a crisis, stakeholders assess who is responsible for the crisis situations; b) depending on the extent of responsibility (e.g., minimum, low, high) of the organization attributed by the stakeholders, different situations are matched (e.g., victim, accident and preventable crisis) as well as the corresponding crisis communication strategies. Therefore, in a low attribution situation, organizations are suggested to declare the crisis as accidental crisis situations and adopt denial or excuse-related strategies instead of going for a full apology (Cheng, 2016). SCCT also suggests a range of strategies depending on an organization’s level of accommodations which spans from pure accommodation to pure advocacy (Coombs, 2007). The proponents of this strategy suggest that at a decreased attribution of the crisis responsibility of the organization, it can adopt defensive crisis response strategies. The assessment of the strategies offered under SCCT demonstrates that it is more systematic and tenable compared to the IRT and its underlying emotional route of crisis communication. Systematic exploration of the entity responsible for the crises and depending on the extent of its attributions the ascertainment of specific crisis communication strategy increases the acceptance of such strategy by the stakeholders, including the consumers. The process of exploring the crises and their resolution is more explicit and visible for management itself. On top of that, if management is inclined to make this process visible among the stakeholders, including the customers, then the customers may also be aware of the systematic assessment process undertaken by the company. Such actions can contribute towards the mitigation of the crises to some extent with specific reference to the company’s transparent act and consequent restoration of reliability and credibility of the company. Furthermore, the causal exploration in the form of experimental studies undertaken by the company in the crisis scenarios helps them get scientific and quantified output in a crisis situation. Numbers seem to have higher believability in terms of establishing a case. From this perspective as well, the rational route of SCCT is more tenable. Although SCCT and its suggested process and strategies seem to have a higher probability of being successful in a crisis communication scenario, it is not a “onesize-fits-all” theory. In particular, SCCT is yet to comprehensively explore the role of social media as an antecedent, mediator, and moderator to the crisis encountered by business entities (Jin & Liu, 2010). One of the prime limitations of SCCT is its failure to accommodate the diversity of stakeholders on social media. Furthermore, the dynamics brought by the social media in crisis situations in terms of participants, their individual and collective contributions to the crisis made SCCT theory and its suggested strategies lose their efficiency and effectiveness in reducing and/or eliminating the damage caused by the crisis. The decision-making

10

Introduction

of the crisis management team in crisis situations is also significantly compromised due to these limitations (Stephens & Malone, 2009). Nonetheless, changes in perspectives, mindsets and the thought process of management relating to social media in crisis situations can increase the potential of this crisis management theory and its suggested specific strategies.

Social media storm as an opportunity As we will present in more detail in Chapter 2, one needs to understand the interplay of social media, consumer empowerment, and negative emotions such as anger in order to grasp the main factors that have led to the creation of social media storms. Studies have shown how social media keep changing the conditions of crisis management through fragmented channels and new types of communication (Aula, 2010; Cheng, 2016). Carberry and King (2012) found the media to be key intermediaries in shaping stigmatization processes, i.e., the flow of perceptions of deviance and illegitimacy. Social media gave the opportunity to consumers to join their forces and collective voices and space to express their opinions and emotions publicly. Further, it provided them with access to information in a timely manner. All those factors have led to consumer empowerment. Consumer empowerment spurred by anger has mostly been viewed as a reaction to unmet expectations and dissatisfaction, materialized in various forms, ranging from isolated complaints to global riots. When companies don’t manage to keep their promises, consumer anger triggers greater action through social media: exposure, criticism, and parody, to name a few. Research has connected empowerment to actions in defense of consumer rights, such as legal actions and boycotts (Gueterbock, 2004). Because consumer empowerment might often lead to negative consequences for companies, this alerts them when consumers publicly express their opinion on their products, services, campaigns, and other brand tactics and actions (Shankar et al., 2006). Therefore, empowerment is a significant strategic challenge for companies (Truong & Simmons, 2010). So far, companies have followed different approaches towards dealing with empowered consumers: some have tried to recover the brand by offering quick apologies and allowances (Bernoff & Schadler, 2010), and others have followed the path of cooperation, socialization, open dialog, and transparency (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004). No matter which approach is followed by companies, the empowered consumer quickly and radically alters fundamental concepts in marketing like brand management. Negative emotions, such as anger, play a central role in understanding consumer behavior in a wired world. Nowadays, consumer empowerment constitutes a precondition of anti-branding, and dissatisfaction acts as a trigger for antibranding and boycotting. Researchers have demonstrated that anger and contempt act as mediators for consumers’ reactions to companies’ wrongdoings (Frijda et al., 1989). However, anger seems to entail a strong constructive element that allows

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room for possible reconciliation (Romani et al., 2013). Therefore, consumer anger can be destructive and constructive to a relationship with a company, which makes it an important and promising issue for managers to comprehend. The premise of this book is that emotions have important social functions and consequences as they influence the behavior of the people who experience them, as well as the behavior of those who perceive them (Van Kleef & Côté, 2007). Providing in the following chapters various insights about social media storms and their dynamic nature, we propose a counter-logical understanding of why it is possible for companies to generate positive awareness from anger, and we demonstrate how consumer empowerment can, in fact, strengthen companies and brands in the long run when refuting a “calming the waters” strategy. One mechanism supporting a constructive approach is grounded on the fact that intense emotions, like anger, tend to leave strong affective traces in episodic memory (a person’s unique memory of a certain experience) and can become drivers of involvement (Cohen & Areni, 1991). We also demonstrate how social media storms could present opportunities to demonstrate a company’s values and to raise social awareness on general issues of social impact, leading to a win-win-win situation for a company, its consumers, and society. Through real cases, we show that companies are able to utilize the attention and engagement to reframe the angerevoking issue into a broader context, which aligns with the brand value and consumers’ interests and concerns. This approach could be an effective answer to Truong and Simmons (2010, p. 250) call that “marketing managers will need to be creative in how they respond effectively tapping into the empowerment and control that consumers now have and want, in the digital world”. We propose that trying to convert the anger of empowered consumers into more positive outcomes is a strategic move towards more constructive and meaningful practices.

Concluding discussion This chapter provided an introduction to how social media had a tremendous impact on how consumers and companies interact, and we discussed that a crucial challenge for managers nowadays is to realize how to address various stakeholders’ expectations on social media platforms (Aral et al., 2013). We also provided some terms and definitions that have been developed to refer to and describe the phenomenon of social media storms and discussed its historic routes and evolution. In particular, we talked about the influence of word of mouth and electronic word of mouth on the purchasing decisions of consumers and the success or failure of products, services, and brands, with a particular focus on the dissemination of negative reviews and opinions, namely the negative word of mouth. Further, we presented the central theories developed to address the issue of crisis communication and described the suggested managerial implications and guidelines. Finally, we briefly discussed the interplay between social media, consumer empowerment, and negative sentiment in the generation and development of social media storms. We saw that consumer empowerment could serve as an

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underlying precondition of anti-branding, and dissatisfaction with brands, companies, or products can act as a trigger for anti-branding and boycotting. However, we believe that managers can embrace this newly empowered consumer. They can potentially view those new phenomena, such as social media storms, as opportunities to improve their companies, demonstrate their companies’ values, and raise awareness on issues of social impact, leading to a win-win-win situation for the companies, their consumers, and society. In the following chapters, tapping into relevant research and real cases, we provide insights on how this is possible.

Structure of the book Chapter 1 was introductory and provided a historic overview of the development of sharing publicly negative sentiment and an initial discussion about social media storms and crisis communication. Next, seven more chapters follow. Chapter 2 discusses the context in which social media storms emerge. We first define social media and outline the main types of social media platforms. Following, we discuss the shift of power from brands to consumers, and we provide an overview of the social drivers for change. Finally, we emphasize the role of emotions in consumers' behavior and how negative emotions drive antibranding activities. Chapter 3 focuses on how data and its built-in properties are shaping up social media storms. It also offers an in-depth knowledge base about social media storms by presenting the types, purposes, properties, contributors, varieties, and constituents of social media storms. Chapter 4 shows how social media storms are merely symptoms of a changing world in which the internet development is causing a profound change in global business behavior and consumer behavior. This presents new challenges to managers and marketers, which calls for rethinking strategic marketing management at a general level. Chapter 5 focuses on how managerial emotions and experiences frame the organization’s perception of a social media storm and how managers decide to respond to it. We outline the role of mental frames, particularly why a social media storm tends to be framed as a crisis situation in a rational management perspective and an emotional perspective. Chapter 6 is designed to develop reflective thinking based on cognitive development processes. It seeks to help managers develop strategic leadership approaches to social media storm engagement by rethinking social media storms as a new form of consumer-empowering leadership movement. Chapter 7 introduces a cognitive framework of four types of businessstakeholder interaction. Equipped with four purposeful social media strategies, managers are empowered to rethink business-stakeholder interaction before, during, and after a social media storm. Chapter 8 focuses on examining the constructive nature of social media storms. Next, we analyze whether companies should take the risk of associating their

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brands with social issues, and we explore the potential use of social media storms as communication and/or pressure tools by companies and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs).

Notes 1 “Delta Airlines face a social media crisis for kicking off a YouTube star after speaking Arabic”, published on Think Marketing website on December 22, 2016 [https:// thinkmarketingmagazine.com/delta-face-social-media-crisis-kicking-off-youtube-starspeaking-arabic/] 2 “United Airlines shows how to make a PR crisis a total disaster”, published on CNN Money website on April 11, 2017 [http://money.cnn.com/2017/04/11/news/unitedpassenger-pr-disaster/]

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2 UNDERSTANDING PRECONDITIONS OF SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS

Do we really understand the properties of social media? The social media phenomenon has tremendously disrupted many aspects of modern life. The rise of networked individuals has changed how people com­ municate, socialize, shop, and probably most profoundly create. Creative parti­ cipation of all parties involved is in the heart of social media (Evans, 2012), but it takes quite an effort to grasp all aspects of various omnipresent websites and ap­ plications such as social networking sites, blogs, or sharing sites. Different websites and mobile applications that we call social media emerged simultaneously, but they are only loosely alike in terms of their properties, size, and impact. Some of them are large players such as social networking sites (e.g., Facebook or LinkedIn), while others are countless heterogeneous entities such as blogs. Nevertheless, all of them are places where social media storms start, evolve, or spill over to. Although most of us intensively use social media platforms both personally and professionally, their dynamic nature and new properties that emerge practically daily posit a le­ gitimate question: do we truly understand social media?

The emergence of new media In order to understand any concept related to social media, including social media storms, business leaders first need to understand the social medium itself. We can say that social media is a part of a wider phenomenon called new media, which is defined as “…websites and other digital communication and information channels in which active consumers engage in behaviors that can be consumed by others both in real time and long afterwards regardless of their spatial location” (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2010, p. 312). New media differs from co-called traditional media (e.g., traditional print, radio, and TV) in several ways. First of all, new media is digital, with no marginal costs of

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distributing content, and without traditional gatekeepers. In many cases, new media enable proactive participation of all parties involved through content creation and co-creation, while (co-)created content is highly visible, widely ac­ cessible, and stored long-term. New media is ubiquitous due to the proliferation of mobile devices and is often real-time or synchronous. Finally, new media forms networks of stakeholders (people, organizations) who can communicate peer-topeer and build relationships. Following the conceptualization from HennigThurau et al. (2010), it can be concluded that new media is all media that has transformed due to digitalization or emerged because of it. It includes websites, blogs, streaming services, wikis, social networking sites, podcasts, and many others, even e-mail communication. These platforms have challenged traditional business models in many industries and redefined the way businesses, consumers, and other organizations interact with each other.

Defining social media Probably the most innovative and distinct part of the new media universe is social media, which is defined as “…a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and ex­ change of User Generated Content” (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010, p. 61). Nowadays, these “Internet-based applications” (e.g., social networking sites such as Facebook, or sharing sites such as YouTube) are usually called “platforms” (Gómez et al., 2019) for the purpose of delineating a platform (e.g., Facebook) from content published on a platform (e.g., Facebook posts, comments, etc.). Social media platforms are rooted in the notion of Web 2.0, which is a term that refers to the transition of the Internet in the mid-2000s from being mostly a channel for broadcasting (Web 1.0) to being an ecosystem for the dynamic interaction of all parties involved (users/consumers, businesses, organizations). Consequently, the concept of user-generated content (UGC) emerged, which refers to media con­ tent created or produced by the general public in a non-professional manner (Daugherty et al., 2008). Social media enabled UGC to be created, published, and shared alongside firm-generated content (FGC; sometimes also referred to as firmcreated content, FCC), which is professionally produced by businesses. Social media platforms became some of the most popular websites and mobile applica­ tions globally. In September 2020, five out of ten top-ranked websites worldwide were social media platforms: YouTube (2nd), Facebook (3rd), Twitter (4th), Instagram (5th), and Wikipedia (7th) (SimilarWeb, 2020). More than 3.8 billion people worldwide use social media, while each user spends on average two hours and 45 minutes on social media platforms each day – more than one-third of their total time spent online (We are social, 2020). The main reasons why people use social media are: social interaction, information seeking, pass time, entertainment, relaxation, communicatory utility, convenience utility, expression of opinion, information sharing, and surveillance/knowledge about others (Whiting & Williams, 2013). Although social media platforms became mainstream by the end

20

Preconditions of social media storms

TABLE 2.1 Functional building blocks of social media

Social media functionality

Implications of the functionality

Identity – The extent to which users reveal themselves on social media Conversations – The extent to which users communicate with each other on social media Sharing – The extent to which users exchange, distribute, and receive content on social media Presence – The extent to which users know if other users are available/accessible on social media Relationships – The extent to which users relate to each other (e.g., connecting via social media) Reputation – The extent to which users know the social standing of others and content Groups – The extent to which users can form communities on social media

Data privacy controls and tools for user self-promotion Conversation velocity, and the risks of starting and joining Content management system and social graph Creating and managing the reality, intimacy, and immediacy of the context Managing the structural and flow properties in a network of relationships Monitoring the strength, passion, sentiment, and reach of users and brands Membership rules and protocols

Source: Adapted from Kietzmann, J. H., Hermkens, K., McCarthy, I. P., & Silvestre, B. S. (2011). Social media? Get serious! Understanding the functional building blocks of social media. Business Horizons, 54(3), p. 243.

of the 2000s, understanding their dynamic nature and adapting it represents a constant challenge for business leaders. Kietzmann et al. (2011) proposed a fra­ mework for understanding social media based on seven functional building blocks, which describe the social media user experience and have implications for busi­ nesses (presented in Table 2.1). These building blocks are not equally represented in all social media platforms and contexts. Each social media platform is configured by a different set of functional blocks and their intensity. For example, Facebook nowadays en­ compasses almost all functional blocks of social media, while YouTube focuses on sharing, conversations, groups, and reputation, rather than identity, presence, and relationships.

Features of social media platforms Social media became ubiquitous and evolved beyond the initial definition of the concept. For example, Tuten and Solomon recently defined social media as “…the online means of communication, conveyance, collaboration, and cultivation among inter­ connected and interdependent networks of people, communities, and organizations enhanced by technological capabilities and mobility” (Tuten & Solomon, 2018, p. 4). Their definition emphasizes the emergence of new functionalities of social media plat­ forms (e.g., collaboration), the rise of virtual communities (including brand communities), the active role of organizations (companies, brands) in social media, and the impact of mobile technologies (e.g., using location specificity). Both early

Preconditions of social media storms

21

and more recent definitions of social media suggest that the social media landscape is very broad, which calls for a deeper insight into the types of social media. Social media nowadays includes hundreds of platforms with different combinations of features (services). Classifying social media platforms by their features is not an easy task, which is evident from the endeavors of Fred Cavazza, a blogger who is outlining the social media landscape on a yearly basis since 2008. In his 2020 report, Cavazza (2020) identified six major social media platforms’ features: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Publishing (making content available on the platform); Sharing (enabling organic sharing – done by users, and paid reach through socalled native advertising – promoting the content); Messaging (peer-to-peer messaging and group chats); Discussing (commenting and feedback); Collaborating (users working together on projects, e.g., co-creation of the content); Networking (connecting through friendship and/or page likes on Facebook, follows on Instagram, subscribes on YouTube, etc.).

These features are equally available to all parties involved in social media, from companies and brands managing their social media marketing activities to in­ dividuals who decide to express themselves, create feedback or network. As much as 170 social media platforms are classified into a staggering 33 groups since many of them have more than one dominant feature. Besides more straightforward groups such as blogging platforms (e.g., Medium) and sharing sites (e.g., YouTube), Cavazza (2020) recognizes GIF portals (e.g., Giphy, Imgur), music sharing services (e.g., Spotify, Deezer), collaboration tools (e.g., Slack, Asana), and many other specific groups of websites/applications - as social media. Even messaging applications (e.g., WhatsApp, Viber), sometimes called “dark social” (Swart et al., 2018), are considered to be social media. It can be concluded that many digitally-enabled services nowadays include features that are typical for social media (e.g., publishing and sharing content, networking, etc.), which makes these services also a part of the social media landscape. Furthermore, it is impossible to draw strict lines between different groups of social media platforms based on their features, which is evident from the visual representation of the Social Media Landscape by Cavazza (2020), presented in Figure 2.1.

Six major types of social media platforms A more parsimonious and theoretically supported classification of social media can be found in the academic literature. Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) proposed one of the most cited classifications of social media platforms by using theories of media research (i.e., social presence theory and media richness theory) and social pro­ cesses (i.e., concepts of self-presentation and self-disclosure) as a classification

22

Preconditions of social media storms

FIGURE 2.1

Social Media Landscape 2020

Source: Cavazza, F. (2020). Panorama des médias sociaux 2020, available at: https://fredcavazza.net/2 020/04/21/panorama-des-medias-sociaux-2020/ (accessed September 2020).

criterion. In the context of media research, social presence theory states that media can be more or less intimate (i.e., interpersonal vs. mediated) and more or less immediate (i.e., synchronous vs. asynchronous). More intimate (interpersonal) and immediate (synchronous) media enable stronger social influence of the involved parties. Media richness theory states that a certain medium is more successful in resolving ambiguity and reducing uncertainty during communication, depending on the level of richness of information that could be transmitted. On the other hand, in social processes, the concept of self-presentation refers to the desire of individuals to control the impressions of others about them during social inter­ action, and the concept of self-disclosure refers to revealing personal information, consciously or unconsciously. Self-presentation and self-disclosure concepts are fueled by the major features of the social media platforms (e.g., the emergence of so-called social media influencers). By combining social presence/media richness and self-presentation/self-disclosure dimensions, Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) provided a robust classification of social media platforms presented in Table 2.2. We included some of the recently emerged platforms as well. We briefly discuss each type of social media and its (potential) roles in social media storms. Collaborative projects are built around collective content creation (e.g., Wikipedia) or bookmarking (e.g., Pinterest), where attention is on the content and not on its creator or bookmarker. These platforms are important sources of information and inspiration for consumers, which can be important in the context of social media storms. For example, after the famous Copenhagen

Preconditions of social media storms

23

TABLE 2.2 Classification of social media by social presence/media richness and self-

presentation/self-disclosure Social presence/media richness

High Self-presentation/ self-disclosure Low

Low

Medium

Blogs and microblogging sites (e.g., Medium, Twitter)

Social networking sites (e.g., Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok) Content communities (e.g., YouTube, Giphy, SoundCloud)

Collaborative projects (e.g., Wikipedia, Reddit, Quora; Pinterest)

High Virtual social worlds (e.g., Second Life)

Virtual game worlds (e.g., World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV)

Source: Adapted from Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media. Business Horizons, 53(1), p. 62.

Zoo social media storm, which we present in detail in Chapter 6, someone created an entry on Wikipedia about the late giraffe Marius, whose culling in 2014 triggered the storm. This way, many details about the event became widely ac­ cessible and were constantly updated on the platform, which is globally used as a popular source of information. Content communities are also built around content creation, which is mostly done by individual creators who want their content to be shared. This is why these platforms are often called sharing sites (e.g., YouTube for videos or Giphy for GIF images). Unlike the collaborative projects, content communities are usually richer in content formats (e.g., photos, videos, music) and, in some cases, more syn­ chronous (e.g., live streams on YouTube). Due to their prominent sharing cap­ abilities, they are often used for viral marketing (e.g., viral YouTube videos), making them a place where many social media storms start. For example, a famous “United Breaks Guitars” social media storm had started when Canadian musician Dave Carroll recorded a song about his bad experience with the airport baggage handlers and published the music video on YouTube on July 6, 2009. The video was extensively shared from YouTube to many other social media platforms (Twitter, Facebook, blogs), which has drawn the attention of mainstream media, leading to 4.6 million views by the end of July 2009 (Hanna, 2010). Although the social media storm was long gone, the YouTube video continued to gain views, reaching more than 20 million in mid-2020. Blogs and microblogging sites, pioneers among social media platforms, are still a considerable part of the social media landscape and important means for gaining thought leadership in social media due to the high visibility of content creators and participators. These platforms also proved to be important entities in social media storms since they are often used to express dissatisfaction and disappointment with

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Preconditions of social media storms

corporate practices (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010). The blog format can be used to build a website that defames the brand (e.g., blog “Dominos Suck”, dom­ inossucks.wordpress.com). In contrast, the most popular microblogging platform Twitter is often used to express negative emotions towards companies and brands (Waterloo et al., 2018) due to the short post (tweet) format, which may include up to 240 characters and an image. Social networking sites are the most dynamic social media category. They enable users to create their profiles and interact with other users (peer-to-peer) and companies/brands, create and publish content, and engage with content (both UGC and FGC) via comments, likes/dislikes, and shares. Social networking sites are crucial for developing brand communities, often managed by community managers, i.e., social media marketing professionals hired by companies and brands. Certain social networking sites provide functionalities that are beyond the scope of media, such as e-commerce. The social networking sites category is dominated by Facebook Inc. (the owner of two major social networking plat­ forms: Facebook and Instagram), but several other strong platforms also play an important role, such as Microsoft Corp. with LinkedIn (business-oriented social networking site) and ByteDance with TikTok (social networking site based on video-sharing). High media richness and, to some extent, immediate commu­ nication (e.g., via live streams on Instagram and Facebook), combined with the possibility for users to engage with the content in many ways, makes social net­ working sites an ideal context for social media storms. There are numerous pieces of evidence of pages, accounts, and communities on social networking sites that are taking a negative stand towards brands (Dessart et al., 2020). Among six types of social media identified by Kaplan and Haenlein (2010), virtual social worlds and virtual game worlds were the least dynamic areas of the social media landscape in the last decade. They share very few features with other types of social media, and they are considered more as platforms for gaming than media for social interactions. Although several platforms in these two categories are still active, especially in the virtual game worlds category, they are not a suitable context for social media storms. Probably the most profound consequence of the rise of social media is that companies and brands have less control over the information available about them in the digital environment (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010). Moreover, the rise of new and social media completely disrupts the management of relationships with cus­ tomers and consequently established business models and practices (HennigThurau et al., 2010). This brings us to the world of empowered consumers, which requires a shift in business and marketing thinking.

Switch of power between brands and consumers From a philosophical perspective, consumers were portrayed as both powerless (or seduced) and emancipated through consumption. Different schools of thought pursued different perspectives, demonstrating how the issue of power between

Preconditions of social media storms

25

businesses (companies and brands) and consumers is complex and has a long history. Denegri‐Knott et al. (2006) analyzed consumer empowerment construct from three perspectives of consumer power: consumer sovereignty, cultural power, and discursive power. The consumer sovereignty perspective portrays consumers as heroes of modern market societies, who can boycott producers and participate in consumerist movements, among other activities. In other words, the possibility to choose is at the heart of consumer empowerment, and consumption is considered as a “voting” mechanism (Shaw et al., 2006). The cultural power perspective sees consumers as creative and playful entities that innovatively counteract powerful businesses and their practices. Consumers are more than just economic entities – they should be considered as citizens with a more encom­ passing view of economic, socio-cultural, and moral issues (McShane & Sabadoz, 2015), especially in the age when social responsibility and sustainability are im­ portant parts of doing business. Finally, the discursive power perspective brings a more inclusive and less antagonistic view of consumer power by dismissing both consumer sovereignty and cultural power perspectives. According to the discursive model, the interests of consumers and businesses overlap much more than it is usually considered, and power is a force that enables co-creation in which both parties participate and help each other. Each of these perspectives enhances the understanding of consumer empowerment but also has its limitations. Therefore, a more boundary-spanning and multi-dimensional approach to the issue of power between consumers and businesses is proposed, where consumer empowerment and marketer power would be seen as more complementary than opposing (Denegri‐Knott et al., 2006). This proposition is already recognized through new perspectives on social media storms, which imply that they could be treated as opportunities for companies and brands and not exclusively as threats (Rydén et al., 2020).

Consumer power in the digital age While it was presumed that consumers hold a lot of power in their relationships with brands, in reality, companies maintained the most powerful role prior to digital transformation in the 2000s. Marketing literature usually describes the shift of power from marketers to consumers as the most interesting and surprising trend in marketing during the first decade of the 21st century. Initially, digital interactive transformation in marketing was considered a scenario where marketers could intrude consumers’ lives more deeply and more precisely than ever before. Instead, the digital interactive transformation unfolded on a model of consumer empow­ erment, which is based on peer-to-peer consumer communication and their power to deal with marketers’ intrusion (Deighton & Kornfeld, 2009). Consumers use the computational power gained through digital technologies (including social media) to fight the computational power of businesses (marketing databases, tar­ geting algorithms, etc.), trying to protect their digital lives. Labrecque et al. (2013) identified four sources of consumer power in the digital age: demand-,

26

Preconditions of social media storms

information-, network- and crowd-based. Demand-based power stems from the aggregated impact of consumption and purchase behavior fueled by the Internet and social media. For example, many social media storms include calls for “buycotts” in order to hurt companies under attack. Information-based power is related to the possibility for content consumption (the ease of access to in­ formation) and content production (UGC). Information transparency makes companies’ misconduct more visible (fertile ground for social media storm igni­ tion), and UGC is the main tool for participation in social media storms. Network-based power is related to the (social) network’s tools that enable dis­ tribution, editing, and enhancement of digital content – giving everybody an opportunity to add value beyond that of the original content. As Gensler et al. (2013, p. 242) argue, “…consumers are becoming pivotal authors of brand stories due to new dynamic networks of consumers and brands formed through social media and the easy sharing of brand experiences in such networks”. In other words, digital and social media made consumers regular co-creators and editors of brand stories, but their narrative is not necessarily always in the interest of companies (e.g., when the co-created content is a part of social media storm). Finally, crowd-based power reflects the ability to mobilize resources in order to benefit individuals or groups. The con­ cepts of crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, and the sharing economy are examples of crowd-based power, and social media storms also reside in the ability to quickly engage a large number of individuals in the activity.

A new (dis)order Although consumer empowerment can also bring more cost to the consumer (e.g., the need to invest more time and effort to leverage on given power), it is mostly seen as beneficial for consumers. Furthermore, consumer empowerment goes beyond the concept of so-called “customerization” or giving customers more options but still under the regulation and control of companies. Although many companies are successfully empowering their consumers (Wright et al., 2006), current customer-centric marketing strategies – including concepts of customer relationship management (CRM), customer management of relationships (CMR), and customer self-service (CSS) – might be based under a false premise (Pires et al., 2006) due to the uncontrolled aspects of consumer empowerment. In order to illustrate how managing customer relationships has changed during the emergence of new media, Hennig-Thurau et al. (2010) describe it as “playing pinball”. Companies are serving “marketing balls” (marketing communication messages) into a cacophonous environment, where new media acts as “bumpers”, which are changing the course of the message in chaotic ways. Business leaders can guide the ball with their “flippers”, i.e., agile approach, but there are no guarantees that the “ball” will go where it is intended – and a miscue can be amplified into a crisis. In contrast to traditional and certain new/digital media, social media are meant to be egalitarian in nature since they allow all stakeholders to communicate along with dyadic ties (Peters et al., 2013). As a consequence, businesses and brands are

Preconditions of social media storms

27

just actors like anybody else (i.e., individual users, consumers) in a network (e.g., a social networking site). As argued earlier, the power has been taken from busi­ nesses by the individuals and communities that create, share and consume content on social media platforms (Kietzmann et al., 2011). While businesses have lost control over their brands, consumers gained several new roles in the brandconsumer interaction: participation in value creation (e.g., co-creation of products and services), content creation (e.g., ratings and reviews that affect purchasing behavior; video production on YouTube, etc.) and content distribution (e.g., spreading messages virally). Value co-creation is far less risky for companies and brands (controlled empowerment) in comparison to content creation and its distribution in social media (un-controlled empowerment). The latter is com­ pletely redefining the media industry (including the marketing communication industry) and brings new challenges to business leaders who are also facing ne­ gative attention to brands (Fournier & Avery, 2011). As Deighton and Kornfeld (2009, p. 4) point out, “…the marketer in peer-to-peer environments is an interloper, more talked-about than talking. At best its role is to provoke conversations among consumers, and at worst it becomes the enemy, attacked with invective or parody”.

Consumer empowerment/disempowerment paradox At the same time, these developments also create many opportunities for new business models and practices. The so-called consumer empowerment/dis­ empowerment paradox implies that if marketers make better use of the newly gained consumer insight in the future (due to the Internet and social media), they could outplay empowered consumers (Labrecque et al., 2013). This is already evident from the social media platforms’ ownership concentration. Two major social media platforms (i.e., Facebook and Instagram) and two major texting apps (i.e., WhatsApp and Messenger) are owned by the same company – Facebook, Inc. A similar scenario is also present in other areas of so-called Big Tech. For example, Alphabet, Inc. dominates the market of search with Google search en­ gine and YouTube – the latter often being called the second biggest search engine. While this kind of concentration empowers the above-mentioned platforms, it also provides tremendous possibilities to companies, which benefit from deeper consumer insight and the possibility to target them across platforms through sponsored content. Consumers’ search engine behavior enables companies to target search queries with sponsored search results, and the usage of location-based services gives companies insights about consumers’ whereabouts. Nevertheless, according to Deighton and Kornfeld (2009), these activities are less radically changing the rules of marketing compared to property, social, and cultural ex­ changes in the digital environment. Property, social, and cultural exchanges are primarily happening in the new media and social media context and are forcing businesses to act as allies of consumers – someone who has to deserve their place in the social and cultural life. Consumers can help brands in their endeavors to reach and influence other consumers and punish them in case of misconduct. A good

28

Preconditions of social media storms

example is Dove, a Unilever brand, and their successful long-term communication platform “Campaign for Real Beauty”. Unilever has successfully used social media to communicate to customers and monitor their sentiments towards the brand Dove (Rydén et al., 2017). The company also searches for types of words and phrases customers use in connection with the Dove brand as well as competitors’ brands and examines how social media affects self-esteem among its female cus­ tomers. This led to deep consumer insights and meaningful engagement with their customers. Despite their excellence in managing the long-term relationship with customers and the public, Dove experienced both praise and punishment in the social media context in the 2000s. In 2006, consumers helped their “Evolution” video to go viral and to become a part of the popular culture, while in 2007, Dove was a target of criticism and spoof (parody) video responses related to their “Onslaught” video (Neff, 2007). Both videos were celebrating the real beauty of women, but the latter reminded the public that the brand Dove is owned by Unilever, the same company that owns brand Axe, which messages are in direct contradiction to the messages Dove is promoting. As a consequence, Dove (and Unilever) was seen as hypocritical, which led to a backlash on social media. This example illustrates how social media enabled consumers and the general public to express their want for change due to perceived unethical corporate practices. Social media made the social motivation to change much more impactful than ever before. For this reason, we are discussing the issues of sustainability and social justice in the context of business and marketing for the purpose of better un­ derstanding triggers for social media storms.

Social motivation for change To understand the social motivation for change in the context of consumer be­ havior, it is important to stress how managing relationships with consumers has evolved over time. Initially, marketing was based on the exchange paradigm by focusing on transactions between businesses and consumers. In the 1990s, as the marketing environment has evolved in terms of new technologies, societal changes, and market development, the exchange paradigm was replaced by the relationship paradigm, which included marketing objectives related to consumer satisfaction and loyalty, besides profitability. According to Pansari and Kumar (2017), when a relationship is satisfied and has emotional bonding, it progresses to the level of engagement. Thus, the consumer engagement concept has emerged in the 2010s, which encompasses engaging customers with businesses in all possible ways. That also includes highly emotional connections between brands and consumers that in the long run result in sales and loyalty, and advocacy – con­ sumers becoming spokespersons for a brand. Or, as Shaw et al. (2006, p. 1049) stated: “Much of the developed world is characterized by consumption practices that have moved far beyond the primary utilitarian function of serving basic human needs”. Furthermore, because of increasing tension that underlies the relationships be­ tween consumers and companies, especially due to the increasing expectations

Preconditions of social media storms

29

related to socially responsible business practices, rising consumer skepticism and distrust towards companies, and consumers’ ongoing search for authenticity in the marketplace, McShane and Sabadoz (2015) proposed a broader definition of consumer empowerment, describing it as “…a state of being whereby consumers are free to enact and even privilege citizenship roles in the marketplace in such a way that they are cognitively able to pursue both economic/rational interests as well as broader human interests in terms of their consumer citizenship”. (McShane & Sabadoz, 2015, p. 548). Empowered and engaged consumers are the focus of the most recent and most advanced approach to marketing called the societal marketing concept. It enlarges the marketing concept (identifying needs and wants of target markets and deli­ vering solutions better than the competition) with the need to reach the wellbeing of both consumers and society as a whole (Kotler & Keller, 2009).

Sustainability, social justice, and woke movement Although the societal marketing concept emerged recently, the responsibility of marketers for social problems such as social justice, sustainability, and ethics has been recognized and discussed since the 1970s (Lavidge, 1970). Meanwhile, the idea of sustainability gained traction in general and in a business context in par­ ticular. Sustainability is sometimes defined as an environmental concept and sometimes more holistically as an economic, social, and environmental issue (Lunde, 2018). It encompasses all endeavors to minimize or eliminate negative impact on people and the planet as a result of business-related and other activities conducted by people and organizations. Besides focusing on the present, sus­ tainability is especially related to the legacy we are leaving to future generations. It can be discussed on both micro- and macro-levels. The macro-level enables a broader view on the idea of sustainability since it encompasses all aspects of the macro-environment, such as economic, political, technological, ethical, and en­ vironmental. Meanwhile, there is an ongoing discussion on the micro-level if marketing can be reconciled with terms such as sustainability or ethics. Despite the fact that marketing is often criticized for many externalities caused by consumer culture, sustainability is at the heart of the societal marketing concept and an important topic among marketing scientists and practitioners nowadays. All sta­ keholders in the marketplace recognized the importance of sustainability. Governments are imposing new legislation and policy measures, whole industries are organizing themselves to successfully deal with certain environmental chal­ lenges, companies are introducing sustainability-related initiatives, and consumers are changing their consumption practices in line with sustainability trends. The voice of consumers and the public, in general, is usually amplified by environ­ mental pressure groups and consumer protection organizations, aided by the use of social media, as was the case with the international mining corporation that we describe in detail in Chapter 5. Individual consumer concerns, behavior, and practices resulted in a specific stream of research related to sustainability (McDonagh & Prothero, 2014). It

30

Preconditions of social media storms

recognized different types of consumers engaging in various acts of green con­ sumption, voluntary simplicity, sustainable consumption, and anti-consumption. These new acts of consumers and companies’ reaction to them have resulted in the practice of sustainable marketing, which according to Lunde (2018), covers five areas from a macro-perspective: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Globalized marketplace of value exchange (sustainability should be considered without thinking of country borders); Responsible environmental behavior for current and future generations (lowering harm to the environment); Equitable sustainable business practices (fair and reasonable business practices in the eyes of all parties involved); Ethical sustainable consumption (consumer behaviors based on moral values and doing the right thing for firms, society, and the environment); and Necessary quality of life and well-being for both consumers and stakeholders (long-term satisfaction).

Expectations have risen, and society is taking a more active stance to remind businesses about it. Social media plays an important role in alerting the public about injustices and wrongdoings in societies, also known as the woke movement. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary (2017), the term “woke” origi­ nates from within African American communities in the United States and refers to people becoming aware of societal injustices, primarily racism. The term “woke” was recently taken into the mainstream and became associated with a wide range of social injustices, including sexism, police brutality, corruption, and pollution. Social media are crucial for the popularization of woke movements, such as #BlackLivesMatter (fighting racism), #MeToo (fighting sexism), and #NoBanNoWall (fighting for the rights of immigrants and refugees). Not only that people use social media to raise awareness of societal injustices and take a stand on these issues – they expect businesses and brands to do the same. Businesses and brands saw an opportunity in activism to differentiate from the competition and win the hearts and minds of their customer base. They started to express their stand on certain societal issues through marketing communication (also known as “woke advertising”), and some of them engaged more deeply with the issues by changing their corporate practices (e.g., ceasing cooperation with unethical sup­ pliers). Proactive engagement of brands in societal issues resulted in the devel­ opment of the concept of brand activism that we discuss in detail in Chapter 8. Consumers are particularly sensitive to the authenticity of brand activism (Vredenburg et al., 2020), and they expect brands to “walk the talk”, i.e., engage in activism beyond just using activist marketing communication. For example, Ritson (2020) criticized several big brands (Nike, Adidas, Spotify, L’Oréal, and Apple) who actively demonstrated their support to racial justice on social media during the Black Lives Matter protests in mid-2020, because at the same time they had no African American board members. Both the absence of brand activism (no

Preconditions of social media storms

31

activist marketing messaging and low prosocial corporate practice) and the in­ authentic brand activism (strong activist marketing messaging and low prosocial corporate practice) are potential triggers of social media storms. But inauthentic brand activism, also known as “woke washing”, will more easily lead to a social media storm, which can have a damaging effect on brand equity. While consumers can be critical of the lack of brand activism, the hypocritical behavior usually ignites a much stronger emotional reaction on social media. Therefore, in the next section, we discuss the role of emotions and motivations in consumer behavior to better understand how they drive consumers’ actions towards brands.

The role of motivations and emotions in consumer behavior Various motives drive human actions. Through understanding consumers’ mo­ tives, business leaders strive to discover and predict consumer behavior. Motivation can be described as the driving force within individuals that urges them to action (Schiffman & Kanuk, 2004). It is a reaction to arousal or tension (unfulfilled needs), and it directs behavior (towards certain goals). Needs can be physiological (e.g., need for food, water, or shelter) or acquired (psychological, e.g., need for affection, prestige, or power) while consumer behavior is often a result of their combination. On the other hand, goals can be generic (e.g., do­ nating to a non-profit organization) or specific (e.g., donating to Greenpeace). While individuals are aware of their goals, they may be unaware of their needs – especially if they are acquired (psychological) ones. For example, people can be unaware of their need to be powerful but constantly join conversations against brands on social media. When a certain need exists, this creates a tension that results in a motive to reduce it – and satisfy a need. Although motives are un­ observable, they explain behavior and can be classified along with several criteria: conscious/unconscious, urgent/non-urgent, positive/negative, intrinsic/extrinsic, and rational/emotional (Hanna & Wozniak, 2001). When individuals’ behavior is driven by conscious motives, they are aware of the reason for their actions. But when a person gets addicted to something (e.g., the need for excessive use of social media), has a low-priority need, or represses (denials) a need, motives for their actions are usually unconscious. When a high-urgency need drives a motive, it requires prompt satisfaction. Social media storms are usually a high-urgency set­ ting, which requires a quick reaction from societies and communities. While positive motives drive individuals towards desired goals (e.g., willingness to help a customer who a company mistreated), negative motives direct individuals away from undesirable consequences (e.g., ceasing buying from a company that uses unhealthy ingredients in their products). Behavior can be motivated intrinsically (i.e., participation in an activity for the inherent pleasure) and extrinsically (i.e., participation in an activity for the external reward). For example, when people participate in a social media storm because they believe it is the right thing to do, they are intrinsically motivated. But if they do it because they want to show off in

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Preconditions of social media storms

front of their friends on social media, their motivation is extrinsic. Finally, be­ havior is driven by rational and/or emotional motives. Rational motives guide individuals towards goals based on objective criteria such as tangible benefits or price. Meanwhile, emotional motives guide decisions based on subjective criteria such as status, pride, or fear. Although it seems that rational and emotional motives are two extremes, in reality, their assessment is not a simple task. Economic theory assumes that con­ sumers are rational – they carefully examine all options and choose those that give them the greatest utility. But many consumer decisions are made based on emotional criteria which do not maximize utility. Schiffman and Kanuk (2004) stress that consumers always attempt to choose what, in their view, maximizes their satisfaction, but the assessment of satisfaction is a very individual process based on one’s need structure and past experiences. In other words, an individual’s behavior that seems irrational to an outside observer may be rational in the context of the individual’s own psychological field. Despite the extensive treatment of consumers as primarily rational, human behavior is to a great extent influenced by emotions, such as love, anger, or fear. Marketing literature recognizes this as the emotional perspective in consumer behavior and stresses that emotions are also an individual’s response to the stimuli from the environment and may lead to action (Kotler et al., 2009). Emotions can manifest in psychical changes (e.g., in breathing, heartbeat, perspiration) and drive specific behaviors (e.g., an angry individual attacks a brand via social media). Business leaders should consider consumers’ emotions both as drivers of the be­ havior (motivation) and outcomes of that behavior (i.e., experience). Consumer satisfaction and emotion are two tenets of the engagement theory (Pansari & Kumar, 2017) that explain how businesses manage their relationships with cus­ tomers in the digital age. In fact, emotions as an outcome of the consumer’s experience with a brand are crucial for the transition from building a relationship approach to engagement with consumers. Emotions are especially important for influencing the referral and influencing behavior of consumers and their feedback towards brands, all of them being related to tangible (e.g., profitability) and in­ tangible (e.g., reputation, consumer insight) benefits for businesses. Business leaders are primarily leveraging on the positive emotions of con­ sumers. They create stimuli that will hopefully result in consumers’ positive emotional reaction, motivation, and action towards desired goals. Negative emotions in marketing are mostly used in specific contexts when needed to direct individuals away from undesirable actions and consequences. For example, fear is often used in anti-smoking and anti-speeding campaigns run by governmental bodies (e.g., ministries of health, police departments). But the context of social media, where consumers are empowered in many different ways and brands no longer control the interaction, requires a deeper understanding of negative emotions – especially anger – which represents a strong driver of behavior (Frijda et al., 1989).

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The complexity of anger As we have already stressed in the previous section, emotions are an important tenant of consumer engagement, which is the actual consumer management paradigm and has important benefits for businesses. But what happens when the emotions towards brands are negative? This is a new challenge for business leaders since the tenants of the relationship paradigm (i.e., trust and commitment) could not have a negative mark. Without trust, there are no relationships. On the other hand, with negative emotions, engagement is still there, but instead of benefits, it brings complex challenges for business leaders. Pansari and Kumar (2017) pro­ posed that a high level of positive emotions in consumer engagement can result in either passion for the brand (e.g., strong emotional involvement but without high satisfaction in terms of the frequency of purchases) or true love (e.g., strong emotional involvement and high satisfaction that drives purchases and loyalty). Following the same logic, a high level of negative emotions towards a brand could lead to negatively-valenced passion (i.e., anger) and hate (as the opposite of love). This implies that there are different levels of negative emotions, which are probably driving different behaviors. Therefore, in the following section, we are discussing the multifaced nature of negative emotions.

Constructive and destructive nature of negative emotions Social media made it easy to share emotions with others. In a qualitative study about the reasons why people use social media conducted by Whiting and Williams (2013), 56% of respondents stated that “expressing their opinions” is one of them. This includes liking/disliking content on social media, posting com­ ments, and criticizing others. Respondents stated that they enjoy the opportunity to “vent” on social media. While venting behavior could contribute to the in­ tensity of social media storms, they can get much more serious when a call-toaction for negative emotions is corporate wrongdoings or social injustices. They are considered moral violations and can provoke negative moral emotions. Following the insights from the psychology literature, Romani et al. (2013) dis­ tinguish three related – but distinguishable – types of negative moral emotions: anger, contempt, and disgust. Negative moral emotions represent a link between an individual’s moral standards and moral judgments and can occur individually or jointly. While anger aims to improve the relationship between the attacker and the target (constructive approach), contempt focuses on destroying the target by the attacker (destructive approach). Therefore, Romani et al. (2013) hypothesized that in the context of corporate wrongdoings, anger would be associated with so-called constructive punitive actions (e.g., temporary boycotts/buycotts directed at changing corporate practices) while contempt will be associated with destructive punitive actions (e.g., so-called “cancel culture”, a modern form of ostracism, directed at harming the corporation by promoting un-following their social media channels and/or permanent avoidance of their products/services). The study

34

Preconditions of social media storms

confirmed the mediation role of anger and contempt in consumers’ reactions to corporate wrongdoings. Also, it was confirmed that anger is a constructive emotion that is likely to result in actions that allow for reconciliation and that contempt is an excluding emotion. Simultaneously, it was found that disgust is not a significant predictor of consumer punitive behavior. If negative emotions can be used constructively, companies should embrace this opportunity by giving customers the opportunity to express their anger and parti­ cipate in the decision-making process in order to correct companies’ behavior. Unfortunately, many companies usually do the opposite and discourage or ignore negative feedback. Addressing anger is not only important for leveraging on its constructive character. If consumers’ anger is unaddressed, contempt is usually de­ veloped, leading to more severe consequences for companies. This can also be applied to social media storms, which can be driven by both anger and contempt. Business leaders should assess the nature of negative emotions expressed during the storm, and by that, improve their understanding of the storm’s drivers and dynamic.

Anti-branding practices: Antecedents & consequences If not playing along, businesses and brands can feel the consequences of con­ sumers’ anger. Gershoff et al. (2007) support Tolstoy’s view that there are few ways to love but many ways to hate: “Hated products tend to have relatively unique reasons for being hated” (p. 505), which further complicates the consumer anger issue. Funches (2011) identified three causes of consumer anger: broken promises, unfair treatment, and expressed hostility. Before the age of social media, these events would end up with angry consumers making individual complaints to the company, and some of them would eventually decide not to buy from that company anymore. Only a very strong consumer anger could cause a public re­ lations disaster, and in that case, help from the mainstream media would be mandatory. But a contemporary empowered consumer has a plethora of “in­ struments” to make managers’ lives a nightmare. As Fournier and Avery (2011, p. 193) picturesquely wrote, “It is a lonely, scary time to be a brand manager”. All types of social media platforms described in the first part of this chapter can be used to actively engage against brands and make their misconduct, wrongdoings, or just a bad treatment of an individual customer publicly available. Fournier and Avery (2011) describe branding in the digital age as an open-source activity through four themes: (1) the age of social collective; (2) the age of transparency; (3) the age of criticism; and (4) the age of parody. Brand managers are dealing with a collective power of groups of socially networked like-minded consumers, and outcomes of this could be both good or bad for brands. For example, brands are crowdsourcing ideas from social collectives but are also attacked by them. Due to lack of secrecy, consumers force brands to be truly authentic, making brand management a transparent activity. Social media features, such as liking, sharing, and rating, made consumers much more critical of companies and their brands, even when certain issues or misconduct are not that severe. This is why managing critically oriented

Preconditions of social media storms

35

empowered consumers became a full-time job for marketers. Finally, people engage in social media storms not only because they are angry but sometimes for the purpose of entertainment. Producing brand parodies is democratized, and it can result in benefits for a brand (e.g., Mastercard’s iconic “Priceless” campaign reached more people because of parodies, but without a damaging effect to the brand), but for some consumers, brand parodies have become a blood sport – with a purpose to humiliate a brand. Business leaders should be aware that parodies sometimes can bring more exposure to a brand than original marketing com­ munication campaigns. While brand managers are in charge of branding, consumers engage in cocalled anti-branding activities. These can be operationalized as websites, accounts on social media, or other forms of digital presence, created and managed by dis­ satisfied and angry consumers or even the members of the general public who never had any relationship with the brand that is being discussed. It is important to understand that anti-branding is much more than complaining. According to Krishnamurthy and Kucuk (2009), complaint and product evaluation forums are focusing on transactional dissatisfaction and product quality, respectively, while anti-brand websites are focusing on affecting individual consumption through the construction of a negative brand identity. Anti-branding activities are more likely to address a wider range of issues beyond bad customer experience, such as cul­ tural, technological, political, and legal issues. The main antecedent of anti-branding is the previously discussed construct of consumer empowerment. While Labrecque et al. (2013) identified four sources of consumer power in the digital age (demand-, information-, network- and crowdbased), Krishnamurthy and Kucuk (2009) similarly describe four dimensions of online consumer empowerment as antecedents of anti-branding: technological, economic, social, and legal. Following their insights, business leaders should be aware that technological/network infrastructure (digital and social media platforms), social connections (crowd behavior), and vast availability of information (economic/ market- and legal-related) are important specific preconditions for consumers’ antibranding efforts. Nevertheless, similarly to consumer complaints, anti-branding is driven by consumer dissatisfaction. But in the case of anti-branding, dissatisfaction can have multiple facets: transactional (e.g., bad service by the retailer), market (e.g., unethical corporate behavior), and even ideological (e.g., anti-consumption groups) (Krishnamurthy & Kucuk, 2009). These forms of dissatisfaction are reflected in communication patterns of anti-branding activities. The market-related narrative is potentially most damaging for a brand, but as we discussed earlier in this chapter, the ideological narrative became a part of the brand management agenda in light of societal motivators for change and woke movements. Anti-branding also brings more severe consequences to brands in comparison to complaint behavior. Krishnamurthy and Kucuk (2009) proved that strong brands are more likely to be a target for anti-brand websites and that presence of anti-brand websites is negatively correlated with the change of brand value. While anti-branding activities usually have a long(er)-term lifespan than social media storms, these two

36

Preconditions of social media storms

constructs could be seen as interconnected. For example, the presence of antibranding activities (e.g., an anti-brand website) can support the emergence of a social media storm. On the other hand, social media storm can initiate the emergence of anti-branding content that will stick around much longer than the storm itself. In conclusion, doing business in general and managing brands, in particular, has tremendously changed due to the factors discussed in this chapter. According to Gensler et al. (2013), business leaders can follow three distinct strategies to brand management in the digital age: (1) follow the path of least resistance by listening carefully and responding (in other words: giving in) to consumer demands; (2) play the consumers’ game by trying to gain cultural resonance through demonstrating a deep understanding of the online cultural environment in which their brand operates and fitting in seamlessly; and (3) attempt to leverage social media’s connectedness and get consumers to play the brand’s game, i.e., work on behalf of the brand. Many business leaders instinctively follow the first strategy, neglecting the opportunity to leverage the possible positive outcomes of the social media storms. To illustrate this scenario, we present the case of Croatian Railways Passenger Transport, a public company that faced a nationwide social media storm in 2014. Despite the fact that the company failed to use the storm for the positive outcomes of the brand, we show how understanding the preconditions and the context of the storm enable marketing managers to think about the possible positive outcomes of the situation.

Croatian Railways Passenger Transport case In the early 2000s, the Croatian government decided to invest heavily in the construction of the motorway network while neglecting their railway system, which is calling for modernization. Although this has resulted in stronger or­ ientation on bus and air transport in Croatia, the railway system is still an important part of public transport – especially for short-distance traveling and commuting. Croatian Railways Passenger Transport (CRPT), a subsidiary of fully governmentowned railway company Croatian Railways (CR), faces continuous passenger complaints regarding reduced comfort and persistent delays. This resulted only in minor infrastructure and service improvements over the years because CRPT has a monopoly on passenger transport in the railway system, and passengers have no choice when it comes to choosing a railway company.

The trigger for the social media storm In April 2014, CPRT’s customers were given an opportunity to raise their voices. In cooperation with a student organization from Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, CRPT announced a crowdsourcing campaign in search of a new slogan. The campaign targeted young adults to raise awareness about the traveling possibilities by train in Croatia and abroad. Participants had to submit their suggestions for a new slogan, and there was a prize for the best one chosen by the expert com­ mittee: the InterRail ticket for two, for traveling all around Europe.

Preconditions of social media storms

37

Very soon, the campaign took an unexpected turn. Twitter community in Croatia reacted to the campaign and started to write parody slogans, mocking CPRT’s slowness, bad service, and old trains. The campaign was not heavily advertised, but the call was entertaining enough for the cynical social media community on Twitter. Soon, an unofficial hashtag emerged (#HŽslogan; HŽ is abbreviated from Hrvatske Željeznice, which means Croatian Railways), with thousands of suggestions. Some of the examples are: • • • • •

“Godot travels with us, too”; “If life is too fast for you, choose CRPT”; “You pay for a three-hour ride, and you get another three hours extra”; “Is it a turtle? Is it a snail? No, it’s CRPT train!”; “Lost in transportation”.

The mocking was not restricted only to the cynical customers and general public. Airport Zadar, also a government-owned public company, joined the social media storm by tweeting: “Waiting for a train? Choose a plane!”. A very popular rock band tweeted: “To all our fans coming to our concert tomorrow by train: we wish you to arrive on time!”. The social media storm has exploded, and soon everybody wanted to jump in. Since the Twitter community is rather small in Croatia compared to other social media platforms, people were opening Twitter accounts only to tweet their parody suggestion for a #HŽslogan. Mainstream media soon picked up the storm, which lasted for more than two weeks. Meanwhile, CRPT was mostly inactive in managing the situation. They issued PR announcements and waited for the storm to fade away.

Analysis We saw an opportunity to learn from this example, especially about the pre­ conditions of the storm and possible alternative ways of handling it. Therefore, we invited two marketing executives from CRPT for in-depth interviews. They revealed strategic considerations during and after the incident. The analysis of the CRPT interviews illustrated how a public company, despite the fact that it was unable to react properly to social media storm due to its inert company structure, became aware of the potential of a resilient approach from this situation. The #HŽslogan social media storm only partially represented the voice of CRPT’s customers. People amusingly suggested parody slogans or re-tweeted them, although they never used the service. Interviewed managers stated: “We believe that the vast majority of Twitter users that have participated in the incident were not our regular customers”. As we have learned earlier in this chapter, social motivation for change can engage the wider public beyond dissatisfied customers. Furthermore, some people join social media storms for entertainment purposes, especially when the storm includes creating parodies about the brand. The CRPT management assumed that the SMS was rooted in the accumulated dissatisfaction: “These slogans revealed something that is already known. It was not a

38

Preconditions of social media storms

reaction to a certain malpractice or an isolated event”. Nevertheless, there was a trigger for the storm: the crowdsourcing campaign. The narrative of the storm reveals that the accumulated dissatisfaction had two facets: transactional and ideological. Customers were unhappy with the CRPT’s service, but the general public was unhappy with how the government treats the railway system – the owner of CRPT and the whole railway system. CRPT has suffered from the overall anger towards the railway system, although it was somewhat not fair because the company was making improvements, their services are to some extent influenced by the railroad infrastructure as well (e.g., an old track that requires new trains to operate slower). The general public declared solidarity with CRPT’s customers and joined in the conversation. The main platform for customer backfire was Twitter, and the storm peaked when traditional media picked up the story: “If this story remained only on Twitter… most people wouldn’t know about it”. This shows how the platform’s properties are sometimes more important than its overall popularity. The least popular social media platform in Croatia (if we compare it to other major players such as Facebook) was used to express the voice of customers and the general public. This is not surprising since it is known that Twitter is often used to express negative emotions towards companies and brands (Waterloo et al., 2018). Although the storm was based on parodies that were funny, members of the CRPT’s marketing department were aware that the desperate customers reacted because they wanted a change: “Customers have expressed their opinions, wanting the things to change”. This supports the notion of the constructive aspect of anger as a negative moral emotion. Although some tweets were implying there is contempt involved as well, the overall impression was that the storm was an outcry for change. CRPT had no official social media presence, as the management only approved the traditional approach to a PR crisis: “It seems to me that there wasn’t enough courage to employ such methods…we were answering journalists’ and other parties’ inquiries, and waited for the situation to calm down”. They emphasized their awareness of the state of the infrastructure and their trains and stated that they were undergoing a change. Following the path of least resistance was driven by no clear vision and strategy (“The vision is still not precisely defined, not by the company itself, but by the owner i.e., government”.) and the fact that it is a public company with a very inert structure: “The sluggishness of the system, namely the inability of making quick and radical decisions is what proved to be the most pronounced element”. Nevertheless, we were interested in the possible alternative approach to the social media storm. Interestingly, CRPT’s marketing team recognized potential opportunities: “We wanted to start our official Twitter account in order to acknowledge parody slogans as well, even to give a prize for the best of them”. “We even thought of making merchandise with the funniest parody slogans”.

Preconditions of social media storms

39

This indicates that CRPT’s marketing managers saw an opportunity to play the consumers’ game by trying to gain cultural resonance by demonstrating a deep understanding of the situation – an alternative approach to brand management in the digital age, proposed by Gensler et al. (2013.).

Takeaways from the storm Being a public company, CRPT faced many restrictions while handling the si­ tuation due to the slowness of management procedures and decision-making processes. Although the Marketing Department argued for a less conservative approach making merchandise with the funniest parody slogans, there was no consent for these actions due to the resistant mindset of their senior management. The director of sales and marketing emphasized one takeaway from this social media storm, namely that employees realized how people perceived their services and made it visible in which areas there was room for improvement as a service provider: “Finally everybody in the organization realized how people see our services and in which areas we fail as a service provider. This was a trigger for many positive internal changes”. Although CRPT failed to utilize customer empowerment constructively, the marketing department tried to find a way to leverage the negative social media attention in a positive way. In their own words, if they had a better maneuver space within the company, they would have handled the situation differently.

Concluding discussion In this chapter, we strived to provide insight into the context of social media storms. It was necessary to present the social media landscape and the classification of social media platforms, although this is not enough to fully understand the dynamics of social media interactions. This is why we dedicated attention to the notion of consumer empowerment as one of the most important preconditions of social media storms. Although one could argue that we live in the age of consumer empowerment/disempowerment paradox, brands will probably never fully con­ trol their interactions with consumers as they did in pre-digital times, nor the interaction among consumers and other members of the general public. The emergence of so-called citizen-consumers emphasizes various economic, social, and environmental issues that are becoming a part of consumer-brand interactions. Consumers are motivated both rationally and emotionally to participate in their interaction with brands, and in the context of social media storms, negative emotions play a crucial role. The constructive nature of anger and alternative approaches to brand management in the digital age call for a rethinking of our approach to social media storms, as we discuss in our consecutive chapters.

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Preconditions of social media storms

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3 INSIGHTS INTO SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS

What is the role of data in social media storms? Food is supposed to be the savior of humans. They need to eat food to keep themselves healthy and alive. This truth equally prevails today; however, information has emerged as one of the main types of foods that humans need to consume for survival. At times, it appears that the importance of information and/or data is more than the food we consume to stay alive. Just imagine what you first do after waking up from sleep. Before fulfilling your tangible food needs, you fulfill your intangible food needs: the need for information or data. The massive development of information and communication technology and the consequent breadth and depth of data/information generation, dissemination, and consumption possibly made humans even more hungry for information than a decade back. Social media is considered the frontrunner among the different media involved in this data/information-related value creation process as it offers individuals real-time interactions with all related stakeholders. Such real-time interactions of individuals with other stakeholders are not an unmixed blessing for organizations. Some maneuver it quite favorably towards their organizations, while others encounter a different reality due to this type of realtime interaction. In particular, some organizations that face kind of situations either controlled by them or someone else or nature may at times feel that things were a lot better and easier when such real-time interaction opportunities were not there. Nonetheless, data/information – particularly the big volume of data generated in every single second around the globe – is changing the interaction patterns, processes, and interfaces between humans and other entities, including organizations.

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Data and human life It is often said that information or data is synonymous with life. Now, it is also considered to be the most valuable resource on earth, bypassing the long-standing material objects gold and oil (BIL, 2019; The Economist, 2017). The role of data and its impact on life is even portrayed in science fiction television series such as Black Mirror, Upload (Clark, 2019; VanArendonk, 2020). Although we call them fiction, our experience with past fiction-based television series tells us that a lot of that fiction now is reality. Regarding data, we can also presume the same if we consider the amount of data-driven and data-dependent technologies and/or products we currently use and expect to use in the future. Think about your current and future use of mobile communication technologies, computing technologies, health care technologies, etc.; data is the main means of functioning of these technologies. And the most interesting thing is humans primarily contribute to the data used in these technologies. While using these technologies, they are and will be continuously contributing to the development of this enormous amount of data commonly tagged as big data. Other than volume, higher velocity, variety, and scope are also considered to be big data’s character. In addition, flexibility and relatability, as well as fine-grained resolutions, are identified as characteristics of big data (Kitchin & Lauriault, 2014, p. 68). In terms of the generation of big data, humans are considered to play the role of prosumers, where they actively participate in the production and consumption process of data. Prior research states – for the growth of the sharing economy (e.g., sharing economy is considered to be one of the new economic orders of the world, expecting to generate global revenue of $335 billion by 2025), the perspective of the prosumer is the key (Lang et al., 2020; Olalla & Crespo, 2019). Experts from different areas of the work unanimously agree that the Internet and various internet-enabled digital platforms and objects are the Fourth Industrial Revolution’s primary engine (i.e., 4IR). If we exclude the “prosumer” role of humans, these mentioned engines of the 4IR would certainly fail as the entire system is primarily built on humans’ data production and consumption capabilities. The data as generated and consumed by them is easing and enhancing their lives; therefore, the attendance toward the data generational mechanism from their end is increasing day by day. Particularly, because the number of available mediums for data generation and consumption is at an all-time high, participation also rises. Consequently, we see the generation of this colossal amount of big data.

Medium that generates data for humans Once dominant media, like newspapers, television, books, magazines, and going to movies, are now considered legacy media because these media somewhat failed to retain the attention of humans. In a world where we have an oversupply of communication medium, attention toward the relayed information has become the scarcest resources (Twenge et al., 2019). In today’s fast-paced, routine life,

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activities such as working, sleeping, eating, playing, communicating, and interacting compete with each other. We are forced to make a tradeoff among these activities due to the lack of available time (Serfass & Sherman, 2015). We couldn’t maximize this tradeoff of activities with legacy media, but new electronically mediated communication media can optimize it. It is fair to say that the higher optimization opportunity offered by new media is making more people prefer to adopt electronically mediated communication. Prior research talks about two competing models about the relationship between legacy and new media use: the complementary model (Nguyen & Western, 2006) and the displacement model (Bauerlein, 2007). The complementary model predicts that the use of new/digital media would have no effect or even increase the interest and use of legacy media. The model even predicts that the use of legacy media would increase even at the expense of sleep (Twenge et al., 2017), travel (McDonald, 2015), physical activity (Spengler et al., 2015), or leisure (Vilhelmson et al., 2017). This new/digital media is presumed to be additive to legacy media (Näsi & Räsänen, 2013) by offering additional efficiencies. However, those efficiencies are contingent on the increased usage of new/digital media. On the contrary, the displacement model predicts that displacement of media occurs as new/digital media offer better and enjoyable solutions to people’s needs than the previously used legacy media (Newell et al., 2014). In addition, new/digital media can serve the purpose of the current attention economy (Webster, 2014) or information ecology (Weng et al., 2012) better than the legacy media. This consequently is influencing people to move more towards the new/digital media and withdraw from the legacy media. Consumers spend around an average of 463 minutes or over 7.5 hours per day with media, and a large share of this attendance to media is enjoyed by the new/ digital media (Watson 2020). In particular, with digital media, consumers spend around 90% of their entire media time. The Internet and other ICT-based technologies are primarily boosting these new media to get attendance from people around the world. Around 60% of the world population, approximately 4.57 billion people, are now using the internet, while this was only 42% just five years back and only 3.01 billion people were using the internet in 2015 (Kemp, 2015, 2020). Social media enjoy the largest share of this internet-enabled media technology boom. Particularly, more than half of the population, around 4.0 billion people, now actively use social media. While only 29% of the world population, around 2.1 billion people, were using social media about five years back (Chaffey, 2020; Kemp, 2015). The Internet and social media have become consumers’ hub of getting news, knowledge, entertainment, relaxation, and whatnot. This is true for all age groups. The freedom of real-time involvement and engagement in an interactive fashion made social media the main interface of interaction between entities, including companies and customers. Up to today, it is estimated that the world has produced more than 40 zettabytes (43 trillion gigabytes) of data which in comparison to 2005 is an increase of 300% (IBM, 2018; Moscato & de Vries, 2019). In every interaction, whether with platforms, technologies, technology-enabled

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products, etc., consumers contribute to the generation of data. Taking into account their interaction intensity and pattern, we can reasonably presume that social media is one of the biggest contributors to the generation of this unprecedented and gigantic volume of data. And the contribution of this type of media in the generation process will continue to grow if we take into account the growing participation of people and organizations in social media. Therefore, the reliance on social media for all types of personality and behavior-based observations and queries is increasing exponentially. Not only marketers but also policy makers, geographers, environmentalists, law enforcement agencies, meteorologists, health scientists, politicians, etc. are actively using social media data due to their relevance, recency, and impact on humans and other constituents of society (Cappella, 2017; Conway & O’Connor, 2016; Grace, 2020; He et al., 2017; Jiang & Fu, 2018; Li et al., 2020; Walgrave et al., 2017). Business organizations, especially the front runners (i.e., Fortune 500/1000 companies), started to follow their customers when the customers were starting to get habituated with social media and making it a part of their life. Following customers at the virtual space gave these organizations important insights/data regarding their customers’ cognitive, emotive and behavioral aspects. Some organizations later used these data to maneuver their strategic actions related to near and distant stakeholders and the environment at large. Following the success of these, few organizations later motivated others irrespective of size to adopt social media as part of their strategic, tactical, and operational strategies. Apart from the success factor, marketers of all sizes started to firmly believe that social media is such a platform with the highest richness in terms of breadth and depth of customer, stakeholder data/insights. This richness of data and its continuous growth, if properly accommodated within the strategy of the organization at all levels, can offer a substantial edge to any organization. It is estimated that the world is spending almost $1 billion/minute only on commodities on the internet (Seed Scientific, 2020). If we factor in other purchases (e.g., services, events, experiences), then this would be several folds. Due to its reach, frequency, and impact of the generated data, social media is and would be impacting immensely towards the mentioned current and future sale of all types of companies. The generated social big data has elements that could go in favor or against the company depending on how they perceive the character of the data.

Impact of social big data on companies Due to its accommodation and generation of mammoth amounts of data called social big data (Del Vecchio et al., 2018), social media offer significant power to all types of stakeholders of society, including the customers and organizations. On a positive note, this power resulting from such social big data makes real-time connectivity between customers and organizations a lot smoother, frictionless, which helps them understand each other better than before. This understanding, in turn, results in the desired response from each other that they aspired for. For

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example, the level and extent of customization opportunity are at an all-time high now due to the tremendous growth and acceptance of social media by these entities and the generation of this huge amount of social big data. Customers are enjoying highly personalized products and services thanks to the availability of social big data. Organizations are enjoying developing and implementing more efficient, effective, and precisely targeted marketing strategies that cater to their target markets’ pre-during-post purchase/consumption needs. The current and ever-growing presence of social big data makes this happen for organizations. Individual level data resulting from demand formulation and information search activities, network based data resulting from individuals’ external actions not related to their individually demanded products and services at social media platforms, and the ability to pool, mobilize, and structure resources around those media to get individual and group benefits (Labrecque et al., 2013) is empowering customers so also the organizations in the form of availability and access which wasn’t available earlier. Nonetheless, it would not be too unfair to say that social big data is the biggest blessing for customers and organizations and, in turn, for societies with specific reference to offering flexible, desired living for customers and organizations. This flexibility at times gets unsettled due to the actions, inactions of customers and organizations fueled by their inadequate understanding and misunderstanding of the data. Bank of America (BOA) once proposed a $5 monthly fee for its debit card users. This created resentment among the bank’s customers, which ended up in the lodgment of a petition at a social media platform. Consequently, this led 300,000 people from all American states to join in the petition, and the bank’s accounts on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter were flooded with thousands of negative messages and comments. BOA eventually had to drop the fee, and more interestingly, due to public pressure, other major financial institutions announced the drop of such debit card charges (Li, 2019). When Donald Trump announced “Muslim travel ban” the taxi drivers of New York in protest of that struck at Kennedy Airport for an hour. At that time, the ride-hailing company Uber in Twitter announced that “Surge pricing has been turned off at #JFK Airport” which within seconds generated furious social media storm by spreading messages like “Congrats to @Uber_NYC on breaking a strike to profit off of refugees being consigned to Hell. Eat shit and die” (Hansen et al., 2018). This was turned into hashtag #DeleteUber campaign through thousands of emotional, angry tweets (Collins, 2017), which later was picked up by other social media with coverage that nobody could think of even five years back. The actions of customers and against that action the delayed reaction of the organizations due to their inadequate understanding of the breadth, depth, and momentum of customer actions made organizations like BOA and Uber suffer. Prior research shows that customers’ actions in social media platforms range from non-purchase, nWOM, complaining, protests, brand hate, boycott, demonstration, etc., all of which has significant negative ramifications in the life of an organization (Curina et al., 2020; Hansen et al., 2018; Li, 2019). For example, Li (2019) finds that revenge-

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motivated online complaining behavior is exhibited more by individuals having high interactional empowerment bestowed on social media platforms. However, this tendency was much lower among individuals having low interactional empowerment. Hansen et al. (2018) show that firestorms at social media create significant crises in the life of a brand such that 58% of the brands had to absorb a decrease in brand perception in the short-term while 40% of the brand had to suffer long-term negative effects. Product harm crisis circulated in social media platforms results in significant share price drops, suspension of business, and loss of market share (Zheng et al., 2018). For example, McDonald’s encountered significant damage in sales and corporate image due to the discussion of a negative incident more than 82 million times on the most popular Chinese social media platforms, Sina Weibo, in 2014 (Zheng et al., 2020). The number of product harm crisis has been increasing tremendously due to the exponential proliferation of social media platforms and the network (e.g., actions by consumers not directly related to their product, service demand) and cloud (i.e., ability to pool, mobilize and structure social media voice/data) based power as exercised mainly in social media by customers. Broad and rapid dissemination of news, especially the crisis news at social media although made customers empowered through their network and cloud-based power than ever before (Agostino et al., 2019; Lowry et al., 2016), organizations are going through the biggest challenging time ever in regards to managing crisis communication. In particular, the breadth, depth, and speed of social media data transmission is so electrifying that managing crisis communication is the toughest job ever for companies (Ramadan, 2017). Managers’ inadequate understanding and at times misunderstanding of the entire social media phenomena with specific reference to the management and use of the social big data further aggravates the entire crisis communication issue and makes the lives of the organizations difficult. To us, the inherent characteristics of social big data are imprecisely defined, articulated, and applied; thus, the strategies undertaken around social media based big data for managing communication seem to be ineffective. To reflect on this, the next section illustrates the characteristics of social big data.

Characteristics of data shaping up social media storms The character of storms at social media that we are referring to here as social media storms is determined by the character of the data as generated, nurtured, and disseminated at these platforms. In particular, the nature of the data contents, along with its amount as circulated in these platforms, is one of the first criteria that ascertains whether the issue related data can be qualified as storm or not. In addition, to be considered as a social media storm, emotions of different types/nature have to be in those messages/contents/data. The embedded emotions of those data should be picked up and relayed to different available media, including both digital and legacy media. Data generated in the form of messages/contents having diverse emotions need to be picked up quickly by social and other media. In addition,

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more and more media need to join in picking and relaying the issue. Furthermore, the issue needs to be spiraled in the form of electronic word of mouth in such a way that more and more people would contribute through their virtual voice. The central issue of the storm and all its by-products need to be relayed across different communication means so people can barely miss it. Last but not the least, the reality of the central issue of the storm would get a few question marks due to the involvement of diverse entities with different cognitive, emotive, and behavioral backgrounds. These characteristics of the data in combination determine the nature and shape of the social media storms and whether it is really a storm on social media or not. The following subsection provides a bit of detail of each specific character of the data that is shaping up the social media storms that we are encountering in and around us.

Volume of the generated contents Two years back, Bernard Marr, an internationally best-selling author, stated that we are producing 2.5 quintillion bytes of data per day (Marr, 2018). Today 1.7MB of data is created by every person on earth in every second, and 44 zettabytes will make up the entire digital universe by the end of 2020 (Bulao, 2020). In most cases, the concept of big data is somewhat synonymous with large volumes of data generated through a diverse set of activities which includes but not limited to commercial transactions, online activities of people tracked by the electronic devices they use, such as mobile devices, tablets, computers, and the internet of things (Gandomi & Haider, 2015). Jan et al. (2019), along this line, stated that big data deals with large volumes of raw data which are eventually used in each and every aspect of life, including business, stock exchange, scientific research, healthcare, public administration, national security, etc. While talking about the volume characteristic of big data, Ferraris et al. (2018) argue that the never-ending and ever-growing technological innovations are letting the world grow the quantity of data at a supersonic speed such that the generation of data in every second now outperforms the storage capacity of the entire internet some 20 years back. Others consider big data as the accommodation, treatment, and analysis of a very large volume of data to aid decision making at organizational and even in public policy settings (Gupta et al., 2019). These assertions and/or considerations signify that scale of data and their storage and continuous creation character define the volume characteristic of big data, which is duly endorsed by prior research (see, e.g., Papadopoulos et al., 2017). On the whole, any activity that leaves a footprint in the virtual, digital landscape generates data and contributes toward the mammoth amount of data generated across the world in every single second. Due to its personal level companionship at an individual level, social media emerged as the most preferred and long-lasting means of virtual interaction, thereby contributing the most in such voluminous generation of data among the available means of virtual interactions. The global social penetration rate with an active population of around 4

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billion exhibits a reach of half of the world, wherein some parts of the world, the reach is even a lot higher than the world average. For example, East Asia, North America, and Northern Europe have a social penetration rate of 71%, 69%, and 67%, respectively (Watson, 2020). The population of such sheer size and their acceptance of social media as their primary mean to express themselves let them give more than 80,000 posts, send 9132 tweets; around 800,000 WhatsApp messages, upload 1016 Instagram photos; 1758 Tumblr posts; 4950 skype calls; watch/upload 85,812 YouTube videos per second (Internet Live Stats, 2020). Just imagine the contribution of these activities on the quintillion bytes of data generated per day. And these activities are of continuous nature, and people around the world, in fact, are continuously joining in social media. As indicated earlier, those who joined social media increased their interactive activities at these platforms over time. Therefore, social media companies and or platforms also had to increase their facilities to accommodate these continuously increasing amounts of data. For example, by March 2018, Facebook had 12 data center campuses worldwide, and it currently stands at 15 (Datacenters.com, 2020). Furthermore, one of the primary means of growth of social platforms is to play around with this data and be close to the customer through customizing and presenting these stored data to the users. Therefore, to ensure their survival, they have to store, organize, and present the data so that it appears most useful for them. In regards to volume characteristics of big data (i.e., scalability, storage, and continuous nature), social media seems to be the most equipped one due to the inherent nature of these platforms. Prior research suggests that the main challenge of big data is not in its collection rather in its management and efficient use in decision making or prediction (Jan et al., 2019). Moscato and de Vries (2019) further states that higher volumes of data themselves are very hard to deal with, and if negative customers and stakeholders’ perceptions complement it and consequent reactions take place at social media platforms, then certainly the brands and company are expected to be flooded with petabytes of data. For some managers, these data are highly undesirable, and for some, these may offer a very good opportunity to further engage and interact with the customers and stakeholders.

Variety of media and sentiments reflected in the contents Variety refers to the diversity of data in terms of sources and patterns. There are many big data sources, and these sources, compared to legacy media, are relatively new. In particular, different digital platforms are generating data whereby consumers are providing their inputs about habits, needs, desires, opinions by using different digital devices (Ferraris et al., 2018). For example, online social network or social media comes under network big data. These social media platforms are one of the biggest contributors to network data. Consumers’ increased use of different social media platforms, in fact, changed the nature of network big data from spatial-temporal data to real-time spatial time-based data. The concept of data streaming is even changed to big data streaming due to the increased and

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diverse use of different social media platforms (Jan et al., 2019). Another source of data is called the Internet of Things (IoT) data, where data is generated through any device connected to the internet having an address and controlled remotely. We also see mobile data and with the introduction of 4G and 5G technologies that replaced traditional cellular to converged mobile network led mobile devices to handle diverse applications such as Google Maps, Google Fit, Nike Fuel which consequently is generating substantial amounts of data (Jan et al., 2019). The different sources are generating data in many different formats such as audio, video, text messages, images resulting in heterogeneity in terms of data types (Constantiou & Kallinikos, 2015). While defining the variety of big data, prior research considers both data variety and interoperability as essential measures of variety (Amaye et al., 2016). Taking into account the diversity of sources and data patterns, the data, in general, can be classified into three categories: unstructured, semi-structured, and structured data (Banerjee et al., 2016). It is commonly observed that the datasets as generated are domain-specific, representing heterogeneity in terms of data presentation, density, distribution, and size. This resembles that for a specific business problem, there is no single big dataset to look at as a single dataset irrespective of the size is not equipped to provide all details required to understand a problem, trend, or even a topic. To get a comprehensive understanding, different types of data need to be derived from multiple sources, combine and analyze them to later draw useful insights for decision making (Moscato & de Vries, 2019). For example, a common data type of social media is “likes” which comes to the marketers in numeric or text format. They cannot simply take decisions on the basis of such likes as these are sometimes manufactured; therefore does not represent the extent of engagement that customers have with the brands and company (Oldford, 2018). Likes, therefore, need to be combined with other sentiments portrayed by customers on social media, such as love, care, happiness, surprise, sadness, anger. In addition to these available sentimental expressions of social media platforms, other sentimental expressions of customers through audio, video, text, image also need to be picked by the marketer. Furthermore, these data need to be combined with different other datasets such as financial trends, sales figures, and historical data to take an informed decision about the next strategic move for the brands and organizations (Moscato & de Vries, 2019). Accommodating the heterogeneity of medium and data type along with data volume certainly equips the managers better in their decision making; however, this is contingent on the decision making context. For example, in a social media storm context, it is seen that the more the issue is rolled out across different media in different formats (i.e., audio, video, image, text, etc.), managers have a higher tendency to adopt a more conservative approach to face the social media storm. The breadth of media to pick up the story and the variations in the content reduces their optimism to get successful outcomes from their intervention during the social media storm. However, some managers seem to approach it with a lot of enthusiasm, engage in continuous dialogue with the stakeholders, and be at the

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forefront to approach and embrace the social media storm. The variety character of big data may increase their enthusiasm to be involved in the issue much more. This is because they would have more opportunity to get engaged and involved with the customers and other stakeholders across media and content type.

Virality of the generated contents and their impacts The third characteristic of big data is virality which denotes the speed at which the data is created and often requires real-time analysis. This also accommodates data obsolescence and the time required to develop tools to analyze this kind of data (Sivarajah et al., 2017). Moscato and de Vries (2019) partially endorse these opinions by suggesting that high velocity resonates with the accelerating pace of the increasingly higher volume and varieties of big data generated across the virtual platforms, including social media. Gupta et al. (2019), while reviewing the application of big data in the humanitarian supply chain context, mentions by referring to earlier research that speed of data generation, data processing time, and data transmission time are the three measures of velocity which essentially explains virality. It is commonly heard that a single flight of a Boeing generates half a Terabyte (TB) of data while one trading session at New York Stock Exchange produces 1 TB of data (Moscato & de Vries, 2019). These examples and others found in almost every case of today’s networked world represent situations where decision makers have to make decisions instantaneously or too quickly. For some managers, there is not enough time to digest the information and then make a decision taking into account each and every perspective. The velocity of big data often contributes to such scenarios for these managers. In addition, the nature of the speed is so fast that (i.e., exponential) for some managers to even observe, adapt and react to those changes becomes difficult, let alone taking market-driven decisions. Some managers, although few, consider speedy, exponential growth-based data as part of their decision making DNA. They have the conception that agile and faster decision making is possible only if they can act on the real-time high volume, different types, and sources of exponential growth-based speedy data. Such conceptualization and consequent action of managers decide the scoresheet between winning and losing brands and organizations (Ferraris et al., 2018). Virality is considered even more important than the volume of data in today’s highly competitive economic world (Ferraris et al., 2018). In a social media storm context, the virality of the data gets even more important than the volume and variety of the big data. This is because of the possibility of the generation of electronic Word of Mouth and its different branches, which may cause irreparable damage to the brands and organizations in a very short period of time. Managers are different in terms of their capability to deal with the speedy, exponential growth-based data, which is explained briefly in the preceding paragraph. The level of difficulty in a social media storm context increases even further when the source of data is perceived to be originated at an unpleasant incident. Therefore, the managers who are already protective, defensive about the speedy, exponential

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growth based social big data in a normal business context would be even more defensive about accommodating and acting on this nature of big data. They are more likely to play a safe game. On the contrary, a few managers who are already permissive, pro towards big data along with its speedy exponential nature may see a social media storm as an opportunity to grow among the target market and their stakeholders. In a normal situation, reaching and engaging with these many stakeholders might take them long and costs them much. A social media storm can serve these purposes quite efficiently and effectively; however, this does not mean that companies should intentionally create a social media storm by creating an unpleasant scenario. Although some smart companies already did as such, we are yet to know to what extent these social media storms served their purposes. Nonetheless, the speedy exponential nature and eWOM potentials of a social media storm based big data may positively impact a company if managers approach them with a permissive and pro mindset.

Visuality of the generated contents An important characteristic of big data is visuality of the generated contents. This expresses the ability of the data to be presented in a meaningful way so that the decision makers can take the data into account while undertaking decisions (Seddon & Currie, 2017). Kakandikar and Nandedkar (2020) suggest that data needs to be presented in a visually meaningful form without compromising the system’s effectiveness. To avoid confusion or to reduce the chance of taking an incorrect direction, data needs to be presented in the most appropriate way. Appropriate visualization of data in most of the cases reveals unknown patterns and correlations that otherwise are not evident to the decision makers; therefore, such revelation is mentioned to improve decision making. The presence of heterogeneity in data type, structure, semantics, and so on makes the issue of visualization very critical in terms of making sense of big data (Chen et al., 2014). There are five key functionalities of big data visualization, as illustrated by SAS (2012). These are: (1) highly interactive graphics, which also includes data visualization best practices; (2) interactive interface based in web to play around with the data before visualization; (3) visual analytics that is integrated, intuitive and approachable; (4) in-memory processing; and (5) easily distributed outputs through electronic and web portals. Prior research suggests that it is not easy to ensure real-time data visualization and human interaction due to the diversity of the data and medium (Jagadish et al., 2014). This is further aggravated by the humongous volume of data generated each second at the virtual platforms, especially social media. Furthermore, the exponential speed of the data transmission across mediums made the task of visualization even more challenging. Computational researchers are actively working with the various visualization techniques; however, they still have a lot on their plate as work in progress, and they are continuously getting new food on their plate due to the earlier mentioned character of big data (i.e., volume, variety, virality). Managers, in general, are yet to have a good understanding of the big data

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spectrum, and one of the main reasons for this is inadequate data-based literacy. This is understandable as the field of big data is still evolving, and businesses are yet to massively incorporate data-based literacy as one of the primary qualities that they seek from a manager. In addition, the managers themselves need to conceive the benefit of data-based literacy, which is currently missing. A rather defensive, protective, and halfhearted approach is seen on the part of the managers while drawing meaningful insights from the generated data, including social big data. Nonetheless, identifying unique patterns and correlations thanks to the visualization character of big data has the potential to be capitalized in the real market scenario. Trust me, some smart managers, through their marketing acumen, are actively doing this. The issue of big data visualization, especially big social data, gets very important when a social media storm is developing. This is particularly important from a manager’s decision making perspective. The revelation of different meaningful patterns and correlations may help managers start their dialogue and engagement with the stakeholders. Continuous reading of customers’ and other stakeholders’ cognitive and emotive expressions and actions and drawing meaningful patterns and correlations from these may help managers and companies to develop an ability to walk with the storm. If managers walk with the storm, that means by being a part of the storm’s cognitive, emotive, and behavioral reactions, they can carefully watch the direction of the storm. This eventually may help the managers to make impactful decisions. However, the above saying is only feasible for managers who are seeing the storm from a permissive, constructive lens rather than a protective, defensive lens.

Veracity of the contents Veracity of the data concerns the quality and accuracy of the generated data (Farooqi et al., 2019). Lozada et al. (2019), while explaining data quality, accommodates the accuracy and reliability perspective of data as well as its sources. They also suggest that this serves as a guarantee of the potential use of the generated data. Other researchers also talk about reliability and accessibility of the data in addition to quality and accuracy of data (see, e.g., Amaye et al., 2016; Gupta et al., 2019; Papadopoulos et al., 2017). Özköse et al. (2015) further elucidates the accessibility perspective by suggesting that the security of the data should be provided such that only authorized people should have permission to access the data. Prior research also considers the relevance, uncertainty, and predictive value in addition to the above-mentioned characteristics while defining the veracity character of big data (Kakandikar & Nandedkar, 2020). Furthermore, the issue of trust, the existence of noise in the data, and the out-of-date potential of the data are considered when defining the veracity of the big data (Ferraris et al., 2018). No data can be 100% valid as it is generated through a combination of known and unknown sources. Thousands of virtual platforms, including social media platforms and internet-enabled devices (e.g., IoTs), generate data that in

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combination is making up the big data. Therefore, validating the data generated from these thousands or even millions of sources becomes too difficult. This made big data to be characterized as having low veracity (Kakandikar & Nandedkar, 2020). Additionally, recently the veracity issue is getting a lot of attention from businesses, consumers, policy makers, and other stakeholders on the grounds of integrity, privacy, and data security (Moscato & de Vries, 2019). A very recent example can be cited in this regard. The CEOs of the biggest platform and tech businesses in their respective industry namely Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Apple, recently had to go through a virtual antitrust hearing before the House Judiciary Committee of the USA (Brown, 2020). Among others, the veracity issue of the big data as accumulated and used by these businesses was one of the main concerns of the committee (Romm, 2020). The low veracity of the data can cost businesses from all different fronts. For example, low quality or poor data standards can cost businesses, economies a lot of money and also raise questions about the integrity of findings originated at these data sources. The context of the social media storm itself is sensitive and requires delicate yet firm handling from the managers’ end. Low veracity of the data in such instances can potentially result in catastrophic business decisions on the part of the managers (Moscato & de Vries, 2019). Therefore, one of the most important skills required by today’s managers is to assess the quality and source of data and decide which to consider and which to discard. A social media storm, in general, is fumed to a greater extent with emotions; therefore, filtering genuine emotions from on-the-go emotions is definitely a skill that managers need to develop if they are to navigate the social media storm and come out victorious. Skill in filtering real emotion from artificial or on-the-go emotion can help managers in figuring out which particular comment to respond to and which to leave. Such constructive and strategic participation by managers will also offer valuable insights from the near and distant stakeholders of the brands, organizations. Managers with a resilient mindset, having permissive and open character are expected to enjoy these benefits due to their enthusiastic participation in social big data. On the contrary, managers with resistant mindsets are not expected to reap these benefits from social big data due to their inherent reservations, “play safe” type of participation in social media platforms.

Categorical variations of social media storms Social media storms seem to vary quite widely, and each type of social media storm is meant to serve some distinct purpose on the part of the participated and engaged parties and or stakeholders. The storm can vary in terms of the issues that originally made the social media storm occur. These can be considered as triggers, and such triggers can range from product or service failure to anything that may go against the universe and its creatures and constituents. Social media storms may also vary as per the intentions to be carried out through it such that individuals intend to express their cognitive and emotive thoughts and feelings. The purpose of such intentions may range from a simple shallow expression of individuals to community, state, and

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world’s deep-seated expressions toward the constituents of the world. The activities exhibited in a social media storm also made it distinct from other types of social media storms. A natural, casual couple of words written on a social media platform may be a contributor towards a social media storm, and this may fly up to the boycott-based action against an organization, a nation, or even a certain view of the world. The actions may even end up in the removal of political parties that may seem invincible and unbreakable. Social media storms may also vary in terms of the speed and momentum it carries. In general, to be a social media storm, one of the defining characters is the speedy, exponential spreading nature of the issue across the medium. However, some issues take time to be picked up on the social media platforms, for example, issues that require evidence-based support and showcasing that evidence takes time. On the contrary, the emotion-focused issues fly a lot faster than the evidence-based ones, thus having higher velocity. The duration of a social media storm also sets it apart from another social media storm. There is no definitive time frame that we can say as a standard duration for a social media storm. Social media storm, in general, is not a long duration phenomenon; however, variations exist even within this shorter duration of a social media storm. The social media storm that has high velocity usually reaches its peak quite fast compared to other types of a social media storm. Social media storms also may vary in terms of location. There may be spatial variations in regards to the generation of a social media storm. For example, in open, expressive, overt culture, there is a higher likelihood of the generation of social media storms so also the frequency of occurring such social media storms. Whereas in covert, conservative, collectivist culture, the likelihood and frequency of occurring social media storms would potentially be lower. Furthermore, cultural homogeneity may also dictate a region to experience a social media storm that might otherwise not occur in another region (e.g., Dolce & Gabbana had to apologize to Chinese customers, BBC News, 2019). The variation among participants may also dictate a social media storm to be varied from another social media storm. For example, young aged participants seem to contribute more to a social media storm compared to old aged participants due to their more spontaneous, emotionally involved, and charged participation in a social media storm. The following subsection delves deeper into each of the mentioned types of social media storm.

Trigger based variations of social media storms As investigated in prior research, a range of triggers was found to generate media storm-like crises for brands. For example, when a customer confronts a product failure (e.g., defective brakes in Toyota vehicles, Warner, 2010) or service failure (e.g., passenger dragged from an overbooked flight, Victor & Stevens, 2017) (McCollough et al., 2000), when company recalls a product (Liu & Shankar, 2015) when a communication failure occurs on the part of the company (e.g., Bud light beer promoting the slogan “The perfect beer for removing ‘no’ from your vocabulary for the night”, Strom, 2015) (Pullig et al., 2006), when a customer had to face harm from products (Chen et al., 2009), or when the company is alleged to be

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involved in something that is considered as a social failure (e.g., Poor working conditions of Amazon, Eddy 2013) (Dutta & Pullig, 2011). The severity of a crisis and organizations’ responses against the crisis are also found to aggravate media storm induced brand crisis (Liu et al., 2017). Although these are termed as the reasons behind media storms in traditional brand crisis research, these triggers are equally valid in social media storm-based brand crises because of their relevance to the deep-seated underlying human patterns (Hansen et al., 2018). Apart from the business realm recently Phippen and Bond (2020), while presenting organizational responses to social media in the education context, talk about the deep-seated individual, organizational, and social triggers which prompted social media storms. Based on the aspects of virtual and offline ethnography, the authors present a series of case studies relating to the voices on social media on the abuse of children, teens in educational institutions. In such settings, teachers’ actions, for example, collecting public photographs of pupils from Facebook (where one of them was in swimwear) for delivering an assembly to educate them about their own privacy setting, generate a social media storm (Robinson, 2014). Parents later get involved in the storm by involving other traditional media and let the storm fly further. Phippen and Bond (2020) also show that in other education settings, inaction or slow reaction of the relevant authorities at these institutions and at other related government bodies also set fire to the storms. Social media storms may also emerge from unwanted state incidents such as the series of coordinated terror attacks in Paris, France, Barcelona, Spain in November 2015 and August 2017 (Smith et al., 2018). As evident in the preceding paragraph, the triggers are not comprehensive and offer us some mere examples of some common triggers from a plethora of triggers. Anything and everything can be a trigger as long as it has relevance at the personal, organizational, and social levels. One general pattern that is evident in these triggers is that all the triggers are related to the wellbeing of these entities. If the wellbeing of the mentioned entities is compromised or destabilized, then that prompts the entity to act on social media and contributes toward the formation of a storm. Now the extent of the compromise to be made at individual, organizational, and social levels may determine the intensity of the storm. There are some instances where the compromise is not at the individual level rather at the social level. In such instances as well, individuals contribute towards social media storms. Here the intention carried out by them through the social media storm is different than that of a situation where they directly had to compromise their personal well-being.

Intention based variations of social media storms Prior research suggests that people who intend to participate in a social media storm vary widely. For example, Kähr et al. (2016) suggest that consumers at times intend to sabotage a brand which consequently leads them to the intention of “collaborative brand attacks” (Rauschnabel et al., 2016). In the case of product recall-based triggers, it is evident in prior research that consumers intend to chat

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negatively among themselves about the product recall crisis (Borah & Tellis, 2016). People may also intend to make sense of events and discuss issues relevant to the events which may make a social media storm distinct from other social media storms (e.g., terror attacks across Europe in 2015 and 2017 and the consequent social media storm) (Smith et al., 2018). The intention to “stimulate the sense of being there in the mediated environment” (Oh & Sundar, 2016; p. 186) and participate in the dialogue (Watkins, 2017) also made some social media storm to be different from other types of social media storm. Customer revenge, defined as “the efforts made by customers to punish and cause inconvenience to a firm for the damages it caused them” (Grégoire & Fisher, 2008, p. 248), is one of their most exhibited intentions. The intent of revenge is usually accomplished through the intention of punishment and getting even (Huefner et al., 2002). One major means of carrying out the intention of revenge is to participate in negative dialogue against the company in social media, which may generate social media storm. Such type of social media storm is different from other intention carried social media storm as mentioned earlier. Consumers can pursue their intent to hate a brand through a social media storm. Negative events induced negative emotions are likely to stay longer with consumers, consequently influencing them to pursue their brand hate intent on social media (Kucuk, 2018). The brand hate intent encompasses a range of the dark side of consumer-brand relationships. For example, brand dislike (Dalli et al., 2006), brand avoidance (Odoom et al., 2019), brand divorce (Sussan et al., 2012), anti-branding (Cambefort & Roux, 2019) can be considered within the realm of brand hate. These different expressions and/or intent of brand hate are frequently pursued on social media. The network and crowd-based power of social media creates significant storms in those brands’ lives. These storms consequently made the brands and company suffer in terms of reputational damage, loss of market share, etc. (VanMeter et al., 2015). The above-enumerated intentions are not comprehensive rather a glimpse of the few. If we carefully look at the presented intentions of the social media storms, it is visible that the properties of these intentions vary in terms of the embedded intensity and variety of emotions. The intensity and variety of emotions drive customers’ intentions. For example, hate is an intense emotion, whereas the emotions involved in participating in dialogue are not intense. The intention of undertaking revenge accompanies hot, intense emotions, while emotions involved in making sense of an event may not accompany such a level of emotion. The presence of such variations of emotions in consumers’ intent made them vary the intent they pursue in social media, consequently creating variation in social media storms.

Activities based variations of social media storms One of the most typical actions undertaken by individuals in a social media storm is complaining on the social media platform. In fact, complaining type of actions adds fuel to a social media storm and fly it even further. Complaining encompasses a range

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of negative word of mouth actions, including simple trivial posts accommodating texts, pictures, audio, video contents; trolls against brands, organizations, political parties; vindictively sharing/spreading anything and everything possible against an entity (e.g., brands, organizations) that violates the normative standards of individuals. The byproduct of such actions at social media, in most cases, surpasses social media boundaries and is picked up by traditional legacy media, and similar types of revenge and hate-based expressions are also portrayed there. Revenge and hate led such collective portrayals may end up to destructive actions like procession, demonstration, rally, boycott, collective banning of products purchase. Prior research suggests that power has a direct association with negative action undertaken by an entity (Grégoire et al., 2010). Power is also found to be aligned with the feelings of personal control, action orientation such as punishment (Obhi et al., 2012) in a way that the feeling of power makes people act and, if required, employ punishment type of actions toward an entity. Researchers in marketing argue that consumers’ empowerment at social media is a psychological state which in fact, motivates behavior (Li, 2019) in a way that they punish corporate brands for socially irresponsible behaviors (Sweetin et al., 2013). Consumers’ empowerment inspired by instantaneous connectivity among others at social media enhances their ability to take collective actions as well as demand social change (Li, 2016). The empowerment led them to undertake actions that restore the wellbeing of individuals, community, state, and the universe. The brand crisis research suggests that journalists primarily contributed to prior brand crises, whereas the current crisis for brands is actually contributed by consumers’ individual level digital word of mouth, which are fundamentally accumulated and aggregated at a social media storm (Hansen et al., 2018). Prior research acknowledges that the reach of messages and the speed with which it is diffused in the social media landscape is far richer and greater than traditional media. Therefore, the act of digitally spreading word of mouth contributes a lot more than traditional, face-to-face word of mouth in igniting an issue and converting it to a social media storm. From this perspective, digital complaining or word of mouth can be considered as an input of social media storm. However, these can be considered as an output of social media storm as well. For example, individuals are motivated to spread nWOM against an entity when they see others posting, sharing the news of the wrongdoing of an entity receiving tremendous accolades and acceptance. Such a scenario motivates individuals to take part in a social media storm through similar behavioral actions, which consequently increases the magnitude and gravity of the social media storm. As indicated in the preceding paragraph, actions like posting, comments, WOM, on the one hand, contribute to form a social media storm, and on the other can be an output of a social media storm. In this regard, one famous social media storm named “Momo Challenge – an online suicide game that became part of the online social media collective conscience during the early part of 2019” (Phippen & Bond 2020, p. 28) can be taken into account. The game presents a disturbing image in the middle of an inoffensive cartoon watched by children, and that image could actually talk.

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The image speaks to the viewer and gives a mobile phone number that later was used to ask them to carry out a series of challenges ranging from minor self-harm to even taking their lives. Some popular press raised the issue in 2018 however was quickly regarded as false by other major media. Authorities were also not bothered as there was no comment about it from their side. Meanwhile, in late February and early March 2019, the Momo Challenge became a big story on social media as well as in legacy media. The gravity of the issue was toned down quickly due to lack of evidence except for the acknowledgment of only the existence of unpleasant content. However, the video was getting popular on video-based social media platforms. Later during Momo week, the UK witnessed and suffered a moral panic that also hit social media platforms as well as legacy media (Phippen & Bond 2020). Diverse groups of people, including professionals and authority figures, joined in social media, expressing their views, opinions, advice. Suicide news of Children in Argentina, India, Mexico were also circulated in social and legacy media. Statutory agencies (e.g., schools, police agencies) also warned parents and the general public about this game. Momo week generated unprecedented attention from people. For example, people searched Momo-related topics 34,464 times during Momo week, whereas the week before the search hits only 76 times, and this represents an increase of 45,000% searches during Momo week. Phippen and Bond (2020) categorized the social media responses in a number of categories. First, fear-driven posts can motivate people to create fictitious threats to let other people show the seriousness of an issue. Second, judgment-driven posts where parents, in general, are accused of “digital babysitting”. Third, professionals’ involvement in offering advice to an issue that is seriously undergoing an authenticity test. Fourth, bypassing the voice of a few that questions the authenticity of the issue. The categories of responses and/or actions listed by Phippen and Bond (2020) reveal that these responses, in fact, work as an input to the Momo Challenge storm and further let the storm to spike even higher. Similarly, the actions of others in the storm motivated some individuals to participate in the issue of children’s well-being rather than contribute towards the moral panic that is already created through the storm. From this perspective, these individuals’ actions can be considered an output of the Momo Challenge social media storm. The preceding discussion shows that the activities undertaken at a social media storm vary quite widely. Different underlying reasons and motivations are working behind such actions of the individuals on social media. The actions being regarded as a contributor and an outcome that eventually requires individuals to vary their commitment of resources against each action in a social media storm scenario.

Speed and duration based variations of social media storms One of the inherent characteristics of social media is its extreme dynamism, and for such dynamism, social media storm in general experiences exponential growth (Hansen et al., 2018). Meanwhile, the speed of this exponential growth may not be the same for all types of social media storms. It is generally perceived that when

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individuals’ self-interest is at risk, they actively get involved in protecting that interest. Therefore, when an individual experiences a product or service failure or product or service harm, his or her risk of losing the immediate interest climbs at the peak. This consequently motivates him or her highly to use personal and social resources (thanks to the evolution of social media that empowers customers to use the network and crowd-based power) at social media landscapes to combat such stressful situations. Prior research suggests that digital messages and contents, particularly on social media, are shared and picked up immediately and in no time (Hansen et al., 2018). Other customers and stakeholders, if found direct personal relevance of such experience, jump in and support the cause of the individual. In such instances, the speed of the exponential growth of the storm is expected to be a lot higher. On the contrary, when an individual raises and experiences an issue that has broader community and social interest, his or her risk of losing the interest will not be at its peak due to the distant rather immediate nature of the interest. This is likely to mildly influence his or her commitment towards the use of personal and social resources. Furthermore, stakeholders’ propensity to jump in and support the cause will also be relatively lower, except for those who are directly affected by the issue or cause. Overall, the speed of the exponential growth of the storm would be relatively lower. Regarding the duration of the social media storm, some social media storm lasts for only a few days, whereas some social media storm lasts for weeks or even months. The variations in the length of the duration of the social media storm can increase the negativity that emerged from the social media storm. For example, a shorter duration social media storm does not retain for long in consumer memory as they are exposed to thousands of messages and contents each day. Therefore, the absence of reinforcers in the form of repeated exposure for a longer period lets the consumer devote his or her attention to a new issue. On the contrary, an issue relayed for longer duration work as a reinforcer for consumers, which eventually lead them to retain the social media storm related information for a longer period. Relatedly Hansen et al. (2018) argued that a social media storm that lasts longer enables the customer to get exposed to social media storm-related information that eventually influences them to attend and elaborate on the social media storm related information. They further argue and later find support for the prediction that longer duration social media storm tends to be remembered in detail whereas shorter duration social media storm is only remembered vaguely. The speed and duration-based variations of social media storm are crucial to consider with specific reference to these variations’ contribution towards stakeholders’ engagement and actions. For example, speedy, longer duration social media storms are generally picked up more by legacy media and other stakeholders as these characteristics made the social media storm newsworthy (Simpson & Lappeman, 2017) and attention-getting. Furthermore, these characteristics of the social media storm increase the nWOM propensity, which ultimately damages the brand’s reputation (Lappeman, Patel, & Appalraju, 2018). Relatedly prior research shows that consumers’ exposure to a brand crisis on social media made them react

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more negatively than their exposure to the brand crisis in traditional, legacy media (Pace et al., 2017). Social media storms that has a speedy, lengthy nature further enhances these negativities instead of the less speedy and shorter duration social media storm.

Location and participant based variations of social media storms Social media made the universe even more globalized than before by connecting people from across the globe and exposed them to issues and matters that are far from their society. The social media storm thus also has some global perspective. For example, people in Germany are getting moved with the human rights violations taking place in Syria, Palestine. The Chinese doctor who was dragged from a United Airlines plane created a social media storm in the US and across the globe, including China. People from across the globe contributed to this storm as they felt they needed to talk and raise their voice about such injustice and inhuman acts on the part of the Airlines. Examples such as this give us a perspective that social media storms do not have spatial specificity rather, a social media storm can be contributed by many from diverse geographic milieu even if they have little direct interest in those activities. In spite of the globalization perspective of social media storms, we acknowledge that social media storms can also be culture bound. Although social media highlights and promotes individual space and expressions, the cornerstone of an individualistic society, people from a collectivist society also use social media for self-expression. However, as expressed in social media, their underlying intent and actions are way different from people from individualistic societies. For example, in a social media storm context, people from the USA (representing individualistic culture) raise their voice, undertake actions to whatever extent possible against the wrongdoing of an organization. On the contrary, people from Japan in a social media storm context although would raise their voice, undertake actions; however, these would not surpass a point where mutual respect gets hurt – the norm of the Japanese society. The character of a social media storm in these two different countries thus would certainly be different. Furthermore, people’s receptivity varies as per the culture. A humorous yet culturally conflicting communication content may go well in some cultures with little friction (e.g., a social media storm with low impact); it may not be the case for every culture. In some cultures, it may generate such a social media storm that the company may need to apologize to the entire nation. For example, in mid-November 2018, Dolce & Gabbana, the Italian luxury fashion brand, released three short videos on Weibo to promote its upcoming fashion show in Shanghai. The videos show an Asian woman wearing a lavish Dolce & Gabbana dress trying to eat pizza, spaghetti, and cannoli with Chopsticks (Xu, 2018). This appeared very inappropriate to Chinese people, and they felt the brand is mocking their culture. This consequently led the Chinese people to boycott the brand in China. Later, Dolce & Gabbana had to cancel the show, and

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even the founders of the brand had to ask for forgiveness from Chinese people (BBC News, 2019). The variation among participants in a social media storm also defines the character of the social media storm as well as its intensity. For example, in the USA, more than 90% of people who belong to the age group of 18–29 are active social media users, whereas this percentage drops down to only 40% for people who belong to the age group of 65+ (Clement, 2020). As of July 2020, 3 social media platforms, namely Facebook, Youtube, and WhatsApp, have more than 2 billion monthly active users (Datareportal, 2020), and the majority of those users are young adults. Prior research shows that older adults do not favor attending to negative material, or they selectively forgot the negative issue. However, this is not the case for young adults (Mather & Carstensen, 2005). In a meta-analysis by Ruffman et al. (2008), older than younger adults have difficulty identifying anger, sadness, and fear. Considering these perspectives, it is reasonable to presume that more participation of the younger cohorts on social media and their higher emotional intelligence led them to participate more in a social media storm compared to older adults. Furthermore, there are generational divides, and each generation has its unique persona. This diverse group-based persona has additional potential to contribute to a social media storm uniquely.

Constituents/Properties of social media storms There are certain common properties of a social media storm. The first and foremost constituents of a social media storm is anything conflicting with our general normative standards. In addition, the issue that created the conflict needs to have relevance in the life of the individual and other constituents of society. To be called a social media storm, the issue having conflicts with normative standards and relevance has to have the attention-getting power from participants at social media. Furthermore, a social media storm needs to have relevance to the other traditional media so that they will also join in the bandwagon to create the impact as intended by the social media storm participants. From a business entity perspective, there are some additional ingredients on top of the mentioned ingredients of a social media storm. In particular, not all types of products are prone to a social media storm in spite of having conflicts with the normative standards. Brand loyalty, as well as equity, can also be an ingredient of social media storm depending on the extent of the conflicts with the normative standards. These mentioned properties of social media storm are elaborated in a bit detail in the following.

An issue that doesn’t seem to be right Anything that challenges the general normative standard of people creates stress and or tension among people. Stress and or tension, emotionally unpleasant feeling, is not conducive to human well-being; therefore, a natural human tendency is to release the stress or tension and let the self get back to a normal state.

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Social media platforms (SMPs) offer a range of power, including informationbased power to people, including consumers. Information-based power is grounded on the fact that consumers and the public have the ability to consume and produce content (Labrecque et al., 2013), and by using such capability, they can influence and or change things. In terms of content production power, social media offers consumers an outlet “for self-expression, extending individual reach, and elevating the potential for individual option to influence markets” (Labrecque et al., 2013, p. 261). The information-based power offered by social media lets individuals release their stress, tension, and emotional state, which consequently helps them to get back to their stable state. Therefore, it seems that any form of violation of normative standards has the potential to kick off a social media storm. The extent of the violation of normative standards may determine the intensity of the social media storm.

Issue relevance The relevance of an issue in the life of the individual is another important constituent of a social media storm since it determines the level of interest that the individual will have about an issue which consequently determines their behavioral reactions. As indicated earlier, personally relevant issues with specific reference to the loss of immediate benefit encourage people to respond more actively in social media. In addition, when they see the violation of some normative standards and feel aligned to voice against it, the relevance of the issue increases. This may increase the participation potential as well as the use of various resources possessed by the individuals. Furthermore, the ease of access to products, services, or other related information on social media reduces the possibility of information asymmetry and expedites the diffusion of information, which increases the information-based power of individuals at social media (Labrecque et al., 2013). Prior research suggests that enhanced learning resulting from supports rooted in social landscape facilitates information compilation and its usage (Ariely, 2000; Jayanti & Singh, 2010). These together further reinforces the relevance of individuals with the issue of a social media storm. The relevance mechanism, as demonstrated for individuals, equally applies to other stakeholders when it comes to the question of finding relevance with an issue triggering social media storm. Overall, the relevance of the issue among the stakeholders is an important ingredient of a social media storm. If they perceive it as irrelevant, it may keep them from bringing their cognitive and emotive resources while contributing to the social media storm. Even participation in the social media storm may be restrained due to the lack or poor relevance of the issue.

Support drawing power Social media platforms inherently are bestowed with network and crowd-based power. As explained by Labrecque et al. (2013) network-based power “centers on the

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metamorphosis of content through network actions designed to build personal reputation and influence markets through the distribution, remixing, and enhancement of digital content” (p. 263), whereas crowd-based power “resides in the ability to pool, mobilize, and structure resources in ways that benefit both the individuals and the groups” (p. 264). In spite of the existence of these types of power on social media, the power is not enforced thus not visible always. Rather a social media storm context showcases the existence of these types of power. In fact, the exercise of these types of powers can be considered the food for a social media storm. Without the exercise of these types of power, the traffic required to form a social media storm may not be available. Furthermore, the traffic required along the way to get support for the social media storm issue also needs to use these types of power. For example, service defection news needs to spread contagiously throughout the customer network (Nitzan & Libai, 2011) to make a dent in a company’s future stock return (Liu, 2006) and let them listen through the social media storm. Furthermore, collective affiliation gets meaning when it portrays a sense of belongings and shared social relationships (Thomas et al., 2013), manifesting crowd-based power. Communal efforts resembling crowd-based power contribute toward status, reputation, spirituality, or moral outrage (Labrecque et al., 2013). Thus, support drawing power emancipated from both network and crow-based power seems to be an essential element of a social media storm and its survival for a relatively long period.

Media relevance As indicated earlier, the complementary model is one of the two competing models depicting the relationship between new (i.e., digital media like social media) and legacy media (i.e., newspapers, television) (Nguyen & Western, 2006). The complementary model predicts that legacy media has the power to complement and increase the efficiency of social media. Prior research suggests that digital media like social media platforms may provide efficiencies in achieving mediated and non-mediated affordances previously offered by legacy media (Blank & Groselj, 2014; Ruppel & Burke, 2015). However, in doing that, they do not need to displace the legacy media or the activities performed by the legacy media. In fact, there is a prediction that a positive correlation exists between the use of digital media and legacy media such that the increased use of digital media would also increase the use of legacy media (Näsi & Räsänen, 2013; Twenge et al., 2017). In the context of a social media storm, although social media seems to be sufficient to generate a social media storm, it is seen in different contexts that when the legacy media picked up the storm from social media, the impact of social media storm seems to be a lot higher in terms of stakeholders’ involvement and engagement. Phippen and Bond (2020), in a recent book on organizational responses to social media storms, acknowledges this. In particular, all the four case studies illustrated in their book show the trend that the involvement of traditional media fundamentally increases the strength of the social media storm. In brand crisis contexts, prior research shows that if the traditional media report on a brand

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crisis that was initially picked up by social media, consumers will pick it up further by discussing the crisis issue further in social media (Hansen et al., 2018). Thus, it is evident that the issue triggering social media storm should also be relevant for traditional media for their attention, interest, desire, and action. The active involvement of traditional media is crucial for the social media storm to take off as well as fly higher and further.

Product scope From the perspective of business and market, each and every single commercial offering is susceptible to a social media storm. While identifying the triggers of social media storms, we have already identified earlier that a firm may face a performance-related crisis from product failures (e.g., Honda will recall 2.7 million U.S. vehicles due to the defection of airbag inflators, CNBC, 2020) or service failures (e.g., Heathrow airport was severely affected on February 16, 2020, as the airport’s departure boards and check-in systems left passengers with little information which consequently affected more than 100 flights, Computerworld, 2020). A firm may also face a value-related crisis which is not directly related to the products or service offered by the company rather the social issues (e.g., the CEO of WarnerMedia, Jason Kilar vehemently acknowledged that racism is a problem for their company, Banks & Harvey, 2020) and ethical issues (e.g., the campaign of Mastercard during 2018 FIFA World Cup that it would feed 10000 starving children with a meal for each goal scored by Messi or Neymar Jr., Mulcahy, 2019) those surrounds the brand (Dutta & Pullig, 2011). These failures can be considered under the purview of the product; thus, all these types of failures are expected to push social media storm. However, Hansen et al. (2018) suggest that the depth and relevance of marketing communication failure for an individual are not as high as product, service, or social failure thus does not affect brand perceptions more negatively in a social media storm. They, in fact, found evidence that product or service failure significantly reduces shortand long-term consumer brand perceptions in a social media storm context. In addition, they found a product or service failure to be significantly and positively related to recalling the correct reasons for the social media storms in a later period of time. However, these effects were not evident for social failure. These findings led us to believe that all types of products and their failures are an important ingredient of a social media storm. However, consumers may not be equally serious for each and every single type of product or service failure; thus, their commitment to use resources to get involved or take efforts to kick off a social media storm will vary. In particular, if the customer faces a product or services failure where he or she was highly involved in terms of the use of resources (e.g., money, time, energy, psyche), then the perception of loss would be higher. This would encourage him or her to restore the loss by letting the company face the social media trial in the form of facing a social media storm. The commitment of a high volume of resources and the consequent higher perceived loss would make

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consumers use additional resources to kick off the social media storm and be involved and engaged in the social media storm. This may not be the case when consumers are less involved with a product or service and face a failure from them.

Brand loyalty and equity Apart from offering information, network, and crowd-based power, social media also offer demand-based power that aggregates the impact of purchase and consumption behaviors exhibited at social media. Previously such demand-based power was limited to only purchase or boycott (Zureik & Mowshowitz, 2005), however when such power is combined with other types of power of social media, then the empowerment of consumers’ reach the peak, and that’s the reality of today. Today’s consumers are more empowered than the empowerment enjoyed by consumers than any time before. Such empowerment led them to contribute to a social media storm more than ever before however, the loyalty and equity of a brand can be a safeguard for a company in regards to facing a social media storm. In particular, prior research shows that high brand equity leads to more favorable satisfaction evaluation and behavioral intentions when compared to low brand equity, which was evident in the entire failure and recovery sequence (Brady et al., 2008). Consumers tend to give more chances in case of failure with more than low reputed brands (Choi & Mattila, 2008). Therefore, it is reasonable to presume that brands that enjoy high loyalty and equity are less susceptible to social media storms however, this may be contingent on the type of failure and the type of moral violations perceived by the customers. Consumers expect that the firm responsible for product harm crisis should acknowledge responsibility morally and act on it (Siu et al., 2013). Their perception of morality violations increases when firms accept low levels of responsibility (Pavlou & Gefen, 2005). Prior social psychological research suggests that consumers’ exercise of social control depends on the extent of the violations of morality (Brauer & Chekroun, 2005), and morality violations positively influence social media storms (Zheng et al., 2020). In line with these research findings, we can reasonably presume that higher violations of morality in the form of big performance failure (e.g., defective brakes in Toyota vehicle, Warner, 2010) or social failure (e.g., Mastercard feeding campaign against scoring of goals by Messi and Neymer Jr.; Mulcahy, 2019) will certainly let people (even the ones who are loyal to the brands) join the social media march against the company. The feeling of betrayal by their loved brands may make them even a terrorist wishing to give the brand a lesson and bring them back on the right track. In such instances, brand loyalty and equity can be considered as an ingredient to a social media storm.

Concluding discussion This chapter was intended to provide insights relating to media storms with specific reference to the role and distinct characteristics of data in social media storms, the

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categorical variations, and the unique properties of social media storms. In that quest, first, we show the omnipresence of data in human life and the different medium that is continuously generating data for them. Of these different mediums, social media is found to be the biggest contributor of data for Individuals. They themselves are actively and passively generating, disseminating, and consuming data across social media platforms. The data as generated also includes the data on brands, companies, their actions, inactions, and the stakeholders’ actions against those reactions (i.e., actions, reactions), consequently impacting the companies and their operations. We then discuss the distinct characteristics of data, particularly volume, variety, virality, visuality, and veracity, and how this unique nature of the data shapes up the breadth, depth, and intensity of social media storms. While discussing these, we also talked about the typical actions of managers when faced with these unique types of data embedded social media storms. While demonstrating the category-based variations of social media storms, this chapter shows that any form of wrongdoing by an entity, including companies, can trigger an SMS. This chapter also highlighted that an SMS could vary in terms of peoples’ intentions and the type of activities they want to display in an SMS. The variations of SMS may also emerge from the speed, duration, location, and differences among storm participants. Lastly, the chapter teased out the properties of an SMS by showing that misalignment of an issue with existing norms and their relevance to the individual, the support-drawing power of the issue igniting the storm, the relevance that all other types of media find in that storm igniting issue, and the specific scope of the product can be the ingredients of an SMS. The brand loyalty and equity issue are also highlighted as an additional ingredient of an SMS, and we argue that rather than working as a buffer against SMS, this can ignite an SMS.

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4 CHALLENGES OF A CHANGING MARKETING LANDSCAPE

Challenge # 1: Drop your traditional marketing management tools Market turbulence triggers the rethinking of traditional marketing management. With the Covid-19 situation adding to the market turbulence, we conclude that times are rapidly changing in unpredictable patterns and so do consumers’ behaviors and expectations towards companies. The worldview described in this opening quote implicates the ontological foundations of strategic marketing and management and, hence, how to frame the business-consumer interaction. The profound changes force us to reconsider assumptions we have taken for granted earlier: can managers be certain of how their organizations should interact with their environment in this digital age? Does it make sense to distinguish between “organization” and “environment” in the future? Can we still talk of strategic marketing and management in the traditional sense if accidental persons on social media provide an opinion, meaning, and impact on how the organization should act and be valued? Are social media then mere marketing tools, or do they, in fact, represent a whole new way of organizing, strategizing, and communicating in business? Assuming that there is a relationship between how managers and employees make sense of their organization, its environment (consumer behavior in particular), and make sense of social media storms relies on the theoretical foundations of cognitive psychology. Sensemaking of the market and interaction with it, as well as the management thereof, depends on individual and cultural cognitive framing, also called mental models, mindsets, conceptual heuristics, or tacit assumptions, which at any given time structure how we interpret and react to all incoming information (Rydén et al., 2015). We argue that when managers are resting on the traditional strategic marketing framework (Wind & Robertson, 1983;

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Schmitt, 1999) and a shared view of companies as “surviving organisms in its environment” (Morgan, 1986), it will lead to a propensity to frame social media storms as an external threat. It is therefore vital to examine the managerial implications of three basic assumptions that lead to this mental framing: 1. 2. 3.

An organization is an entity in a surrounding environment; An organization can adapt to and, to some extent, control its market(s) through communication, analytical and strategic efforts; Social media are marketing tools for doing so.

Organizations function in large, interdependent ecosystems Addressing the first assumption stating that an organization is an entity in a surrounding environment, we must remind ourselves that social media are born out of the Internet and must be seen in such a context. Connecting through global digital networks dramatically improves the efficiency of organizations but also empowers customers. In the age of the Internet, the environment is no longer a pre-existing set of problems to which the company must find solutions. This digital business ecosystem focus considers an organization as a network, not an independent actor, that shifts and develops in response to external feedback. Creating and participating in social media communities thus disturb the “physical boundaries” between companies and market (consumers): the company must redefine itself as a potential player in constructing a market in “mutual agreement” with the consumers. For instance, Coca-Cola’s Facebook site is co-managed with its fans (Fournier & Avery, 2011). This Weick’s description of structure as patterns of meaning explains how this social construction consists of interaction patterns that stabilize meaning by creating shared interpretive frames, “structure as a complex medium of control is produced and recreated in interaction and yet shapes the interaction” (Weick, 1993, p. 645). With social media storms, we see how companies are being defined by people who organize, communicate, and exercise control through social media interaction in large business ecosystems.

Market control through planning efforts makes less sense Assumptions in strategy research (Mosakowski & Earley, 2000) influence how people act and interact in organizations and respond strategically to market development (Reinecke & Ansari, 2015). New management concepts reflect how we experience shifts in business values and actions. e.g., “Agile” describing the power of moving quickly and easily (Keeley & Doz, 2011), while “Integration” describes the synergies accomplished by aggregating platforms and real-time data. Thus, the times of stable and predictable marketplaces for the executive to analyze the market and consumer behavior are gone (Rydén & El Sawy, 2019), which triggers a need for researchers to update, redefine, and reinterpret management for it to make sense in a digital business context.

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To address the second assumption of an organization being able to adapt to and, to some extent, control its market(s) through communication, analytical and strategic efforts, we refer to Daft and Weick (1984, p. 294), who are moving away from the traditional framework of seeing organizations as control systems. They reframe organizations as interpretation systems, i.e., the process through which information is given meaning and actions are chosen. As stated by Weick (1993, p. 634), “The link between decisions and actions are loose-coupled and interactive rather than linear; the past is notoriously unreliable as a guide to the present and the future”. The argument is that all organizational events are based on interpretation and meaning systems, placing “rational” decision-making in the background and sensemaking in the foreground. This definition covers the increasing use of real-time technologies in business and encourages us to unravel decision makers’ perceptions and practices in strategy and organization. This perspective affects how one perceives a social media storm and sees its strategic and communicative potential, thus influencing how members of an organization will participate in social media storms. It can also explain why consumers are not just “environmental entities” as they become part of the organizing and strategizing processes, hence undermining the assumptions of a clear boundary between an organization and its environment and the locus of control. Strategic management literature generally aims at answering how companies can meet the challenges of adapting to shifts in the market (Mintzberg et al., 2009). Like any crisis, a social media storm can occur as a result of a more or less unpredictable event and requires that decisions are made quickly to limit damage to the organization. But people tend to have stronger psychological and emotional reactions to a crisis if it is man-made or imposed, and these types of crises also tend to have increased media exposure (CERC: Psychology of a Crisis, 2019). The field of crisis management most likely outsprung from Johnson & Johnson's handling of a crisis situation in 1982, when Tylenol killed seven people in the Chicago area. At that time, Tylenol was the leading painkiller provider with a 37% market share1 until an unknown person replaced Tylenol capsules with cyanidelaced capsules, resealed the packages, and deposited them on the shelves of at least a half-dozen or so pharmacies and food stores in the Chicago area. The company immediately recalled all Tylenol capsules in the U.S. and offered free products in tamper-proof packaging. As a result of the company’s swift response, the effect on shareholders was minimized, and the brand recovered. One way to shift focus from communicative control to meaning is to look more closely at sensemaking and framing of social media as it can reveal how managers and marketers understand the organization-market interaction during a social media storm.

Social media reflect a whole new business paradigm Addressing the third assumption that social media are marketing tools for controlling the market(s) through communication, analytical and strategic efforts

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reflects the traditional marketing logic in action. Weick (1993) explains why this happens: when meaning in the surroundings decreases due to rapid changes and disruptions, like when facing a social media storm, people pay more attention to existing frameworks in the attempt of recognizing, interpreting, and negotiating strange situations. Hence the subtitle analogy to Weick’s (1993, p. 635) Mann Gulch case where 13 firefighters died as they refused to follow the order and drop their tools as it didn’t make any sense and would deprive them of their identity as firefighters. In this context, “drop your tools” refers to letting go of existing logic and marketing management tools for interacting with consumers engaging in a social media “firestorm”. Thus, unlocking the social media storm potential presents a strategic, as well as a cognitive challenge, as their own assumptions can further block managers and organizations: how managers make sense of – and navigate through – social media challenges depends to a large extent on how they make sense of the business world. By exploring how strategic marketing theory based on a certain degree of stability, predictability, and control, it is also easier to explain why crisis communication in this context becomes a tool that fits into the existing marketing framework and thus creates less resistance amongst managers, as it does not challenge the fundamental beliefs and meets the need of control during times of uncertainty. In concert, these fundamental market changes are calling for new ways of thinking for most organizations. In order to adapt to these changing demands and expectations, managers should learn how to interact in a more resilient manner with consumers and other stakeholders. But more importantly, managers need to intentionally change their way of thinking according to the particular context and address strategic challenges in more resilient ways. In the context of the above mentioned, what are then the remaining main challenges that managers face?

Challenge #2: Understanding and managing the social media runaway train At the organization level, it is reasonable to talk of social media as disruptive technology when they are considered as offering a significant impact that will substantially alter the structure, processes, and practices of the organization. In a social media storm context, the social media disruption stems from a shift from “one-to many” distribution to a “many-to-many” configuration, where customers are both the providers and consumers of content (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010). The first challenge is how the company should deal with the viral effects of social media, which is one of the triggering forces of social media storms. As over 3.8 billion people use social media (We are social, 2020), we have seen how these media can be a catalyst for consumers engaging with each other in social media storms. Like any virus, it is very hard to assess the speed and scale of their disseminating effects and their long-term impact. This means that the companies who are using social media must understand these dynamics and their own role in the

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negative mentions and how they interfere with--and distort--the businesscustomer engagement. Therefore, it is only natural that managers see social media as a double-edged sword to manage due to the risk of getting complaints and bad publicity, which can lead to loss of revenue and image (Pfeffer et al., 2014). Approaching these challenges through the lenses of traditional marketing frameworks, the strategic process will most likely be undertaken by people in the company analyzing the social media communications from the corporate window, exemplified by this visualization inspired by Latour (2005): Imagine a marketing department in a company. The managers sit in their offices – far from their customers but seem to know what’s going on. There they study piles of data to see how the market is developing. From this strategic view they send out orders intended to fulfil the company’s mission. But various mediators such as data gatherers, mapmakers, analysts, as well as objects like the maps, computers, charts, and graphs construct their strategic view, even their decisions also depend upon mediators. The managers have influence, but their sense of control is an illusion since all of those mediators are capable of transforming the outcome in potentially far-reaching ways and thus making a difference. In spite of their far-reaching influence and the huge amounts of data gathered to give them a strategic view, the managers are situated within the system and have no more ability to control it than any other being. With critical masses that protest and attack organizations and influence consumer behavior and attitude towards brands (Kietzmann & Canhoto, 2013) follow an increasing fear of organizational stigma, which is typically generating one or more of the main crisis responses: base, denial, evasion, justification, concession or even manipulation, or covering up (Cheng, 2018). One factor that is essential to these challenges is that emotions are at play at both sides of the business-consumer engagement, which reflect deeper emotional causes to conflicts: lack of trust and understanding, fear and frustration due to loss of meaning and control. Without sincere communication from a company that the stakeholders can trust, the psychological impact and negative emotions will not be reduced neither for the stakeholders nor for the members of the organization. In a worst-case scenario, social media storms can convert companies into emotional pressure cookers where tensions are running high, and management happens by reflex rather than reflection. Another thing that matters is the intensity and the duration of the social media storm. In the case of a sudden social media storm, the intensity is usually high. The stresses resulting from chronic adversity of a continuing social media storm that persists for months or even longer might be lower exerts repeated and cumulative impact on emotional and corporate resources and the ability to constantly adapt. Understanding social media storms by use of data analytics (i.e., showing the number of posts, not their emotional depth) can mislead managers to believe that a social media storm will lead to unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences for their company image, all of it accompanied by a significant loss of money

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(Pfeffer et al., 2014). Adding to that, people experiencing a social media storm and the stresses it brings may suffer from physical symptoms, too (CERC: Psychology of a Crisis, 2019), which will negatively influence organizational performance. Emotions tend to be underestimated in traditional crisis management, yet we argue that they tend to be the most powerful aspects of a social media storm. Without reflection on what is going on below the surface, managers will have a difficult time adjusting themselves and their organizations to functioning during a social media storm. A consequence of the power of emotion is so profound is that it can create crises within crises. At the same time, social media storms happen more often than you may think, which makes it a common event rather than a crisis event in the traditional sense. However, since social media storms tend to evoke emotional defense mechanisms at the managerial as well as the organizational levels, it makes sense to take a psychology perspective. Here it becomes crucial for managers to learn how they can approach social media storms in a more reflected and resilient way to strengthen their customer engagement and strategically leverage these opportunities. Adding to that, when markets change due to the emergence of disruptive technologies that trigger changes in customer behaviors, and there is a relationship between how managers frame problems and the level of risk that they take, it becomes relevant to focus on the manager’s thoughts and emotions when dealing with these phenomena. This mandates the psychological framing of social media storm management as emotional crisis management. We define it as the application of resilient coping strategies for managers combined with an empowering and engaging social media strategy to help an organization deal with a sudden and significant negative event. It is also obvious that when managers can reframe their outlook on social media storms to embrace these changes and strategically appropriate the company, the social media storm may provide new profitable windows of opportunity. Reframing the management perspective implies that managers convert a dominant perception of social media as a threat to their business into framing social media as being part of the solution to the identified issues and challenges, which the technology originally was assumed to cause (Rydén et al., 2015).

Challenge #3: Managing crisis triggered by consumer anger Consumer anger is usually a natural reaction to unmet service expectations (Su et al., 2014). When companies fail to match expectations or behave in ways that are not applaudable, the angry reactions can trigger social media-driven consumer actions spanning from individual complaints to collective exposure, criticism, parody, and even global riots manifested by social media storm. Unfortunately, consumers tend to find it easier to express themselves negatively than positively towards a company, service, or product on social media (Pfeffer et al., 2014) that can be disseminated at an exponential pace (Talbot, 2020). But a newer study of

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more than 11 billion social media mentions shows that it is not necessarily social media that is the problem, but rather the behavior of companies: social sentiment has gone from overwhelmingly positive to consistently negative since 2013, however, the overall, positive (6.51%) and negative comments (6.4%) are almost equal, and the neutral mentions count for far more than the positive and negative (87.9%) (Whatman, 2018). Culture also impacts the propensity to post negative mentions, and here the US (7.08%) and the UK (6.92%) are the most negative as opposed to Canada (4.98%) and India (3.59%). Adding to that, social media algorithms can further boost the exponential growth of social media storm (Gonzalez-Herrero & Smith, 2010) by promoting “moral content” that has more emotion in the post and is, therefore, more engaging for others to read, comment, and share. And since social media are rewarding engagement, it is tempting for users to take their posts to an extreme (Whatman, 2018). The exponentiality of such actions requires resilient crisis management because traditional consumer anger management tends to compromise rather than empower the company (Rydén et al., 2020). In some cases, a social media storm is a rare event whose causes and aftermath are worth examining to prevent it, but we found through a field survey on 226 companies operating in Europe and South Asia that the chances of experiencing social media storm is rather high and therefore an incident to expect: 37% of the managers said that their company had faced a social media storm. The experiences of a social media storm are also found to be significantly higher among Marketing and PR managers than other managers working in different departments, which also influences how the social media storm is framed. Crisis management is traditionally defined as a set of practices engaged before, during, and after a crisis that seeks to minimize the damage a crisis causes and bring the organization back to normal (CERC: Psychology of a Crisis, 2019). When a crisis like this occurs, the (crisis) manager is responsible for directing the organization’s response in accordance with its crisis management plan. Control is needed in order to navigate safely in times characterized by immediate change of status quo, high levels of uncertainty, and complexity (Seeger et al., 2003). The management is usually the one responsible for – and authorized to – communicating to the public. Since fast action is deemed important for damage control, employees should know who is and who is not authorized to speak to the media and must do so in a manner consistent with what the crisis manager is saying (Rouse, 2020). This “best practice” for managing a crisis reflects an understanding of organizations as being in a state of equilibrium where a crisis – like a social media storm – disrupts this status quo and leads the organization into a state of disequilibrium, which must be restored to get the company back to normal. However, with a resilient approach, organizations can better convert negative attention to constructive core value discussions of larger societal relevance as part of the service experience. To do so, they must rethink empowerment as a win-win-win situation and learn to cope with emotions (Rydén et al., 2020).

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Social media storms in an emotional coping perspective When a social media storm hits an organization, it also hits people. In a psychology framing, “crisis response” relates to the reaction that the crisis (stimuli) triggers with the individual, and in this context, “crisis management” describes the process of coping with emotional reactions under stress (CERC: Psychology of a Crisis, 2019). A manager’s coping strategy can be triggered by the assessment of the emotional significance, which determines the reactions. Like consumers, managers decide about their most active reactions in terms of more intense emotions and subsequent behavioral reactions depending on what they will get out of it. A negative response can thus serve as a basis of judgment, explaining why people spontaneously write angry posts and why managers instinctively feel threatened by them. Being emotional creatures, managers may not attempt a logical and reasoned approach to decision making to cope with a social media storm. Instead, they may revert to more basic or instinctive fight-or-flight reasoning and rely on old habits, mindsets, and long-held practices. The degree of severity of social media storm is measured in the form of cognitive adjustment or reframing among managers and their reluctance and/or inability to confront these issues at an individual cognitive level and social collective level. In affect, managers and employees take in, process, and act on information differently than they would during “normal” times, e.g., they may selectively listen, miss the overview and nuances, forget and misinterpret information, and exaggerate their communication responses. A lack of information or conflicting information from the management is likely to create heightened anxiety and emotional distress. If the company is hiding, they increase the risk of a confused and angry crowd. We argue that by understanding how people take in information such as emotional outbursts during a social media storm, organizations can better reduce the psychological impact and communicate with consumers, and empower them to take actions that will reduce their emotional tensions and release a learning potential. So, social media storms create negative emotions and behaviors; positive responses fed by the social media storm might trigger relief and understanding of coping and altruism. Feelings of excitement, greater self-worth, strength, and growth may also come from the experience. In the longer run, a social media storm can lead to changes in the way the future of the company is viewed, including a new understanding of risks and new ways of managing them. This confirms what we know from psychology studies: crises are unique triggers of learning and the development of stronger relationships! Thus, when seen from a long-term strategic perspective, the outcome is not re-establishing the status quo and turning back to normal. Rather, the ambition is to gain and grow from the social media storm. In a best-case scenario, our management study found that a social media storm can bring opportunities for enterprises to engage more deeply with consumers and even educate them, the enterprise, and society (Rydén et al., 2020).

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The positive outcome of a social media storm depends on thoughtful and empathetic management and communication. Positive responses may include the potential for stakeholders as well as members of the organization to feel relieved, enlightened, and empowered. The positive experience can breed new insights and capabilities for social media storm management and bring new opportunities for growth and renewal, as well as a renewed sense of community between consumers and company. Moreover, though the marketing discipline has trended towards consumerism with the consumers’ individual needs as the key to corporate success, the “environment” seems to play an increasingly important role (Kohli & Jaworski, 1990); Increased awareness of the exploitation of the earth, its natural and human resources bring forward the issue of environmental and social business ethics where consumers and governments place a stronger responsibility on the corporate shoulders. With an increasing focus on sustainable business conduct, a big issue of today is how companies manage and communicate their actions and, in particular social responsibilities of minimizing their impact on climate and nature, secure human and animal welfare, and fair working conditions. At the same time, stakeholders now demand businesses open towards transparency and consumer influence, and they use social media to assert their opinion and power. Thus, a more integrated approach to marketing has emerged, assuming that organizations can do well by doing good and thus match consumers’ long-term interests of a sustainable global society (Kotler et al., 2010). For example, the “triple-bottom-line” of the Danish company Novo Nordisk strives to promote responsible and ethical business practices throughout a global value chain in the attempt of reducing the negative environmental impacts and to stimulate economic growth that is socially just and environmentally sustainable.

Challenge #4: Managing individual and organization frames The third and perhaps biggest challenge is the manager’s way of seeing the world, thinking, and feeling about consumer anger and social media as it influences the social media storm response. The meaning of a social media storm can be sensed by the thoughts or ideas associated with the expression in the mind of the person using it. In cognitive theory, ideas are conceived as mental models or frames (e.g., Goffmann, 1974; Daft & Weick, 1984; Held et al., 2006). Managers usually rely on approaches that are coherent and compatible with their own beliefs (Winkielman et al., 2012). This creates consistent and predictable decisionmaking, which leads to insensitivity towards unexpected perspectives, especially when managers are under pressure for fast decisions, which typically is the case of social media storms. Lack of awareness of cognitive frames (which are conceptual heuristics also referred to as schemata or mental models) may create blind spots for managers, who may risk overlooking a window of opportunity in social media business-consumer interaction. Individual and collective frames tacitly structure

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how managers interpret and react to all incoming information (like emotions). Upbringing, education, and professional training develop certain norms and practices that influence how we view information as new or known, as an opportunity or a threat, make judgments about the situation and act. As practical and conceptual skills are mastered, these processes become largely automated. Basic assumptions and beliefs are often held very strongly and not easily altered, especially not under stress, so asking managers to change perspective during a social media storm is difficult. Moreover, we tend to seek evidence that confirms beliefs we already hold. For example, by saying, “we have followed the policies of the company or the letter of the law and have therefore done the right thing”, managers can easily bias the situation to match their current beliefs. Accordingly, feelings differ in what they tell us about a likely cause, giving rise to differential judgments of responsibility. This means that managers appraise the negative posts to determine the emotional significance of social media storms. When managers face a social media storm, and personal and financial stakes are deemed high, emotions instantly and subconsciously influence decision-making. We argue that companies cannot develop viable strategies and make informed decisions unless they understand the human motives of the people involved in social media storms. We, therefore, wonder why so few have investigated the cognitive and emotional mechanisms behind social media storm management. We also find that most management research (e.g., Tourish & Robson, 2006; Daunt & Harris, 2011) is warning about the destructive forces, describing social media storms as unexpected incidents that threaten the viability of the company. Likewise, it focuses on how to shield companies from negative reactions and reputational threats, which can trigger the framing of social media storms as a threat and a crisis phenomenon. Therefore, part of the challenge is how to question mainstream thinking about social media storm by critically scrutinizing the conventional assumptions and management recommendations while thinking counter-intuitively to not fall victim to stereotyped narratives. Though most managers tend to view a social media storm as a threat, our survey revealed that managing social media storms successfully is not all about service recovery and apologizing; but rather knowing how to turn frustrations into fruitful lessons for customers and companies as well. Social media storms do not always empower customers in the form of public redemption of justice, and when managers apologize and meet immediate demands, it may be at the expense of the integrity and identity of the company, prevent value coherence at a higher level, and might harm customer trust and loyalty. More likely, managers’ capacity for resilience is what determines if they have higher chances of succeeding or failing in reframing a social media storm from being about negative criticism to enlightening the crowd. To summarize, the traditional marketing framework is resting on assumptions that stem from a context very different from the modern digitalized markets. Within related disciplines such as strategic management, organization, and communication theory, the assumptions in question have been subject to substantiate criticism by researchers. However, the same criticism should also be addressed to marketing managers as the very same assumptions determine how they make sense

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of social media storms. Since language is both descriptive and constitutive of reality (Giddens, 1976), rethinking social media storms also involves a transformation of the concepts used to describe the phenomena of social media. One way to do so is by investigating how managers interpret and make sense of the phenomenon of social media storms. What should leaders do about the fact that framing can have such a powerful effect on their decision-making? First, they need to be careful about imposing their frame on their management team. In some situations, leaders might want to hold back on offering their assessment of a situation because their framing of a situation may constrict the range of advice and the range of options brought forth by their team. To know how leaders cognitively and emotionally relate to these changes, besides assuming a sense of frustration and lack of control, cognitive psychology can help us understand managerial framing of social media storms and the antecedents that inform the managers’ cognitive processes. Therefore, the next chapter addresses the role of mental frames and explains why a social media storm tends to be framed as a crisis situation in a rational management perspective as well as an emotional perspective.

Note 1 https://www.ou.edu/deptcomm/dodjcc/groups/02C2/Johnson%20&%20Johnson.htm

References CERC: Psychology of a Crisis. (2019). https://emergency.cdc.gov/cerc/ppt/CERC_ Psychology_of_a_Crisis.pdf. Cheng, Y. (2018) How social media is changing crisis communication strategies: Evidence from the updated literature. Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 26(1), 58–68. Daft, R. L., & Weick, K. E. (1984). Toward a model of organizations as interpretation systems. The Academy of Management Review, 9(2), 284–295. Daunt K. L., & Harris, L. C. (2011). Customers acting badly: Evidence from the hospitality industry. Journal of Business Research, 64, 1034–1042. Fournier, S., & Avery, J. (2011). The uninvited brand. Business Horizons, 54, 193–207. Giddens, A. (1976). New rules of sociological methods. London: Hutchinson. Goffmann, E. (1974). Frame analysis: An essay on the organization of experience. London: Harper and Row. Gonzalez-Herrero, A., & Smith, S. (2010). Crisis communications management 2.0: Organizational principles to manage crisis in an online world. Organization Development Journal, 28(1), 97–105. Held, C., Knauff, M., & Vosgerau, G. (2006). Mental models and the mind – current developments in cognitive psychology, neuroscience and philosophy of the mind. Elsevier. Kaplan, A. M., & Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media. Business Horizons, 53(1), 59–68. Keeley, K., & Doz, Y. L. (2011). Agile innovation: A footprint balancing distance and immersion. California Management Review, 53(2), 6–26. Kietzmann, J., & Canhoto, A. (2013). Bittersweet understanding and managing electronic word-of-mouth. Journal of Public Affairs, 13(2), 146–159.

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Kohli, A., & Jaworski, B. J. (1990). Market-orientation: The construct, research propositions, and managerial implications. Journal of Marketing, 54(April), 1–18. Kotler, P., Kartajaya, H., & Setiawan, I. (2010). Marketing 3.0. – From products to customers to human spirits. John Wiley & Sons. Latour, B. (2005). Reassembling the social. Oxford University Press. Mintzberg, H., Ahlstrand, B., & Lampel, J. (2009). Strategy Safari – your complete guide through the wilds of strategic management. Prentice Hall Morgan, G. (1986). Images of organizations. Sage. Mosakowski, E., & Earley, P. C. (2000). A selective review of time assumptions in strategy research. Academy of Management Review, 25(4), 796–812. Pfeffer, J., Zorbach, T., & Carley, K. (2014). Understanding online firestorms: Negative word-of-mouth dynamics in social media networks. Journal of Marketing Communications, 20(1–2), 117–128. Reinecke, J., & Ansari, S. (2015). When times collide: Temporal brokerage at the intersection of markets and developments. Academy of Management Journal, 58(2), 618–648. Rouse, M. (2020). Crisis management. https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/crisismanagement. Rydén, P., & El Sawy, O. A. (2019). Real-time management in the digital economy. In T. K. Das (Ed.), Time issues in strategy and organization. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. Rydén, P., Kottika, E., Hossain, M., Skare, V., & Morrison, A. M. (2020). Threat or treat for tourism organizations? The Copenhagen Zoo social media storm. International Journal of Tourism Research, 22(1), 108–119. Rydén, P., Ringberg, T., & Wilke, R. (2015). How managers' shared mental models of business–customer interactions create different sensemaking of social media. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 31, 1–16. Schmitt, B. (1999). Experiental marketing. Journal of Marketing Management, 15(1–3), 53–67. Seeger, M. W., Sellnow, T. L., & Ulmer R. R. (2003). Communication and organizational crisis. Westport (CT): Praeger. Su, L., Hsu, M. K., & Marshall, K. P. (2014). Understanding the relationship of service fairness, emotions, trust, and tourist behavioral intentions at a city destination in China. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 31(8), 1018–1038. Talbot, P. (2020). Social media storm clouds keep rolling in for marketers, Forbes.com (December, 2019). Retrieved January 2020, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/ paultalbot/2019/12/24/social-media-storm-clouds-keep-rolling-in-for-marketers/. Tourish D., & Robson, P. (2006). Sensemaking and the distortion of critical upward communication in organizations. Journal of Management Studies, 43, 711–730. We are social. (2020). Digital in 2020. Retrieved September 2020, from https:// wearesocial.com/digital-2020. Weick, K. E. (1993). The collapse of sensemaking in organizations: The Mann Gulch disaster. Administrative Science Quarterly, 38, 628–652. Whatman, P. (2018). Analysis of 11 billion mentions: Social media is more negative than ever. https://mention.com/en/blog/social-media-mentions-analysis/ Wind, Y., & Robertson, T. S. (1983). Marketing strategy: New directions for theory and research. Journal of Marketing, 47(2), 12–25. Winkielman, P., Huber, D. E., Kavanagh, L., & Schwarz, N. (2012). Fluency of consistency: When thoughts fit nicely and flow smoothly. In: B. Gawronski & F. Strack (Eds.), Cognitive consistency: A fundamental principle in social cognition (pp. 89–111). NY: Guilford Press.

5 MANAGERIAL FRAMING OF RISKS AND OPPORTUNITIES

What is a mental frame? We all use mental frames to simplify our understanding of the complex world around us, so we can better make sense of the world. Such heuristics are particularly effective in cases of uncertainty that social media storms bring. Frames are guiding thought processes by relying on already internalized heuristics that involve our – often taken-for-granted assumptions – about how things work. Mental frames de­ velop from factors such as education, social class, upbringing, professional training, norms, and practices, which become integral parts of how managers view the world (Atuahene-Gima, 2005). How managers frame a problem often shapes the solution at which they arrive. Over time, our mental frames become largely automated and tacit, freeing up cognitive capacity to attend to other issues that require conscious evaluation (Kahneman, 2011), but they also create consistent and predictable ca­ tegorical thinking (as opposed to reflective thinking). Categorical thinking in managerial decision-making leads to narrowing perspectives and insensitivity to unexpected perspectives and is one of the main reasons many organizations get locked into certain ways of doing things (Ringberg & Rheilen, 2008). Acting by default also happens when people face a new situation and judge if the new situation poses a threat. In particular, scholars have argued that we tend to use well-established routines and procedures when we frame something as a threat. Thus, managers’ framing has a decisive influence on the sensemaking of pro­ fessional domains (Gary & Wood, 2011) and frame how they conceptualize social media and stakeholder interaction and what strategies they deploy to manage (Rydén et al., 2015). When managers are judging a social media storm, they tend to rely tacitly on the mental frame being internally coherent and compatible with their beliefs (Winkielman et al., 2012). Categorical thinking increases when the manager suffers from high cognitive loads and is under pressure for quick decisions, which

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typically characterizes a social media storm situation. Therefore, it takes an extra effort to make room for reflective (i.e., strategic) thinking. Organizations tend to act more rigidly when they are faced with threats and act much more flexibly and adaptively if they frame those same situations as opportunities. Moreover, easy processing is experienced as more pleasant than difficult processing (Schwarz, 2013), which becomes a potentially useful input for evaluating the quality of reactions. When a manager is focused on the most accessible approach to the problem, it is vital to reframe the situation or to imagine the opposite (Larrick, 2004). Rydén et al. (2015) suggest how strategic processing or reflective thinking – at individual and collective levels – can help managers and organizations to better meet future challenges of using social media strategically. The ability to challenge one’s own and others’ assumptions through reflective thinking can be initiated through reframing techniques and the frameworks presented in this book. Such practices become important to establish when businesses increasingly depend on fast-moving technology like social media. It also becomes a critical precondition for understanding the nature of change in the market and to be able to interact with stakeholders during a social media storm in an appropriate manner. While some managers feel a rising uncertainty and get worried about the company’s future and their careers, others are quick at seeing it as “a new normal” and seeking meaning from the disruptive situation. Faced with changes in business values and ethics, and stakeholder expectations, managers may have to listen to consumers with little or no business experience. Consumer opinion and sugges­ tions may leave managers with increased uncertainty and fear, but they may ac­ tually offer valuable opposing viewpoints and opinions. Trust in consumers’ intentions will more likely increase the chances of listening to their messages.

Opportunity or threat? That depends on the manager’s framing According to Prospect Theory (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979), framing influences how managers view certain information as an opportunity or a threat, depending on the exposure to such mental models, and consequently, their decisions and actions. If the problem space is undefined, as for a social media storm, the problem solvers will search their memory for possible schemas that allow structuring the problem (Kaplan & Simon, 1990). If a person frames a situation in terms of a potential gain, he or she will act differently than if framed in terms of a potential loss. This notion of loss vs. gain turns out to have a great impact on risk-seeking or risk-aversive behavior. Resistance and change depend on whether decision makers view environ­ mental changes as opportunities or threats to gain legitimacy (Chattopadhyay et al., 2006). Huy (2012), Hodgkinson and Healey (2011), and Healey and Hodgkinson (2017) suggest strategy researchers account for rational and emotional (in terms of cold cognition-hot cognition) and automated thinking aspects of strategic adop­ tion, which is highly relevant when explaining managerial reactions and responses social media storms. They find that how managers identify and react to instances as

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opportunities or threats depends on whether they are in a positive or negative state at that time. The capability to manage thoughts and emotions, as well as fostering them as a precursor for strategic adaptation, aligns with our definition of a resilient mindset, in Healey and Hodgkinson’s (2017, p. 110) words: “The primary psychological challenge of sensing is to ensure that managers accommodate or assimilate new information concerning emerging technologies, changing customer needs, and/or new industry developments so that the firm embraces opportunities rather than avoids them”. The authors explain that a skilled strategist reflects a deeper understanding of how to harness and control emotions, but many formulate and implement strategies as if emotions do not exist or, at best, can be easily suppressed or sidelined (Healey & Hodgkinson, 2017). We tend to assume that framing a social media storm as risk or opportunity are two sides of the same coin, but the human mind tends to choose different approaches to imagine a desirable or undesirable future and have different information search stra­ tegies, i.e., structural differences of the underlying cognitive processes. Thus, there appear to be differences in cognitive strategies between risk and opportunity types of task in terms of how people search for information (explicit, absent, or emergent search strategy), how information is incorporated in the risk-opportunity identification (su­ perficial vs. relational), and how the people plan to act on the information (active vs. passive). These differences in cognitive strategies mean that it takes a more explicit and deductive effort to identify opportunities, whereas identifying risks rely more often on affective or insight-based problem-solving strategies (Stingl, 2019). This finding un­ derscores the importance of reflective thinking in clarifying the problem space. Though all human beings (and some animals) are equipped with the same fundamental stress-response system, which has evolved over millions of years, some managers seem to be far better at dealing with social media storms than others. One of the central reasons is that a manager’s experience is not inherent in the social media storm; it resides in the psychological construal of the social media storm: do you conceptualize a social media storm as a crisis for you and your organization or as an opportunity to learn and grow your business? The capacity to withstand turbulence or bounce back from perturbations is becoming even more critical to successfully manage the opportunities and threats posed by social media (see Sutcliffe & Barton, 2017). So, managers make themselves more or less vul­ nerable to social media storms by how they think about them. Our work suggests that framing a social media storm as a threat may actually be useful to some extent because it increases people’s alertness and allocates more resources to the problem. But because framing a social media storm as an opportunity opens up for more divergent thinking and new perspectives, it is then an advantage to reframe it as an opportunity to use corporate resources more effectively. Thus, opportunity framing is not always better than threat framing; the art is to time and balance the competing frames right.

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Given that the manager’s way of thinking constitutes an important barrier as well as a resource for companies (Rydén et al., 2015; Sutcliffe & Barton, 2017), the cognitive theory is highly relevant for understanding why some managers counterintuitively perceive a social media storm as an opportunity to leverage negative emotions, customer empowerment, and social media dynamics to propel awareness of their company and increase their brand value. Affective aspects of business, as well as customer behavior, influence social media storm decision-making even when considered as a classical strategic crisis communication phenomenon (see FearnBanks, 2001). This double loop of emotional framing (i.e., how a manager’s emo­ tions influence how he or she “reads” customers’ emotional responses) is not well explained in strategic management literature. We elaborate on this issue in Chapter 6.

Managerial reflections To avoid falling into the categorical thinking trap, managers can reflect on the questions of what does opportunity and threat mean in the context of a social media storm and what would the management objectives and outcome look like? Following the action learning approach, the manager can also look at the behavioral and verbal practices of the organization and ask how people make sense of the social media storm, how they define it, for instance, by metaphors or analogies, and what type of information they are requesting and how they search for it and at what pace. By asking people why they do or say what they do, the managers can better surface the underlying rationale of their approach. Actions that can further spark reflective thinking in the organization are to ask people how the information and conversa­ tions lead to risk and opportunity identification or to what extent it is governed by preceding cues, gut feeling, situational assessments, or structured practices? Moreover, how managers frame a social media storm influences how other people in the company assess it. By changing the wording and reframing the challenge, also known as “sensegiving” (Gioia & Chittipeddi, 1991), the manager can actually help peers change behavior from risk aversion to opportunity-seeking. For example, to promote a shift in perception of social media storm from threat to opportunity, the manager can associate “storm” with a power of nature, which may work as a “free driver” (akin to windmills, kites, or gliders) by those who understand how to utilize its constructive potential. This is interesting because we know that personality and mental frames can be consistent, but language matters for sparking reflection processes and can drive organizations towards new solutions.

The origin of resistance and resilience The need for conceptualizing resistance and resilience is partly due to a massive shift in the very nature of management and marketing, moving from predicting and planning for the future towards “surfing fluid reality”. We, therefore, examine how and why the buzzword “resilience” can increase a company’s ability to successfully manage a social media storm.

Managerial framing of risks and opportunities

FIGURE 5.1

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Resilience and resistance in medicine

The concepts of resistance and resilience stem from the natural sciences and are the two main components of ecosystem stability. The concepts are used to describe how environmental change can impact ecosystem stability or human functioning. In this context, resistance is when the system or body keeps its structure and continues its normal functions despite the environmental changes, whereas resilience means following the disturbance and rather quickly regain its normal structure and function (see example below by Norris et al., 2009) (Figure 5.1). The concept of resilience has been transferred from natural sciences to the social sciences and humanities to describe relational and systemic dynamics also in families, organizations, and business ecosystems. We rely on the psychological base and define resilience in this context as the ability for a leader and an organization to consciously approach a social media storm with optimism and to calmly bounce back from adverse conditions and conflicts (Luthans, 2002). However, we also wish to focus upon the joint ability and the responsibility of the manager and other members of an organization, the technology, and the stakeholders to accom­ modate the adversity to address the causes of the adversity. One of the pioneers of resilience theory, Norman Garmezy (Rolf & Glantz, 2002), studied the factors of a person’s background or personality that could enable success despite challenges. Factors of resilience are a positive attitude, optimism about the ability to regulate emotions, and the capacity to see failure and criticism as a form of useful feedback. Related concepts such as agility or versatility refer to the capability to transform and reinvent (Tugade et al., 2004; Bahrami & Evans, 2011). Resilience only shows when people experience obstacles, stress, and other environmental threats and can hardly be captured by psychological tests. In consequence, when the social media storm hits, it will tell whether the manager succumbs or surmounts (Konnikova, 2016). Gever Tulley, the American writer, entrepreneur, and computer scientist was quoted as saying, “Persistence and resilience only come from having been given the chance to work through difficult problems” while Nelson Mandela once stated, “Do not judge me by my success, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again”.

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Several elements seem to predict resilience. A study by Werner (1993) showed that resilient children tended to “meet the world on their own terms”. They were autonomous and independent, would seek out new experiences, and had a “po­ sitive” social orientation. Perhaps most importantly, the resilient children had an “internal locus of control”, meaning that they believed that they affected their achievements and not their circumstances. Managers with an internal locus are perceiving less stress and performing better (Anderson, 1977). Changing one’s locus from external to internal leads to positive changes in both psychological well-being and objective work performance (Kottika et al., 2020). This confirms that social media storm events in themselves do not have much predictive power when it comes to outcomes. It is only predictive if there is a negative response. Werner (1993) also found that the cognitive skills that underpin resilience can be learned over time which raises the question of how resilience might be learned. Teaching managers to reframe a social media storm in positive terms when the initial response is negative or in a less emotional way when the initial response is emotionally hot (Healey & Hodgkinson, 2017) also change how managers ex­ perience and respond to the social media storm. The majority of the managers we surveyed found that social media storms can boost transparency and would like to utilize the situation as a way of creating transparency. They displayed resilient thinking when saying that they listen to and respect emotions espoused in a social media storm without necessarily agreeing with them, but when looking at the managers with social media storm experi­ ences, it seems to make managers more upset, and that does not necessarily lead to resilience as otherwise assumed. People can also become less resilient or less likely to be resilient. Werner (1993) discovered that most people have a breaking point when the stressors become so intense that resilience is overwhelmed. Unfortunately, people can create or exaggerate stressors very easily in their own minds; for instance, when managers frame social media storm as a threat and a potentially traumatic event, it may become an enduring problem, where the management and the organization, in general, become more inflexible and more likely to be negatively affected. In the next section, we outline how managers can approach social media storms differently by being resistant or resilient.

Resistance towards social media storms Resistant managers tend to frame social media storm as a threat to be eliminated. They are being governed by corporate beliefs about the value and need for crisis management (Pauchant & Mitroff, 1988) and by a “flee or fight” response, like targeting negative customers through strategic communication suggested by Grégoire et al. (2015, p. 180): “The firm could politely communicate that it was not aware of this situation, which would relay good faith and intention; this may be necessary to counteract customers’ and third-parties’ tendency to assume bad intentions when communication is lacking.

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After engaging in a reasonable round of negotiation to solve the problem, the firm should close the cycle by communicating the outcomes on social media, regardless of whether they are positive or negative”. The propensity to experience a social media storm as a crisis situation is evoked by the manager’s interpretation of customers’ negative posts. Managers who instantly perceive social media storm as a threat may lose the ability to integrate diverse material (see Isen, 2000), leading to risk-averse behavior and an exploitation focus rather than exploration strategies (Day & Nedungadi, 1994). For example, the manager of a large American fast-food chain quoted here acknowledges the customer empowerment, but he assumes that social media escalate crises that will hurt sales: “The traditional business model, that business governs the process is upended. Instead, customers control business. They can start online petitions, viral videos, they can post a video of something really bad that happened in the restaurant and people will hear it and talk about it. Once you have enough social momentum, reports will start picking that up. Now it blows up from a niche thing that happened in Iowa to international news and that is really bad, that will hurt sales” (in Rydén et al., 2015, p. 131). The intent of a categorical apology response is to silence the customer commu­ nication rather than exploring the potential of a dialog with emotionally engaged stakeholders. What is really needed is to consider the nature of the social media storm more carefully or see the interest customers might have in engaging and dialoguing with the company, thus stimulating creative problem solving and ac­ tivating flexible cognitive skills.

Resistance rooted in managerial assumptions At the beginning of the 20th century and until the 1950s, the prevailing man­ agement discourse was business-centric and characterized by rationalization and management control (Gardner & Thomas, 1985). The attitude of authoritarian managers was to tell customers what to believe (Cohen & Levinthal, 1990) and ultimately what to buy. In a more recent version of company-controlled inter­ action (i.e., the resource-based view, Wernerfelt, 1984), companies adopt media strategies and tactics to brand themselves, advertise, and sell more products and services to the customer (Winer, 2009). Interaction is a management-steered, one-way process in which the company sets the direction and message content delivered through different channels to the passive customers, which initiates resistance against customer action. Shannon and Weaver (1949) reflect this view by depicting communication as a process of transmitting messages. Being governed by this line of thinking, managers show less concern over listening or enhancing customer voice, or encouraging customer empowerment. Instead, they aim at

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maintaining control because negative mention (cause) is assumed to impact brand value negatively (effect) and must be handled as a threat as proposed by Pearson and Clair (1998, p. 73): “The visibility of the affected organization or the affected industry will influence success outcomes so that positive exposure will increase crisis management success outcomes and negative exposure will increase crisis management failure outcomes”. Moreover, the business-centric manager expects that corporate communication can calm down customers and accommodate their social media behavior ac­ cordingly, i.e., stop negative posting (see Law et al., 2003). The managerial efforts are deemed effective and successful when the organization is able to: (1) regain the momentum of core activities necessary for satisfying the needs of their customers; (2) minimize the loss of stakeholders; and (3) learn and prevent the company from facing similar incidents in the future (Pearson & Clair, 1998). Shrivastava’s (1993) 4Cs framework rests on the underlying assumptions of the resistant approach. It describes crises as: Causes (failures triggering the crisis and the antecedent conditions that allow failures to occur), Consequences (the immediate and long-term impacts), Caution (the measures taken to prevent or minimize the impact of a potential crisis), and Coping (measures taken to respond to a crisis that has already occurred). Here, social media interaction between the company and its stakeholders prior to, during, and after the social media storm is designed to maintain and repair mutually productive relationships and to reduce the damages to the brand value and corporate image (see Bruning & Ledingham, 2000). An underlying “risk-of-failure attitude” encourages the manager to eliminate the problem or minimize the impact of the social media storm. Social media storms can impact profits negatively as well as positively (Pfeffer et al., 2014; Rydén et al., 2020). However, surviving a social media storm is not a criterion for success, especially not when measured as the customers’ dedication to the company vision, mission, and willingness to co-create brand value (Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004). Rather, we find that success should be measured as the ability to lead by providing vision and direction during times of change and uncertainty and resolutely shape the future in concert with stakeholders and social technology rather than adjusting to it, which aligns with a locus of control, i.e., the ability to manage your own faith (Kottika et al., 2020).

Resilience towards social media storms Resilient managers act differently from resistant managers. They may actively seek opportunities, which more likely lead to a positive turnaround instead of reacting default to the negative circumstances (Werner, 1993). Research shows that managers, who perceive markets as opportunities, are willing to take greater risks, commit more resources, and are more adept at taking explorative initiatives (White et al., 2003). Resilient managers are more concerned about “establishing

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common meaning”, “sharing”, and “transparency”, so this way of thinking upends the strategic assumptions by seeing social media storm in a customer empower­ ment perspective (see Kietzmann et al., 2011; Labrecque et al., 2013) where social media potentially empowers customers as well as companies to change the char­ acter of social lives, on both an interpersonal and a community level (Ellison et al., 2009). With this way of thinking, social media development facilitates and enables managers to transfer the logic and assumptions of social business onto their stra­ tegic response to social media storms (see Yunus & Weber, 2007). Resilient managers better accept consumers as people with a voice, heart, and conscience, so when they show anger towards a company, the task is to listen and respect those emotions in a constructive manner; but not necessarily agree with them. This dynamic strategy approach of “leadership-in-action” emphasizes consumer em­ powerment through open and equal sharing (Zahra & Nambisan, 2012). Meaningful interactions with stakeholders help the organization in creating and maintaining social ties around the brand. From a learning perspective, managers and companies should continuously practice an open dialog to further strengthen the engagement, create opportunities for exploring the business-customer re­ lationship, and co-create mutual learning. Companies are not regarded as superior to consumers, yet leadership is appreciated through role model behavior of ex­ pression and engagement that creates followers – even fans. By outlining the differences between resistant and resilient approaches to social media storms, we show that the context of emotions matters in decision-making as it frames managers’ interpretation and use of information (Healey & Hodgkinson, 2017). Because managers draw on their immediate feelings and emotions, relevant or not, as a source of information and can transfer that onto a social media storm, we need to look more closely in this part of cognitive psychology to understand better how and why the perception of social media storm may impact strategy and eventually the outcome. Next, we present two cases of companies who experienced a social media storm to illustrate how they were managed and how their managerial approaches can be identified in the companies’ responses to the social media storm.

Telenor case Telenor is a Norwegian majority state-owned multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Fornebu, Norway. Being one of the world’s largest mobile telecommunications companies with operations worldwide focused in Scandinavia and Asia, it offers a full range of telecommunication services in the Nordic Countries, including mobile and fixed telephony, Internet access, and as well as cable TV access and content (Telenor Annual Report, 2019). Its biggest competitors in the Danish market are TDC and Telia. Since the turn of the millennium, the battle between the two major players and Telenor was motivated by the wish to become the Danish market leader of telecommunication. A fierce

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price-dumping and cost reduction strategy focus left the customer service, com­ munication, and the development of social media in a neglected state. By these managerial dispositions, we argue that the company paved the way for a social media storm. The social media storm began Thursday on August 2, 2012, when a customer, Anders Brinkmann, complained on Telenor’s Facebook page that the company charged him 50 DKK because their automatic payment system did not work properly. The post states: “Dear Telenor, this is the final month as your customer. I have never experienced anything like this. The first four months I had to contact you every time I wanted to pay my bill. You did not manage to install automatic payment; instead, you sent me more than one reminder before sending me the invoice. Though this action is not legal, I forgave you, though I had to spend hours every month talking to customer service and pay an additional DKK 50 fee to pay my bill. Today, I talked to Helle, because my girlfriend’s contract with you had terminated, but still she automatically receives DKK 184 claims (which apparently works here). She tells me that the contract no longer exists, which her superior confirms, though you encourage customers to call customer service if we have any questions. It is quite disgraceful that you cannot even find the contract. Therefore, you cannot tell me whether I have paid too much or too little. I hereby stop all payments from me and my family. Thanks for now, Telenor, I will never recommend you”. The language was fairly sober, calm, and well-articulated and reflected no anger as such; rather, the tone reflects a disappointed customer puzzled by the inefficient system. He could not grasp why Telenor could not make it work. This was the hotbed of the virtual consumer riot since the complaint was the spark that ignited the social media storm a large number of other complaints from dissatisfied cus­ tomers. In less than 24 hours, the complaint received more than 16,000 likes from other Facebook users. For comparison, the company’s Facebook page had close to 26,000 likes at the time. Moreover, the post fed more than 1,500 comments from customers with similar bad experiences with Telenor. It took a while before the management became attentive to the development of the social media storm, but they remained passive rather than investigating the situation. In 2012, Steffen Trannerup was a senior digital consultant with responsibility for social media, marketing, and communication at Telenor. According to him, the management was shocked and said that no one should touch anything until they knew exactly what was happening (Bü low, 2016). We assume that since they had never experienced a situation like this earlier, it made them take the matter very seriously and react in a resistant manner. But this not only shows that the management was very surprised by the strong reaction that the Facebook complaint has caused, it also shows the “freeze” response and as­ sumption that the management could withdraw to the command center, analyze the situation, get an overview, to turn back to employees with the right response.

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As the social media storm accelerated, the employees began to answer the many comments, but they soon discovered that this was impossible with such a few people assigned to the task. The storm seemed to calm down for a short while, which relieved the management. But then the traditional newspaper and television media in Denmark noticed the Facebook post and now brought the history about the attention Brinkmann’s post had received. Less focus was on the why of the social media storm, namely the bad customer service of Telenor, but many Danes knew about the case in the course of a few days. In concert, the online and written media escalated the dissemination of the story, so people who were not on Facebook or Twitter could see what was going on. Though the management realized that the strong reaction on Facebook might have reflected the level of customer dissatisfaction with Telenor, they could not recognize the problem (Wittorff, 2012). This illustrates that when consumers express themselves negatively due to bad experiences with a company, very strong emotions such as anger and frustration are involved on the customer side, but also on the management side (Wetzer et al., 2007; Garg & Kataria, 2013). Wetzer et al. (2007) state that consumers need to take revenge and warn other consumers about the company, but when you look at the posts from consumers, you find a blend of negative and positive reviews. Since reality is more nuanced, emotions can be relieved by widening the perspective. In response to Brinkmann’s complaining Facebook post, Telenor blamed his bank for the troubles, but later the management admitted the errors they were responsible for and apologized to the public, assuming that this response would resolve the case, as Tom Lehn-Christiansen, communication advisor with Telenor stated (Wittorff, 2012): “We have obviously made a mistake in the specific case, and we apologize, and we have also done so to the customer. So, the case has, as far as I understand, been clarified and resolved”. This statement reflects the assumptions of traditional damage control with the Telenor management: an apology does the trick and closes the case. Though Telenor realized that the strong reaction on Facebook might have reflected the level of customer dissatisfaction with Telenor, they could not recognize the ne­ gative picture the customers were drawing of Telenor’s services in general. Their reflex response is different from a resilient approach of zooming out and calmly reflecting on the big picture: is this only a single case, or are customers paying the price for our partaking in the cost-cutting price battle with competi­ tors? A resilient approach would be asking questions like, “we at Telenor cannot take a customer perspective; only customers can, but the customers’ responses reflect how they experience our business practices, so how can we listen and learn from them? Our mission is excellent customer service so what can we learn? How can we improve what we do by the help of our customers’ engagement?”

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This social media storm experience became an eye-opener to the management with the potential of disrupting not only the managerial mindset of Telenor but the whole Danish telecom industry. The “Promote & Sell” approach they had been executing seemed to be the root cause of the problems the social media storm created public awareness about. Rather, they needed to listen to their customers and alter course towards a Listen & Learn strategy approach (Rydén et al., 2015) (see Chapter 7 for elaboration on these social media strategies). The new CEO, Marec Slacik, announced a new strategy called STORM aimed to shake up the Danish telecom market (Wittorff, 2012). The strategy focused on taking their customers seriously, i.e., acknowledge the issues they were experiencing and improve their customer service. Apparently, this company learned from the social media storm and increased their “internal locus of control”, meaning that they acknowledged that they, and not their circumstances, could affect their achievements. But even more important, the social media storm triggered a larger in­ vestigation, and the results of the survey (Engholm, 2014) pointed towards four general problems of the industry to manage: 1) poor coverage – almost half of all Danes experienced “gaps” in the coverage of their provider, 2) internet/data connection issues, 3) poor service as every third person experiences a long waiting time when they call their telecommunications company, and two out of three calls for customer service outside normal working hours, 4) too complicated products – three out of four have difficulty finding out about the various mobile subscriptions, half have difficulty finding out prices, and one in four believe that telecommunications companies do not live up to their promises. To sum up, the case shows how resistant and resilient approaches were at play during and after this 2012 social media storm. It also illustrated a change over time, which in this case was caused by the replacement of the CEO, also changed the entire strategic outlook, and had positive effects for customers outside Telenor. This was a single event, and critical readers may ask if it is possible for B2B companies, too, to be resilient? Another question could be what if the company experiences recurrent social media storms over the years? The answer to both questions is “yes”, and to illustrate that, the next company case presented at the end of the chapter from the American continent operating in South Europe. The case is used to illustrate how managers assess the dangers of consumer anger and the risk of a social media storm.

Risk impact assessment Organizations influenced by resistant managers may do careful pre-crisis planning to be prepared if and when a social media storm hits. Part of this preparation can be to identify the potential risks and find ways to prevent or minimize those risks. Crisis management involves figuring out the best way to respond when the social media storm occurs, and it differs from risk management, which means looking for ways to minimize risks (Rouse, 2020). As such, risk management is an important

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part of crisis management, but crisis management covers incident response, which is also a resilient action, whereas risk management focuses on internal analysis, decision-making, and preparation. So how can companies prepare? Usually, as­ sumptions about “what is the problem here” are set before a social media storm hits and may trigger auto-responses making managers ready for formulating what they want to achieve and what the responses to the public should be. Some or­ ganizations establish a communication task force during this phase and work at more detailed levels, draft and test messages, identify allies and ambassadors, create communication plans, and determine the social media storm management process. Others would provide an open and honest flow of information to the public. Generally, more harm is done by organizations trying to silence the social media storm by withholding information or over-reassuring the public than by an angry public acting irrationally. Risk perception of a social media storm involves the measure of risk and the emotions that facing the risk evokes. Some managers mistakenly measure the mag­ nitude of the social media storm only based on how many people are involved or how much profit can be potentially lost. Another way to measure is the level of emotional stresses and trauma associated with it. Risks generated by external forces are likely better tolerated than risks generated by man or institution. Therefore, managers should expect a stronger emotional reaction and more demands for explanations and in­ formation if the behavior that led to the social media storm is intentional and was caused by management decisions. This emotional reaction may be more intense in terms of anger, frustration, helplessness, fear, and a desire for revenge if management decisions have damaging effects for individuals, other companies, or nature. One example of a high-risk social media storm is a “David vs. Goliath” storm that hit a Danish steak house in 2014. Jensen’s Bøfhus (steak house), a larger res­ taurant chain operating in Norway, Sweden, and Germany, brought a case against Jensen’s Fiskerestaurant (fish restaurant). Jacob Jensen owns three fish restaurants and was accused of using the name “Jensen”, which, in fact, is the most common surname in Denmark. Jensen’s Bøfhus lost the case in Commercial Court but won the case on appeal in High Court. They won the right to use the name “Jensen” in the food business and were awarded damages of DKK 200,000. This led to a “Boycott Jensen’s Bøfhus” campaign led by over 100,000 angry Facebook users who found the case unfair and ridiculous. The case became a proxy for the power abuse of large companies using all means for wiping smaller competitors out of the market (Keilberg, 2014). The case example testifies to unusually poor crisis man­ agement and bad risk assessment when Jensen’s Bøfhus arrogantly announced that customers must just understand the matter. That did not exactly help the process and resulted in a DKK 30 mill deficit in 2014. Palle Skov Jensen, the owner of Jensen’s Bøfhus, stated in a press release that the dispute with Jensen’s Fish Restaurant and the subsequent “storm” resulted in fewer guests. They partly blamed the media for the misery and for evoking people’s anger (Witten, 2015), so the media was – according to them – a risk factor. A wide body of research exists on issues sur­ rounding risk communication, but some risks are more accepted than others.

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Managerial framing of risks and opportunities High Risk: Negative sentiment directed towards a person or the company/ brand. The company / manager is at risk. The company can control its own attitude and communication. Emotional impact: Threat to career and reputation. Feelings of powerlessness and helplessness. Feelings of facing malevolence from others and deliberate efforts to harm the company/person. Medium risk: Negative sentiment towards the conversation/actions. This may be harmful to the communication and raise some doubt. The company can to some extent influence the conversation. Emotional impact: Feelings of frustration and being responsible, telling oneself “I should be doing more/better”, and uncertainty, needs for emotional balance and self-control, need for reassuring Low Risk: Generalized negative sentiment. Not to be controlled but influenced. Emotional impact: Feelings of curiosity and empowerment to make a difference, need for engaging with the community and take responsibility

Societal issues Conversation/ Actions Company Person Brand

FIGURE 5.2

Organizational and personal risk assessment model

As Figure 5.2 illustrates, emotional reactions vary and will depend on per­ ceptions about the risk and the stresses the managers experience and anticipate. Managers may experience varied emotional states during a social media storm, and the longer the social media storm lasts, the greater these reactions may be. Thus, the more stress felt in a social media storm, the greater the impact on the in­ dividual, leading to the stronger need for resilience. The magnitude of the social media storm, the emotional impact due to the personal risk that the individual feels, and the management actions towards a resolution are in motion during this phase. During the social media storm, communicators should resiliently express empathy with the engagement but respond in ways that align with their mission to promote the wanted action. In the organization, backstage maintenance often takes place: here, managers assess and explain ongoing risks to the employees and shareholders, while communicators try to segment the crowd, do sentiment analysis, and monitor the social media storm in order to provide the necessary background information and addressing the issues. To ensure that the organization gains a positive social media storm experience, the managers should also take a resilient perspective when evaluating their com­ munication efforts. They should emphasize that a social media storm is a process to learn more and discuss the lessons learned to better embrace future social media storms. Moreover, managers can encourage communicators to keep the mo­ mentum and motivate the stakeholders to stay vigilant but acknowledge un­ certainty and avoid over-reassuring in order to be trustworthy. Moreover, they can empower and engage their communities to help them make informed decisions.

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The next case illustrates how a company assesses risk during a long-lasting social media storm and how the management perceives ongoing adversity, which calls for resilience rather than damage control. The seven risk assessment factors identified are as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Do the stakeholders trust or mistrust the company/industry in general? Who/what does the social media storm hit? Is the social media storm ongoing or reversible? Who/what caused it? Was the social media storm intentional or unintentional? How is the power relationship between the company and the people involved in the social media storm? Which types of media are involved, and how are they involved?

The international mining corporation case The anonymized international corporation operates in Southern Europe in the mining industry. For the past 27 years, they have built partnerships with stakeholders to develop long-term opportunities. They pride themselves on values of being genuine, honest, and straightforward and for behaving responsibly and acting with respect and accountability to establish and maintain good relationships with local communities. Examples of how they add value to communities are providing local workers with well-paying jobs to support their families and building local economies by investing in health, infrastructure, and education initiatives. Being the largest industrial project in the country where the social media storm took place, their investment provides the region with more than a billion Euros in tax revenue and creates thousands of jobs. It is considered the most important foreign investor in the country. Moreover, they claim to listen to and engage with local stakeholders to build meaningful, long-lasting relationships based on trust. They build these relation­ ships before they build a mine. Ongoing dialogue and meetings with locals allow them to better understand stakeholders’ priorities and concerns and ensure that stakeholders understand their values and way of doing business. This enables them to partner with individuals, interest groups, and municipalities to develop in­ itiatives that meet the needs and priorities of local communities. To help these local communities learn more about the corporation’s operations, they invite visitors to their sites. Local communities are often unfamiliar with mining, and the industry is viewed with skepticism. The management recognized this as an op­ portunity to educate people about how mining has evolved in general and about their business approach in particular. Though they claim to strictly adhere to safety and environmental regulations by assessing potential impacts to ensure an en­ vironmental footprint as small as possible, citizens’ groups have opposed the project for years, fearing impacts on the environment and the local industries of tourism and agriculture. An in-depth interview with the Administration Manager of the corporation unveiled central aspects of strategic responses.

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The social media storms have taken many forms during the years: at the be­ ginning, some people accused them of possible environmental destruction (the firm was acquitted in court). Later on, they faced a social media storm accusing them that the agreement that they signed was not for the best interests of the national government. Then they were accused of not paying enough taxes. Basically, different interest groups did what they could to stop the investment. A political group showed its hostility towards the corporation from the very be­ ginning, and after some time of media pressure, the political group succeeded in recalling the license for this investment. The manager explained how he sees companies as scientific and rational, whereas some of their stakeholders can be radical and overtly emotional in their responses. “Usually enterprises use scientific evidence and logical argumentation about an issue. On the other hand, usually people that are activists or people coming from a radical ideology really use the sentiment… It is very difficult for a company to exaggerate in order to persuade people that like exaggerations… If I use an argumentation like that [emotional], I am afraid that there are great chances to lose my credibility to the audience that I really want to be perceived as credible”. The corporation responded to the various social media storms with a scientific narrative, assuming that showing emotions will erode credibility. Interestingly, the quote reveals the manager’s fears and risk assessment (“radical ideology”; “I am afraid that there are great chances”; “I really want to be perceived as credible”) which reflect the underlying emotions and cognitions framing his judgment of the situation and the opposing groups. To reduce the tense relationship with the locals through dialogue, the cor­ poration keeps a transparent culture by allowing visits to the mines. The purpose is to educate the locals so they understand what takes place and why. But the manager pointed out that not all people are open-minded and within reach: “The problem starts when there are people against you who don’t want to be educated…I know from the very beginning that it is very difficult to persuade an activist against us about our morality or about whether the way we are doing things is right. But on the other hand, other parts of the society do not have an opinion against you. I think these are the audiences for you in order to prove yourself and explain what you are doing…” The quote reveals that in the mind of the manager, the social media storm is triggered by “resistant stakeholders”, and they present a risk. The first risk assessment factor we find here is whether the company is trusted or mistrusted in general. The second risk assessment factor is Who does it hit? The sentences “there are people against you” and “activist against us” indicate that the social media storm is perceived as being “personal” to some extent and not directed towards a behavior (against what you do) or a cause (against what we stand for). Thus, we find some traits of resistance.

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Likewise, it is not clear what the manager means by “persuade or educating people or prove yourself” (does it mean convincing people that their business practices are correct and ethical?). We argue that for a change to take place, it also involves the critical voices, not just people with a neutral stance, and education must happen at both sides of the business-stakeholder relationship. The corporation should likewise be open to being educated by the locals and not just seeing them as “people against you”, but as people who are concerned about the environment. Environmental concerns took place on both traditional and social media (Facebook and Twitter). The company monitors its social media presence and strategizes in a dynamic manner because they have to constantly adjust to things happening: “the fact that we were under a constant crisis for the last two years has an impact on things… something always occurs so we have to actually adjust our strategy to what occurs”. This relates to the third risk assessment factor: is the social media storm ongoing or reversible? The manager defines the social media storm as a constant crisis that brings uncertainty navigation into the picture (“something always occurs”) and increases the need for risk assessment as well as the need for managing the emo­ tional alarm system. Due to the involvement of multiple stakeholders in each social media storm, the corporation learned that understanding the locality helped them embrace the reaction and efficiently communicate with each party involved. We could detect elements of resistance as well as resiliency, which affects the risk behavior of the company towards being willing to be in the eye of the storm and even seeing a potential for creating awareness and a moment for getting people’s attention: “I think that in this kind of incident for companies there are great opportunities. Someone could claim that those are the 15 minutes of publicity that the company has, and I still believe that there is no bad publicity. I think that you do have the way as long as you are in the center of the media coverage to prove yourself right and to explain to the public what you are doing". If we look at the fourth risk assessment factor, who and what caused it?, it becomes obvious that the social media storm does not represent the voice of their custo­ mers. In fact, their product is considered as a commodity that will be sold either way. The source of anger can be allocated in local communities near the mining projects and activist groups. The manager said “we have some groups against the company, groups that were pre-organized and they were there before us and they are doing several demonstrations and actions for several social issues, not only against us”.

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He also noted the cultural differences that stem from political preferences among the public opinion concerning the corporation’s investment plans in the region. This relates to the fifth risk assessment factor: was the social media storm intentional or unintentional? The manager stated that for some, it was unintentional, whereas some stakeholders do it on purpose: “There are a lot of social media groups sometimes with fake accounts attacking the company, some newspapers or media that have many ecological sensitivities…they are very difficult to reach and approach in order to have a normal discussion”. The quote reflects traits of social media culture, such as criminal and destructive acts such as making fake accounts and groups purposed to combat the company. In those cases, the chances of creating a positive outcome are slim. Resilience seems to be useful in such instances. The sixth risk assessment factor relates to the power relationship between the company and the opponent individuals, who started the social media storm. Power is a cardinal component of social systems and thus a key human concern that constantly in­ fluences behavior (Labrecque et al., 2013). In some social media storm cases, we meet the “David vs. Goliath syndrome”, where the small consumer goes against the big company and gets support from the crowd. This is what happened in the Croatian Railways case example (Chapter 2). Some marketing management practices rest on a business-centric control premise, and in a social media storm context, the management task becomes to reduce consumer power (Pires et al., 2006). Understanding the relationship between power and knowledge is vital to social media storm management because consumers frame the narratives to state what is right, true, and important to know and do. Here, social media are used as weapons to influence the power relations between consumers and companies. The seventh risk assessment criterion relates to media: which types of media are involved, traditional, social, or both? How are the media used? What is their interest in bringing the social media storm? Which types should the company use? These concerns also affected the company’s approach: “It is a matter of target group. If you want to communicate something efficiently about the company of course you are going to prefer printed media in the case you want to give an extensive interview or article to be read by the audience. If you want something really quick as a response to a Twitter rumor against you of course you are going to use your Twitter account to face it”. The traditional media are regarded as more serious and in-depth channels, whereas social media deliver the message to a bigger audience faster but more superficial. To summarize, this case shows how the manager of the corporation assesses social media storm as a challenge, as well as an opportunity, based on a variety of rational and emotional risk assessment factors (Figure 5.3).

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Is your company trusted or mistrusted in general?

Who does the social media storm hit?

Is the social media storm ongoing or reversible?

Who and what caused the social media storm?

Was the social media storm intented or unintented?

How is the power relationship between the company and the opponent individuals, who started the social media storm?

Which types of media are involved, traditional, social or both?

FIGURE 5.3

The seven risk-assessment factors

A social media storm triggers a feeling state that stimulates resistant or resilient management perceptions that automatically trigger rapid affective responses (Slovic et al., 2004). Negative emotions such as fear and anxiety tend to leave strong affective traces in episodic memory that allow people to draw on experi­ ences and call up past events and emotions, giving them the ability to imagine and anticipate the future (Funches, 2011). Moreover, destructive patterns are more predictive, which helps organizations observe and react towards threatening emotions by knowing their impact and what actions they need to take to em­ power outcomes. For example, educating and communicating the reasons for management actions is seen as an effective way to gain customer support in wildlife tourism experiences (Curtin, 2010). Emotions have vital social functions and consequences as they influence the behavior of the people who experience them, as well as the behavior of those who perceive them. Social media storm risk management can have negative reactions and consequences for the organization (Shankar et al., 2006) if the emotional impact and personal risk factors are not addressed. The cases illustrate the re­ lationships between social media and negative emotions, being the two central drivers of a social media storm (see Figure 5.4). But the manager’s framing is also essential, being either company-centered, leading to a resistant approach, or

Managerial framing of risks and opportunities Perspective

Outcome

Consumer empowerment (customer-centered)

Win-win-win: Increased understanding and support for consumers-companycommunity

Resilience

“Here is my opinion” Generalized anger towards a theme. Companies are just proxies

Reframing

Social media SMS Drivers Negative emotion

“I got carried away” Arousal driven by the conversation

SMS

“Protest!” Local voices calling for action and support

Responsibility

106

“This is personal” Anger directed towards a person or company

Company control (company-centered)

FIGURE 5.4

Resistance

Win-lose: Defeat or truce between stakeholders and companies through apology or silence

Drivers, perspective, and outcome of social media storms

Source: Rydén et al. (2020) and adapted by the resilience and resistant approaches

consumer-centered, leading to resilience. Social media communities appear stronger than empowered individuals, which adds to the dynamics of the con­ sumer empowerment construct (Labrecque et al., 2013). The cases also show that resilience help managers to creatively and effectively tap into the communities of empowered consumers. They enable further sharing of opinions and experiences, leading to a win-win-win outcome, whereas a resistant approach is more likely to end in a win-lose scenario. Also, the cases show that when companies fail to connect with their stakeholders on social media in a crisis, they also fail to reach them in a significant enough way to successfully manage the crisis. Figure 5.4 provides an overview of the social media storm management processes.

Concluding discussion By understanding the cognitive and emotional factors along with knowledge in social media and crisis management, organizations should be able to handle social media storms by coping with the negative consequences they may or may not have and increase the positive consequences social media storms can also bring. As Marie Curie was quoted as saying, "Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood”. A social media storm is a fairly new phenomenon in business management, which tends to be met by old mental frames, so leaders, as well as experts in the field, have limited information and data on social media storms and how to manage them properly. In consequence, management approaches should explain this new phenomenon to extend the works of, e.g., Romenti and Murtarelli (2014), who

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try to divide the crisis into different phases in order to best formulate the correct action plan and to identify the type of crisis and who is responsible for the crisis. The assumption is that the organization can find the correct response strategy and communicate it. Social media and its users do not follow such rules; they have reinvented the game completely. Therefore, managers need to develop novel strategies for encouraging eWOM behavior among their users (see Chapter 8). Building resilience is an important part of growth and change. There are several ways to cultivate and inspire resilience in people. A good start is focusing on how you communicate and how it empowers you as a manager because each framing of a social media storm will tilt the organization toward one kind of solution or one range of options. A social media storm is, in fact, a metaphor used to succinctly describe a situation to others. Metaphors are very powerful, but they can also constrict our thinking because they are part of how we frame problems and si­ tuations. Managers, therefore, need to surface their implicit assumptions that are part of their mental frames and then probe, validate, and test those very carefully. That is also part of being a resilient manager, by which you affect the entire organization and help your employees become more flexible when facing ad­ versity or change in general. More importantly, resilience helps people cope with negative emotions and receive feedback, not only with customers and external stakeholders but also with co-workers. On the other hand, a “conspiracy of optimism” should also be avoided as it fosters a climate in which organizational pressure suppresses the acknowledgment of ambiguity and uncertainty, leading to the development of “irrational objec­ tivity”, which also relates to social conformity (Chapman et al., 2006). Referencing F. Scott Fitzgerald, the author of The Great Gatsby, “The test of a firstrate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposite ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function”. When managers and employees can hold the power of competing frames and not allow one definition of a situation to constrict the range of options considered is absolutely critical. Building such capabilities affects the culture and, eventually, the performance positively because people can better stay motivated and engaged during stressful situations, which increases productivity (Tracom Infographic). The next chapter provides a reflective framework for managers to interact successfully with their stakeholders on social media.

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6 REFLECTIVE AND RESILIENT LEADERSHIP OF SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS

The Copenhagen Zoo case The case shows how the Zoo management framed and analyzed, and identified the game-changing potential of the social media storm, and generated positive brand awareness from a resilient management approach. We published this study together with Professor Morrison in 2019 based on in-depth interviews and secondary data, such as newspaper articles, websites, annual reports of the zoo, substantiated by a sentiment analysis of the social media storm conducted by Zimmerman et al. (2014). Founded in 1859, Copenhagen Zoo is one of the oldest zoos in Europe. It is driven by a vision to become Denmark’s leading cultural institution through innovative communication, education, and display. As an active nature conservation company with a global perspective on the environment and sustainability, it aims to become respected for its high ethical standards. In February 2014, the management took the vital but risky decision to euthanize one of its young male giraffes, Marius, despite massive protests. In compliance with the European Breeding Program, a transfer to another zoo would cause inbreeding, hence zoos manage their animal populations to ensure they remain healthy, and Copenhagen Zoo typically does that by putting down 20–30 animals a year. As a common practice, the zoo publicly announced the event, and children witnessed the postmortem examination for education. The remains ended up as lion food, and some were used for research studies. This event was announced in advance, and knowledge of this euthanasia quickly spread across conventional and social media, and since people affectionately relate to giraffes, it led to massive global protests and mourning (Zimmermann, 2014). The blog poster by Dr. Rex (2014) shows that it became highly personal and dramatic (https://hrexach.wordpress.com/2 014/02/11/marius-a-young-giraffe-copenhagen-zoo/).

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The Zoo staff was called “barbarians” and “murderers” and a “Close the Danish zoo” Facebook group quickly got more than 15,000 followers (Rydén et al., 2020). The Marius case even got its own Wikipedia page (Wikipedia, 2014). Despite this social media storm, measurable negative effects on Google, and advice from experts, the Zoo did not apologize, nor in other conventional ways, met the demands. The Zoo’s Administrative Director, Steffen Stræde, had received death threats but would not alter his decision (BBC News February 9, 2014). He stated that "Giraffes today breed very well, and when they do you have to choose and make sure the ones you keep are the ones with the best genes” (Warnock, 2014) and argued that their core values of transparency and honesty would protect them and that the real threat rises if the social media storm hits the company's core values. He stressed that fear is the real enemy and that companies often exaggerate the effects. His strategy was to stay firm on their decision and keep cool while explaining the necessity of this action. Also, Bent Holst, the Zoo’s scientific director, said the emotional protests would not alter their decision, which was taken on a factual and proper basis. “It’s important that we try to explain why we do it and then hope people understand it. If we are serious about our breeding activities, including participation in breeding programmes, then we have to follow what we know is right. And this is right”. The global reactions on social media were larger in volume and stronger in negative sentiment than the local reactions of the Danes, who are their customer base. The reactions were primarily expressed on Twitter, which counted for 75% of the total online conversation, which is a less popular medium in Denmark (Zimmermann, 2014). The director did not blame people for the situation but explained how the social media configuration affected the way things were stated, “The story took off on Twitter. The problem with Twitter, or the balance with Twitter, is that the statements have to be more extreme if you have 140 characters to make a point, so the social media storm did not represent the voice of the loyal or potential customers”. The management kept their heads cool but hearts warm in the sense that they appealed to the common love for wildlife and focused on doing what has to be done from that point of departure. In an organizational context, being fully aware of the role of social media, the task was to define the type of business-stakeholder interactions that best allowed for developing shared meaning and vision between the Zoo and its stakeholders. We elaborate this in Chapter 7.

A reflective approach to media storms Many organizations get into a social media storm without knowing why. Categorical thinking among managers is one reason, according to the previous chapter.

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When managers repeat current norms and practices without considering what their stakeholders are thinking and feeling, the negative consequences of decisionmaking typically only become obvious in hindsight. In times of market disruptions, it can be helpful for managers to stay aware of the force of preferred thinking to scrutinize their basic assumptions and adjust their strategic thinking and act accordingly to successfully interact with their stakeholders. Exploring the underlying aspects and assumptions is the first step towards reframing (Nutt, 1998). Many organizations also end in a social media storm situation without knowing what to do. With a fear of the unknown, the management may feel helpless when acknowledging that the social media storm is out of control and that they have no power to improve the situation or protect themselves or their companies. Some managers may resign mentally or physically when they let their feelings of fear, anxiety, and confusion grow, which blocks the possibilities of constructive action. Taking control over one's own emotions can be an action that can help restore a sense of control and overcome feelings of helplessness during a social media storm. This chapter allows organizations to consider the social media storm from the cognitive-emotional perspective. A dual perspective offers more options in strategic decision-making and makes it easier to handle potential threats and detect windows of opportunity in a reflective manner. By doing so, managers can begin to consider the strategic opportunities of a social media storm. We found central aspects of a resilient framing that partly explains how the Zoo Director influenced their strategic response and the successful outcome as well as the director of the mining corporation mentioned in Chapter 5. We explain how managers develop the skills needed for conducting resilient leadership during crisis situations as well as in general. The process driving this cognitive, emotional, and cultural coping at the individual, as well as organizational level, is an ongoing engagement with the stakeholders. It is in this continuously reflective learning-through-interaction that windows of opportunity emerge. First, we explain why emotional self-awareness and emotional intelligence (EQ) can help managers develop organizational resilience and craft social media storm responses and actions in ways that strengthen the business-customer engagement and increase the value outcome of a social media storm. We also present the Copenhagen Zoo case to demonstrate how management strategically responded to a “high risk” social media storm by keeping the focus on their mission and identity in their response to the public, however in an untraditional manner, as the CEO explained: “I have decided not to run a regular value process with value words and vision, mission, because I want to do it differently. I am so fortunate right now that we have a PhD student, who is following me for the next three years in order to actually document the way that we are doing it… I think that is quite extraordinary. It is also a little bit scary, because it means that I have a shadow for the next three years overlooking my shoulders and to see if what we are doing is working. We are rolling it out as we go along, so we don’t have a finished product or anything or leadership approach to communicate”.

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This learning approach to strategy enables the zoo management to act on the fly and being more responsive to what is going on around them rather than looking into strategic plans. What made their strategy particularly effective was the assumptions and knowledge of the nature of the social media storm that the Director held. Although social media provided platforms for provoking negative sentiment momentum at a global scale, it may only have a minor damaging effect on the brand, and in the best case, strengthen the brand if the company takes a resilient management approach.

What emotions does the social media storm evoke in you? First of all, the manager should prioritize time for critical reflection of the situation and ask: “what emotional reactions does a social media storm evoke in me and my peers?” The resistant and resilient framings presented in Chapter 5 direct managerial attention towards central aspects that promote this emotional awareness. They further enable managers to fundamentally redirect organizational attention from damage-controlling to potentiality-seeking behavior. Healey and Hodgkinson (2017, p. 117) underscore how important it is to gain emotional situation awareness as it can help managers “understand what steps are needed to enable the executive team to process information more deeply and critically, while keeping an eye on the bigger picture”. This is likely to offer a more adequate perspective of strategic adaptation from the lenses of psychological foundations (Healey & Hodgkinson, 2017). Setting emotions on the management agenda and scrutinizing sensitive issues are definitely conducive to building emotional intelligence and resilient leadership. Healey and Hodgkinson (2017, p. 127) state, “feeling secure in the self creates a psychological buffer that unblocks the desire to protect the self from threatening information, leaving people more inclined to consider new information”. The findings similarly show that when managers fail to question the underlying assumptions when judging the social media storm they are facing, they risk overlooking customers’ need of feeling empowered, which may trigger unwanted power struggles.

Managing emotions is also managing the social media storm Being able to manage emotions is also a vital part of managing the social media storm on the company end. For example, in some cases, a perceived threat can motivate and help managers take desired actions, but oftentimes, fear of the unknown or the feeling of uncertainty may be the most debilitating of the psychological responses to social media storm and prevent managers from taking action. Fear is an important psychological consideration in response to a social media storm. When people are afraid and do not have adequate information, they

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may react in inappropriate ways to avoid the threat. Thus, managers do not passively detect information and then react to it; rather, they construct perceptions of the social media storm as the architects of their own experience, and their feelings are a critical determinant of the experience they create. In the Zoo case example, despite this social media storm, measurable negative effects on Google, and advice from experts, the Zoo Director did not apologize, nor in other conventional ways, met the customers’ immediate demands of changing actions. Being an organization grounded in their core values of honesty and transparency protected them and helped them eventually meet the customers’ deeper expectations of a zoo as a wildlife protecting institution: “We need to make sure that people understand how things work and how nature is. That is the whole purpose of being here, not just to show funny animals. I did not have any concerns. I was absolutely sure that what we did was right…Nobody in this process came up with an argument for not doing it”. He defined fear for reputation damage as the real enemy and that companies often exaggerate the effects of a social media storm, assuming that the social media storm did not represent the voice of the loyal or potential customers. Their sense-giving approach was using scientific language to avoid undermining the opportunity to manage the Zoo scientifically and professionally while people’s language was strongly emotional. For example, the Zoo approached the social media storm through transparency and adhered to the strategic pillars of a clear corporate mission and vision. “…I have introduced a very high level of transparency, very high level of honesty, and openness about what we do, even when it is critical, even when it is a Marius case… You can say that people got educated during the Marius case. They were severely educated, because there were so many things that people didn’t see… We could see, during the lion case that came five weeks later (another euthanization), on Facebook that people were explaining to each other why we were doing this”. The Zoo kept meeting the public anger with this scientific and animal ethical discourse rather than accommodating the criticism and demands put forward by people on social media. The reason was to make sure that people understand how things work and how nature is and not just to show funny animals, as the Director put it. The management kept a high level of transparency about what they do during the social media storm to enact its mission, which prepared them for justification of their purpose at any moment. The Zoo case reflects external affirmation from the stakeholders. For instance, six weeks after Copenhagen Zoo euthanized the giraffe, they euthanized lion cubs, but this was never blown into a global social media storm because, in particular, their stakeholders legitimated this decision based on the insights into wildlife conditions that the giraffe social media storm caused.

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In situations when managers face a social media storm, and the personal and financial stakes are deemed high, emotions come into play instantly, but often subconsciously, influencing decision-making. Being subjected to an escalating social media storm, the management may feel that they unwillingly sit at a public “negotiation table”. Some may even experience a negation of their leadership, feeling forced to surrender their power and follow by the massive protests. Thus, with a social media storm, external struggles may follow to define the reality because they do not share a common way of making sense of their experience of the situation in question. But internal struggles may also occur due to expectations of traditional authoritarian leadership, where it is the CEO who defines the reality, not the stakeholders of the organization. Patriarchal culture and hierarchical power structures have in-built triggers of resistant thinking because the manager is expected to perform as “the strong leader” and will be seen as failing in her/his organizational role if he/she is not able to firmly protect its reputation and set the direction of the company. Managers must therefore be attentive to their own emotions. This is supported by Reid (2008), who spoke with Canadian leaders, for example, the leader of Homewood, to identify attributes of resilience. Factors that were important to managing disruptive events were having a strong sense of self-esteem, being empathetic, and managing the give and take of interpersonal interactions. Also, the EQ consultant Byron Stock underscored how important it is for managers to be able to manage their own emotions to be resilient, not only when they are under severe pressure but in general to create environments in which people want to work and live. Besides paying attention to own emotions, it is equally important to acknowledge stakeholders' emotions, particularly because the source of empowerment is emotions. The next step towards resilient leadership and creating value coherence is to rethink a social media storm from being an emotional circus of anger and revenge to focus on its empowering effects, asking what are the motivations of people for engaging in the social media storm?

Value customer voice and emotion A social media storm can be defined as a distinct type of online consumer behavior, which requires a larger portion of empathy and emotional stamina from the organization. One important step that leaders need to take to accomplish is acknowledging the situation based on analysis of the resistant and resilient approaches while acknowledging the emotional mechanisms activated in the management team when a social media storm hits. Valuing the customer anger that drives it is an important part of the process and building value congruence (Bundy et al., 2018). This “mirror exercise” of taking a stakeholder perspective not only helps the managers to understand the impact and nature of emotions on human actions in general; but also eases the process of building a transparent organization. This is vital because when organizations reject or “distort” certain actions or lie to the public, it consequently triggers a stakeholder call for transparency.

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Understanding the diverging emotions such as frustration and powerlessness as well as solidarity and support that may lie behind the angry posts is part of this step, too. Managers can express empathy for the uncertainty that the members of the organization experience and share with them the process you are using to get more information about the evolving situation. It can feed more empathy in the stakeholder communication. Transparency will help people to manage their anxiety inside as well as outside the organization. Tell people what you know and what you do not know and what you do in the process, rather than giving promises you cannot keep. During the social media storm, the Zoo management was paying close attention to the emotional factors, partly because the anger was so fierce but also because they seemed to understand why people reacted so strongly. They embraced the negative reactions and refused to deploy the usual PR crisis tools. How the Zoo Director interpreted the emotions at play and assessed the risk shows that he acknowledged their emotional reactions. Due to the cuteness factor and the bizarreness in killing a perfectly healthy baby giraffe, he expected a very strong emotional reaction but assumed that the anger espoused was not deep-seated, but rather spontaneous emotional arousal triggered by these aspects: “This case was a bomb waiting to go off. It probably was triggered by the pictures that were taken of the long eyelashes and the fact that it [Marius] was named with a human name…also that was announced in advance, so a lot of people, I think, thought now I have a chance to engage myself in something I can prevent”. Moreover, he spotted the crowd’s positive intentions and, to some extent, instinct-driven need for protecting little defenseless Marius. In the perspective of the social media storm participants, they were actually doing what they considered the right thing to do. However, people’s strongly emotional discourse was met by scientific discourse. The strategy was to keep cool while explaining the necessity of this action to ensure professionalism in wild-animal welfare. He went beyond simply observing the public as angry customers and resiliently tried to understand the stakeholders and their roles in the context, “You can get in a very close dialog with a lot of people, who really want to know more, that you have a very good relation to. Then don’t worry about all the negative stuff, because you cannot control it anyway”. With this empowering effect, social media storms may have the capacity to force managers into a “Listen & Learn” empathetic mode, which we explain in the next chapter (Rydén et al., 2015) and is yet an argument for the potential of a social media storm. The aim of educating people is rooted in their mission and identity, coupled with the attention to the emotional need of its stakeholders and people, in general, to be close to unspoiled nature.

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“I think, it is a risk that people are getting so detached from nature that they get a totally unrealistic view on how we interact with nature and what we eat and why we do it. It is our job to slow down that detachment from nature”. While being aware of the importance of customer loyalty, the Zoo management saw the social media storm as a window of opportunity to raise global awareness about what they do in zoos and why to increase customer loyalty. Like the zoo Director, resilient managers can more easily consider social media storm as a novel type of brand cocreation that promotes transparency where the customers play a proactive role in the creation of value for companies. Social media storm management becomes an issue of brand governance because it implies that companies share control over their brands with stakeholders, who increasingly demand to know the company and what it stands for. Resilience was crucial to the Zoo’s success in handling a global social media storm, and several preconditions were important for developing and utilizing this approach. Animal welfare concerns took place on both traditional media and Facebook and Twitter. The zoo monitored its social media presence and strategized in a dynamic manner because they had to constantly adjust to things happening. The director of the Zoo strongly opposed classical strategic communication; instead, he prioritized a high level of professionalism in wildanimal welfare. By doing so, the Zoo managed to bridge the voices and direct people’s attention towards a more long-term shared interest in protecting wildlife. “The whole spin culture in communication is built on the idea that you can control how it is perceived by people”. Important for managing this phenomenon is understanding that leadership is essentially a social process of managing meaning defined through interaction. Hence, the leadership motives of engaging in a social media storm, combined with the awareness of emotions and framing mechanisms, underpin the company response that is triggering a social media storm. Rethinking a social media storm as a vehicle for customer voice enabled the Zoo to take a “long-sighted” company mission lens rather than a “myopic” crisis communication lens: enlighten, educate, and thus empower the stakeholders at a higher level. It, therefore, provides a step for managers to build resilience. More importantly, since social media storm motivations are usually anchored in the emotional state of the consumers, we suggest that managers focus on building emotional abilities. Emotional intelligence (EQ) and management of emotions are the core of social media storm management, as Kidwell et al. (2011, p. 82) state, EQ will “more likely generate positive feelings toward customers and create relationships characterized by goodwill and understanding. They [managers] are more likely to be viewed as nonmanipulative and genuine in their interpretation and understanding of customers’ emotions, which should lay the groundwork for establishing and maintaining long-term customer relationships”.

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The concept of Emotional Intelligence (EQ) People have unique levels of emotional knowledge underlying their emotional abilities, also referred to as emotional intelligence (EQ), which helps distinguish people who understand emotions from those who get lost in them (Mayer et al., 2000). Following Goleman (1995), EQ can be a critical factor affecting a person’s resilience during crises such as a social media storm. This is because an empathetic person with a high degree of (self-) awareness can socially adapt to the people engaged in the social media storm and will be able to thrive on a crisis because they can better handle unexpected and unfortunate circumstances. In addition, emotionally intelligent people know how to provide empathy to those around them who may also be affected by a crisis or dire situation. Being supportive and compassionate to others can have a positive impact on our emotional adjustment – when we feel needed and believe that we can help others, we also become stronger and more resilient (Goleman, 1995). Developed in childhood, our ability to process and use emotional information can strongly affect interactions and social influence. Managing with a high EQ means that they can more effectively perceive, use, understand, and manage the emotions involved in the social media storm. Such behavior is also consistent with customer orientation, requiring that managers “engage in behaviors that increase customer satisfaction and avoid behaviors leading to customer dissatisfaction” (Dunlap et al., 1988, p. 178). Moreover, with a high EQ, the organization members can better assess customers’ needs in the particular situation and respond to it appropriately by explaining the situation more effectively relative to the customer’s current emotional state and avoiding escalating the social media storm. Thus, customer orientation reflects the ability to use emotional information obtained through the social media storm to build a stronger relationship with its customers. EQ can be taught and applied to a social media storm context. Building experience with emotion management may further enhance the managers’ self-confidence, which may increase their willingness to further explore the potential of social media storms. Inherent emotions like fear and anxiety are both highly intense and highly relatable and often overrule all logic. Emotions are significant because they make us react strongly. Since it is a critically important challenge, emotion management should be discussed, strategized, and rehearsed on a continuous basis. Not just in the case of a social media storm, but in all forms of everyday corporate communication contexts. To manage an emotionally impactful social media storm, the managerial focus needs to be on reaching the hearts of your stakeholders in order to then be able to reach their minds. The best way to do this is to develop a trusting, emotional relationship with your stakeholders prior to ever experiencing a crisis. In some cases, a social media storm strikes for organizations that have not built up an emotional connection with their stakeholders. It also happens that the emotional impact is simply too strong, which escalates the social media storm, and even in such situations, resilience is the best approach. The management should

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try to understand the emotional impact by asking questions that help you take the position of your stakeholders: • • • • •

What is the emotion our stakeholders are feeling? What in particular is causing them to feel this way? If I were in their shoes, what would I want from the organization? What would I expect of the organization? How can I shape my communications and actions to be emotionally impactful and relatable?

Social media storms do not always empower people in the form of public redemption of justice. When companies apologize, go with the flow, and meet immediate demands, it may be at the expense of the integrity and identity of the company, prevent value coherence at a higher level, and eventually reduce customer trust and loyalty. The findings indicate that the ability to quickly recognize and read emotions and managing them are effective ways to emotional leadership of the organization. Particularly useful is: (1) to perceive how the customer feels in various situations without turning defensive, but knowing which emotions are useful in various settings; (2) to understand how negative emotions might evolve given a customers’ current emotional state and manage emotions to reduce frustration and anxiety or elevate moods through positive emotion. Attending to customers’ needs uttered in the social media storm (customer orientation) and influencing them (engage forcefully in the dialog) are more positively related to performance when people possess high EQ. Also, managing their emotions and understanding the consumers’ emotions are likely to perform more effectively. Thus, we are arguing for the complementary effect of resilience and emotional abilities (EQ) on customer engagement and leadership of social media storms and, consequently, company performance. Therefore, we suggest that leaders aim to recognize relevant emotions involved in social media storms and use them to suit their stakeholders’ needs for emotionally facilitating types of interaction. This leads to the third step of building resilience. Understanding own emotions while embracing the emotions of the stakeholders can trigger value thinking, even during adversity situations like a social media storm, as leaders are responsive to the promotive factors of the social media storm for creating valuable dialogs. This helps them create true leadership, change focus and redefine immediate interests into higher order purposes such as sustainability and corporate social responsibility.

Practice value thinking Leaders who can read their customers’ emotions more effectively can learn which emotions are useful relative to customers’ needs; understand how fear, anxiety, or frustration make customers feel; and manage emotions toward finding common ground which leads to positive outcomes for the customer, company, and in some

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cases, society, too. EQ can alleviate negative emotions and enhance positive ones without repressing or exaggerating the information the company conveys. Similarly, leaders are likely to perform better if they can keep their emotions on a leach after experiencing a social media storm from spilling into subsequent situations. Instead, they should consider each social media storm as a unique opportunity for interacting with their stakeholders and integrate their experience of emotional information into their responses. EQ is a prerequisite for developing resilient leadership because it empowers people – the ones who exercise it and the ones who are exposed to it and creates a solid foundation for win-win situations. The more empathetic understanding professionals have, the better they are at meeting the needs of their customers (Homburg et al., 2009), stakeholders, and members of their organization. Only a few studies have identified what emotional abilities help leaders and marketers understand and determine how to interpret emotions and use them in marketing exchanges to enhance performance (Palmatier et al., 2009). If managers and marketers do not understand how anxiety and frustration can lead to anger, and if they do not know which emotions can reduce tension with the customers or themselves, they will not be able to help their customers – or themselves. Instead, they may risk appearing as uncaring, insincere, cynical, or even manipulative, which may trigger a vicious circle of negative emotional escalation. Leaders who have control over – and knowledge of – their own emotions and the emotions of their customers will not only perform more effectively but also more proficiently employ strategies designed to create and maintain strong positive customer relationships (Kidwell et al., 2011).

Resilient leaders – riders on the storm Leadership is socially constructed through interaction (Berger & Luckmann, 1966; Weick, 1995; Weick et al., 2005) and can be defined as “the process whereby one or more individuals succeeds in attempting to frame and define the reality of others” (Smircich & Morgan, 1982, p. 258). Smircich and Morgan (1982) explain how leadership is most evident in unstructured group situations where leadership emerges naturally and spontaneously, making which makes it a central concept for understanding organized action and its potential and possibilities in terms of leaders and followers. If we look at the social media storm mechanisms from a leadership perspective, we find interesting observations, and not only in terms of “social media followers”. A social media storm is predominantly opinion-based, not fact-based, thus being affective in nature (Pfeffer et al., 2014). This opinion-driven form of organizing resonates well with Smircich & Morgan’s (1982, p. 257) definition, as the participants “enact a particular form of social reality with far-reaching, but often poorly understood and appreciated, consequences”. As mentioned in Chapter 2, the primary factors leading to social media storm behavior are consumers’ desire for social (inter)action, economic incentives, concern for other consumers, and the potential to enhance their own self-worth

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(Hennig-Thurau et al., 2004). What usually happens is that people use social media to mobilize for action and to implicitly or explicitly appeal to a company of moving in a certain direction through shared meaning and opinion, for example, “we do not like what you are doing; we think you should do this or stop doing that”. People who participate in social media storms can be grouped based on what motivates their behavior. Hence, a social media storm reflects the formation process from minority to voiced majority that consequently both consist of leaders and followers. We elaborate on this in Chapter 8.

Leadership involves sensemaking – sensemaking involves emotion Social media storm motives can differ and appear in combinations of emotional reduction, revenge, altruism, and seeking peer recommendations (see HennigThurau et al., 2004). The former is more emotionally anchored, whereas seeking recommendations is more rational but can trigger other people’s emotions. Organizations can, to some extent, prevent a social media storm by ensuring excellent product/service quality at fair prices. Though this approach is highly recommendable, it can be “mission impossible” to keep all customers satisfied at all times. Another way to avoid social media storm is to predict the motive through social media analytics and sentiment analysis to prevent the social media storm. Still, managers should be critical of using these methods, mainly because such analyses draw maps of what emotions and opinions are stated in the posts. Still, they cannot explain the consumers’ motivations behind the statements. In other words, the map is not the landscape. Rather, a social media storm can often be visualized by data analytics that gives evidence of the storm and confirms managers’ fear that social media storm is “unforeseen and uncontrollable consequences for their company image, all of it accompanied by a significant loss of money” (Pfeffer et al., 2014, p. 119). Similar to the Telenor case we presented in Chapter 5, the social media storm is usually triggered and motivated by a consumer's bad experience with a product or service, i.e., the product quality, quality of service, comparison with other products and service and/or the relationship between price and quality (Garg & Kataria, 2013). Here, the consumer tried to reduce emotional tension by seeking social comforting through sharing his bad experiences and frustrations with the crowd. The consumer can thereby regain his mental and emotional balance through the social confirmation of “I am not the only one having these emotions” and “my emotions are justified”. Despite Anders and his girlfriend’s bad experience may have evoked emotions of disappointment or the feeling of being exploited by a company, he did not seek revenge by creating bad publicity. In other social media storm cases, such as the Zoo case, the motive for revenge was very strong, which resulted in a high degree of involvement aiming at “killing” the business. This case example leads us to the ‘political’ motivations for igniting or engaging in a social media storm, such as fighting for a specific cause, warning

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other consumers of a bad product or service or a general cause, e.g., animal welfare, nature preservation, etc., which relates to altruism. We address this in Chapter 8. In some instances, a consumer may seek the crowd for advice if the company is not able to sufficiently provide the information needed or if the product/service is not working as expected. In cases where several others share the experience, a minor incident may trigger collective frustration leading to a social media storm. An example is the pet food recall crisis of 2007, caused by the contamination of mainly pet food with illegal ingredients imported from China, and resulted in the largest recall in U.S. history of 60 million cans of wet pet food. On March 15, 2007, FDA learned that certain pet foods were sickening and killing cats and dogs. FDA found contaminants in vegetable proteins imported into the United States from China and used as ingredients in pet food. The tainted pet food was used to produce farm animal feed and fish feed. FDA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture discovered that some animals that ate the tainted feed had been processed into human food. The agricultural and environmental issues shocked the Americans (Gao, 2007). The immediate context in which the social media storm takes place deeply influences how managers and stakeholders perceive the situation and understand the utterances, form evaluative judgments, make sense of others’ behavior. If other and more “serious” crisis events are taking place at the time of an escalating social media storm, it may be overruled by this other event, such as a war or pandemic that draws the full media attention or put the incident in a larger perspective. But this method of changing perspective can also help in terms of defining what common purpose is central for the actors involved. As mentioned, leadership actions from the company side are about shaping and interpreting the social media storm to guide the other members of the organization into a common interpretation of reality. In other words, how the leadermakes sense of the social media storm serves as a basis for internal action, and it is equally important for the leader to give sense through the use of language, images, narratives, and other symbolic constructions in ways that help others to focus on the higher meaning or purpose during a social media storm. Here, using the company vision, mission, and values as the context is very helpful for framing the social media storm experience in a strategic manner. It hones the focus of attention on the big picture and brackets the ongoing stream of experiences creating a complex pattern of meanings in the social media storm. This type of leadership is different from the more resistant management approaches based on direction and control.

Reflective exercise: assess your thoughts, emotions, and responses Lastly, we will provide you with a quick reflective exercise aimed to help you get social media storm on the strategic agenda. The exercise is based on a thought example, but in case you have experienced a similar event, you can replace the post example with real examples from your company.

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Image your company was mentioned in this Facebook post, and the post got more than 1,000 likes and 567 similar comments: Minna A: “How could you do it? I was horrified when I discovered that your company for years has been charging too much for your services. You only say that it is a few bugs, but according to the news, you refunded several thousands to one customer who had been cheated by you”. Not only is my money gone; my trust in you and your industry in general is also gone! A. Indicate the types of emotions the customer expressed in this post and assess the strength of the emotions on a scale from 1 to 5: 1. Not at all present; 2. Slightly present; 3. Moderately present; 4. Quite present; 5. Extremely present. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

“Anger” (1 to 5) “Disappointment” (1 to 5) “Sadness” (1 to 5) “Surprise” (1 to 5) “Contempt” (1 to 5)

B. Indicate how likely you might feel the emotions mentioned below when facing the scenario that is presented on a scale from 1 to 5: 1. Not at all likely; 2. Slightly likely; 3. Moderately likely; 4. Quite likely; 5. Extremely likely. 1. 2. 3. 4.

“Hostility” when reading the post, thinking “we do our best and repaid the money, so problem solved” (1–5) “Anxiety” when discovering how much this may go viral? (1–5) “Guilt” when reading what the customers feel about you) (1–5) “Frustration” when having compensated the amounts, but people seem to not care at all? (1–5)

C. How useful might it be to respond to the customer in the scenario in the following ways on a scale from 1 to 5: 1. Not at all useful; 2. Slightly useful; 3. Moderately useful; 4. Quite useful; 5. Extremely useful. 1. 2. 3. 4.

Apologize for the trouble it may have caused (1–5) Promise that it will never happen again (1–5) Explain how such a mistake could happen and what you did to solve it (1–5) Persuade the customer to come back again (1–5)

D. Circle the action that you most likely take in the company after a situation as in the scenario occurred: 1.

I will focus on communicating how we have been improving internal processes and now can offer a better product and service than our competitors.

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3.

4.

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I will do a survey to try to figure out what our customers’ needs are when experiencing situations like this and suggest actions for taking those needs into account in the future. Having the customer's best interest in mind, I will invite the customers in for a dialog so the customers can help us find solutions that can improve our processes and prevent future incidents. I will provide the customers with the information and online tools needed so the customers themselves can better check their payments of the products/services and status in the future.

E. Who influenced your decisions in your how you will response to the stakeholders and manage the situation and with how much weight? 1. Not at all likely; 2. Slightly likely; 3. Moderately likely; 4. Quite likely; 5. Extremely likely. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

The customers’ emotions and negative experiences will be the decisive factors in how we handle the situation. (1–5) Our involvement with the customers, in general, will most strongly influence our choices of action. (1–5) How the case spread in the media and how media seem to handle the situation will have a big say in how we decide to approach it. (1–5) Our shareholders are the most important influencers – our job is to take care of their interests. (1–5) The employees and what they are going through is a very central factor – they are the ones to communicate with the crowd. (1–5)

Concluding discussion Understanding and managing your own emotions is just as important to successful social media storm leadership as understanding and managing stakeholders’ emotions. The relationship between sensemaking and customer emotion has barely been integrated into management and leadership research, despite its influence on strategic behavior, especially under conditions of uncertainty and ambiguity. By illustrating how the manager’s emotions influence how they frame and respond to the social media storm, we supply the management literature with new insights into the challenges of approaching customer voice and social media in new ways. When managers experience fear and anxiety, they are adept at perceiving the social media storm as a threat to their businesses. As a result, they not only risk that their strategic approach backfires; they also risk that the negative bias prevents them from exploring the potential of social media storm by combining social media dynamics and customers’ anger expression, and hence, the opportunity of developing resilience. Social media storms will likely be a common management issue in the future. It, therefore, becomes vital to understand how the dynamics of social media and the empowerment of customers change the game of business-stakeholder engagement in general. The job is not to make the feelings disappear, but to acknowledge them in a state of empathy and be open about it, for

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example, by stating, “I’ve never faced anything like this before and it can be frightening but let us find out what is going on”. Changing one’s framing and remembering that the social media storm makes people feel empowered and in control may also reduce fear. From a leadership perspective, a social media storm works as an alternative organizational form that manages meaning and enables the enactment of a reality that expresses a power relationship. It certainly challenges the traditional leadership model because it suggests more equalized interaction in which each contributor has the right – and obligation – to define what is going on with the company and respond accordingly “to solve the problem” (see Smircich & Morgan, 1982). Turning the cognitive focus and viewing the social media storm as a form of leadership through sensemaking processes increases the learning and adaptive ability of organizations and hence helps managers build leadership and organizations build resilience. The chapter shows how to utilize a resilient response strategy rather than being anchored in fear of failure. This is useful because reflective thinking helps to avoid the pitfalls of resistant thinking. Facilitating a change of attitude with a management team that is dominated by resistant thinking is not something that is done overnight, but we provided two cognitive tools that ease such a learning process. It also demands that the manager know why a particular approach is necessary to reach the company’s strategic goals and the implications for not doing so, as the Zoo case demonstrated.

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Homburg, C., Wieseke, J., & Bornemann, T. (2009). Implementing the marketing concept at the employee–customer interface: The role of customer need knowledge. Journal of Marketing, 73(July), 64–81. Kidwell, B., Hardesty, D. M., Murtha, B. R., & Sheng, S. (2011). Emotional intelligence in marketing exchanges. Journal of Marketing, 76(January), 78–95. Mayer, J. D., Caruso, D. R., & Salovey, P. (2000). Models of emotional intelligence. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), The handbook of intelligence (pp. 396–420). New York: Cambridge University Press. Nutt, P. C. (1998). Framing strategic decisions. Organization Science, 9, 195–216. Palmatier, R. W., Jarvis, C. B., Bechkoff, J. R., & Kardes, F. R. (2009). The role of customer gratitude in relationship marketing. Journal of Marketing, 73(September), 1–18. Pfeffer, J., Zorbach, T., & Carley, K. (2014). Understanding online firestorms: Negative word-of-mouth dynamics in social media networks. Journal of Marketing Communications, 20(1–2), 117–128. Reid, J. (2008). The resilient leader: Why EQ matters, Ivey Business Journal, May–June. https://iveybusinessjournal.com/publication/the-resilient-leader-why-eq-matters/ Rex, Dr. (2014). Marius – A young giraffe – Copenhagen Zoo. https:// hrexach.wordpress.com/2014/02/11/marius-a-young-giraffe-copenhagen-zoo/ Rydén, P., Kottika, E., Hossain, M., Skare, V., & Morrison, A. M. (2020). Threat or treat for tourism organizations? The Copenhagen Zoo social media storm. International Journal of Tourism Research, 22(1), 108–119. Rydén, P., Ringberg, T., & Wilke, R. (2015). How managers' shared mental models of business–customer interactions create different sensemaking of social media. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 31, 1–16. Smircich, L., & Morgan, G. (1982). Leadership: The management of meaning. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 18(3), 257–273. Warnock, M. (2014). A Giraffe has been killed – why the fuss? The Guardian. https:// www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/10/giraffe-killed-fuss-human-beingsanimals-marius Weick, K. E. (1995). Sensemaking in organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Weick, K. E., Sutcliffe, K. M., & Obstfelt, D. (2005). Organizing and the process of sensemaking. Organization Science, 16(4), 409–421. Wikipedia (2014). Marius (giraffe). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marius_(giraffe) Zimmerman, C., Chen, Y., Hart, D., & Vatrapu, R. (2014). Marius, the giraffe. A comparative informatics case study of linguistic features of the social media discourse. Proceeding of the 5th ACM International Conference on Collaboration Across Boundaries: Culture, Distance, & Technology, 131–140. Zimmermann, T. (2014). Marius the giraffe is every zoo animal. http:// timzimmermann.com/2014/02/12/marius-the-giraffe-is-every-zoo-animal/

7 BUSINESS-STAKEHOLDER INTERACTIONS DURING SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS

Stakeholder interaction and social media strategies Organizations increasingly use social media as strategic tools to better interact with their markets, but there are still fundamental aspects that we need to explain and consider when it comes to a social media storm. Generally, managers recognize the strategic value of social media like Facebook and Twitter for promotion and selling. Likewise, social media can be brilliant tools for companies to engage more actively with stakeholders at different individual and group levels (Rydén et al., 2015). But social media have actually led to a paradigmatic change in business and society (Aral et al., 2013). Strategic management studies (e.g., Cheng, 2018) show how social media are changing the classic crisis management strategies (i.e., in­ formation, sympathy, and apology) through fragmented channels and new types of communication. Therefore, it becomes increasingly important for organizations to learn how best to integrate social media into their social media storm strategy (Aral et al., 2013). Kotler et al. (2010) describe how these profound changes in customer behavior, market dynamics, and competition will require a major rethinking of marketing management, in particular the balance of power towards empowered consumers, where the boundaries between organizations, customers and suppliers are breaking down (Wind, 2009). This calls for resilient leadership and emphasizes the importance of “interaction” and “dialogue” between the organization and its stakeholders, but how? With the rapid transmission of social media, a negative dialogue or a wrong time to interact might quickly arouse a social media storm instead of preventing the risk. Resilient leadership obliges people to be attentive to the sensemaking ema­ nating from that role. Rydén et al. (2015) showed in their study how mental models of traditional business–customer interactions confine managers’ sense­ making of social media and how the historical behavior becomes the destiny of

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the company. Thus, managers’ mental models represent a key obstacle for having managers question current ways of interacting with stakeholders and using social media to handle the social media storm that they are also boosting (Kim & Liu, 2012). For example, Twitter and Facebook can positively impact the effectiveness of companies’ social media storm strategies (Utz et al., 2013), e.g., by using the strategy of information, while Twitter used for sharing and posting newspaper messages positively affects secondary social media storm communication and re­ actions such as willingness to boycott (Schultz et al., 2011). Research also shows the empowering function of social media for accom­ modating the increasingly stronger public agenda (Brown & Billings, 2013) in cases where the information is accurate, transparent, consistent, and dialogic. Hence, organizations can effectively utilize the “interactivity” of social media by creating dialogues with stakeholders and by paying more attention to contents generated by stakeholders, adopting stakeholder desired strategies, cultivating opinion leaders on social media, and creating online contents in the same way for organizational legitimacy (Veil & Yang, 2012). Given that management cognition constitutes an important barrier for orga­ nizations to engage more resiliently with stakeholders on social media, we provide a cognitive framework by Rydén et al. (2015). Figure 7.1 depicts how each mental model of business-customer interaction (center layer) creates unique sensemaking of social media (top layer) and is influenced by historical antecedents sustaining their sensemaking (bottom layer). It is also useful for rethinking existing assumptions and approaches and deciding what social media strategies managers and organizations can apply to better engage with their customers and other stakeholders. For doing so, the punctuated lines illustrate the categorical/reflective sensemaking processes. For managers to over­ come categorical thinking, they need to move into reflective (meta-cognitive) thinking. When a manager reflects on her/his thought processes, it allows for a potential disruption of the existing mental model or frame, enabling an adjustment in the fit between sensemaking and the situation. This “strategic thinking ap­ proach” helps managers do the right things for the right reasons.

“Promote and Sell” social media sensemaking This marketing approach has prevailed for more than 100 years and still dominates the marketplace (Grönroos, 1994). At the beginning of the 20th century and until the 1950s, business-customer interactions focused on encouraging customers to transact with the company to buy its products and/or services, not tell them what to do or what they do wrong. Managers governed by this social media sensemaking see social media as tools to enhance one-way communication, create and reach more customers faster, and target existing and potential customers through advertising and/or sales. When a social media storm hits, the “Promote & Sell” sensemaking frames how the organization manages social media storm, and the tactics will be similar,

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Reflective Thinking Meta Cognition Categorical Thinking

Cognition

Promote & Sell

Connect & Collaborate

Listen & Learn

Empower & Engage

Business to Customers

Business with Customers

Business from Customers

Business for Customers

Transactional

Relational

Informational

Communal

Mental Models Confirmed Mental Models Disrupted

FIGURE 7.1

Social media sensemaking

Source: Rydén et al. (2015). How managers’ shared mental models of business-customer interactions create different sensemaking of social media. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 31, 1–16.

i.e., on “spreading messages” that can change people’s attitude towards the company from negative to positive. This business-centric management view is characterized by rationalization and company control and positions managers as authorities possessing the power to speak to customers (Gardner & Thomas, 1985). Likewise, communication is viewed as a linear, management-steered process in which the organization actively defines direction and message content through channels to the passively receiving customers (Law et al., 2003). Managers with this mental model communicate in times of a social media storm in order to create positive awareness and change attitudes among prospective customers and continue to use social media in this way (Aral et al., 2013). Billingsley (2012) states that the only proper response when managing com­ plaints on social media is that the organization has to offer an apology and a solution. When organizations publish one post for everyone that says “they were aware of the issues and they were working to fix them”, it reflects a onemessage-fits-all assumption.

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Likewise, in organizations with an outbound marketing approach that talks to or at customers, but not with them (Lusch & Vargo 2009), marketers control the communications through the media to customers (Winer, 2009). They adopt strategies and tactics to sell more products and services to the passive customer, based on the influence of their business-to-customer mental model. This is also re­ flected when organizations like Greenpeace deliberately initiate social media storm against companies in order to spread their message in global campaigns for rain­ forest protection and to create environmental leadership movements (Korsten et al., 2013; Roosevelt, 2011) (see Chapter 7). The social media sensemaking is primarily company-oriented and reveals an instrumentally oriented understanding of the business-customer interaction, and shows little concern with relationship-building. This partly explains why a customer-driven social media storm challenges the inherent assumptions of power and control and triggers resistant thinking and behavior. Managers with this sensemaking will mostly be concerned that the social media storm will hurt their sales in the future, and to prevent that, companies produce and distribute content (information, apologies, denial, accusations, etc.) that will get the audience “on their side”. This attitude was also reflected in the behavior of Telenor and Jensen’s Bøfhus mentioned in Chapter 5.

Social media sensemaking: listen and learn The “Listen & Learn” social media sensemaking differs from the previous as customers become central within this orientation, but organizations still take the initiative to decide when, how, and what information to collect. So, although customers are likely to be better served by a company that is listening to them, the empowerment balance is still in favor of the company. Here, managers use social media, and social media storm being part of that, as customer intelligence tools by “listening in” on the conversations to observe and analyze customers, but not for a customer-initiated dialogue: “Companies are watching what consumers do and say to one another on social media” (Chui et al., 2012, p. 2). Customer insights are deemed very important, and the organizations can monitor customer communication and obtain data about online customers through social media to avoid crises (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2013). Assuming that people want to be heard, the listen-and-learn from customers approach is vital for the management of social media storm. Following the Drucker logic (1954), the main factor in resilient social media storm management is understanding customers and their emotional needs, so such organizations are more sensitized to fulfilling customers’ needs by listening to their inputs. However, some resistant managers also reflect the Listen & Learn sensemaking, but here, the purpose is to increase company control. It often appears in a moderated version as part of a “Promote & Sell” tactics, like suggested by Haarlov (2014). She suggests that a business first has to listen and prepare before a social media storm arises. The second phase during the social media storm includes responding as fast as possible. After the

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social media storm, the organization should restore the process. She also finds it necessary to document how the crisis broke out and how it spread to prevent future hazards. Social media monitoring has become an important method for business ana­ lytics and trend detection. Monitoring mentions of a company online or analyzing the sentiment towards a certain product, service, or decision and use that in­ formation for managing reputation is enabled by the big data technologies. Online reputation management can be defined as “the process of analysis and management for people and organizations’ reputation represented by content among all kinds of online media” (Hung et al., 2012, p. 88). Ironically, reputation management is purposed to build trust between the company and its stakeholders (Yang et al., 2011) by influencing people’s perceptions of a company, which aligns with the “Promote and Sell” sensemaking (Waerass & Sataoen, 2014). Integration of the corporate communication function and the business management function further strengthens the alignment and control. An increasing number of social media agencies provide these types of “threatdetection” services to assist companies, but they often base their offerings on installing fear of social media storm with the managers combined with the illusion of control. One example is taken from a company called LexisNexis. Their homepage (LexisNexis, 2019) states: Social media monitoring or social listening is the continuous monitoring of the social media activities of competitors, customers, target groups and influen­ cers relevant to the organization. It means that you are always aware of what user-generated content on particular topics related to your brand is circulating on the web. The information can be important for sales and marketing activities and for product development – for instance, in order to identify trends, develop campaigns or protect your reputation. If negative comments are picked up early, a shitstorm that could damage your reputation can usually be mitigated or even averted. In addition, social media monitoring enables you to keep track of your competitors and initiate a prompt response when necessary.

Likewise, they promote and sell their services as increased company control, which aligns with the resistant mindset. Therefore, installing such tools can further trigger resistance within the managers and company in general, depending on how the company interprets the information. As such, managers still use social media as a one-way channel, focusing on collecting rather than disseminating information, which provides unfiltered feedback and behavioral data. This approach underscores the influence of the business-from-customers mental model, which reflects a market orientation, as the focus is on gathering information and listening to customers to explore their

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sentiments and needs to secure customer loyalty, but the company controls when, how, and what type of information should be collected and acted on.

Social media sensemaking: connect and collaborate The “business-with-customer” mental model dates more than 100 years back as it highlights the influence of the collective (Durkheim, 1895). Society is considered a web of interactions in which personal and professional interests interact, which occur and reoccur in different periods and cultural settings (Simmel, 1897). This description aligns well with a social media storm, where personal and corporate interests amalgamate in an infinitely expanding online/offline social network. Though the idea of connecting and collaborating existed before social media, social media enable this interaction, and it is reflected in the shift in companies’ orientation, from a capability orientation (e.g., marketing, human resources) to a customer-involving orientation. Consumers do not just “have a say”, in fact, they “have a do”. From this perspective, social media, and social media storms, are regarded as an avenue to develop relationships (Hinchliffe & Kim 2012), to fa­ cilitate interaction with customers and other stakeholders, to share skills and knowledge to improve business outcomes (Korsten et al., 2013). Similarly, social media reflect a relationship philosophy that adds value for all participants through information sharing and creation (Hoegg et al., 2006). This mental model differs from the two previous models by reflecting a resilient approach. Here, managers want customers to become emotionally and practically involved in the “business” and see a social media storm as an opportunity. It increases consumer empowerment as social media interaction expands the ex­ perience, knowledge, and market power of the users as participants in business and social processes (Constantinides et al., 2008). A social media storm can facilitate the flow of views, and knowledge is shared with the purpose of evaluating and/or changing company practices. Since social media are used strategically and become deeply integrated into internal processes, it requires top management involvement. This resembles the service-dominant logic proposed by Lusch and Vargo (2009). One example of a Connect & Collaborate strategy from 2010 stems from a social media storm Greenpeace initiated on the global company Nestlé, which makes use of palm oil for its KitKat chocolate bars. Claiming that palm oil destroys the rainforest and the lives of critically endangered orangutans, Greenpeace pro­ duced a video showing the disastrous consequences of Nestlé’s business on nature. In 60 days, 1.5 million people in 24 countries had seen the video. Nestlé re­ sponded by forcing the withdrawal of the YouTube video by citing copyright. Greenpeace responded by posting it on Vimeo instead, and soon after, the video reappeared on YouTube. Greenpeace also started a petition, and more than 250,000 people participated. At first, the social media storm triggered a resistant behavior with the Nestlé management (citing copyright to stop the video), but they then acknowledged that Greenpeace’s intention was to show the way towards sustainable production,

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which helped them turn the social media storm into an opportunity. Nestlé changed its strategy from a “Promote & Sell” strategy to a “Connect & Collaborate” strategy. They suspended sourcing palm oil from the affected region and invited Greenpeace in as a credible external partner to certify the sustainability of its palm oil suppliers. Nestlé learned that collaborating with its critics and ad­ dressing some of their concerns was more effective than trying to shut down discussion on social media (Shreeves, 2010; Ionescu-Somers & Enders, 2012). More about Greenpeace in the next chapter. The example illustrates how a social media storm is an opportunity to connect companies with customers to collaboratively interact in social learning systems. The “business-with-customers” mental model blurs the traditional busi­ ness–customer distinction because customers become involved in the decisionmaking processes, so managers must realize the need to encourage them to speak their opinion. Managers with this mental model will embrace a social media storm as a way to expand the company’s contact base to cultivate meaningful relation­ ships with stakeholders.

Social media sensemaking: empower and engage This mental model also existed before the social media era but gained momentum by the digital development and societal trends of sustainability. It differs from the other three foci because it disrupts the very fabric of the capitalistic structure. Pecuniary and social interactions are not viewed as separate entities, so business serves a societal purpose as an exchange of services and goods in which both parties were concerned with the local community. In this framing, social media may change the character of social lives, on both an interpersonal and a community level (Ellison et al., 2009). So resilient “empower-and-engage” managers describe social media storm interaction as a way of improving the world through transparency and building shared meaning. From a company’s point of view, the social dynamics of technology empowers custo­ mers. The empowering and engaging sensemaking suggests a more altruistic ap­ proach that is at odds with the dominant capitalist paradigm’s business-customer interaction. Yet, it was not social media per se that created it; rather, it simply facilitated and enabled managers with already existing ideas to transfer the logic of “business-for-customers” interaction to the media. In the Zoo case, the management followed an “Empower & Engage” strategy, where their decisions and actions were focusing on strengthening the wildlife community through enlightenment, which can further support leadership and formalize resilient work practices. The managers of the Croatian Railways (Chapter 2) and the mining corporation (Chapter 4) exemplify how businesses represented by this sensemaking do not exclusively focus on attention, money, insight, and creative skills. It is equally important that customers are regarded with a “heart and conscience”. Welfare, social responsibility, and democracy are con­ sidered long-term consequences of sensitive business models (Ahlqvist et al., 2010).

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Therefore, a social media storm involves building “social and cultural capital” (Bourdieu, 1986) through deeper local relationships based on joint responsibility (Constantinides et al., 2008). Business-for-customers is about transforming through political and value-based initiatives that focus on the welfare of a customer community in which a business operates (Cova & Cova 2002). Thus, this mental model turns businesses toward broader political and societal issues and values and upends the business-customer interaction by focusing on customer empowerment (Labrecque et al., 2013). It reflects corporate social responsibility thinking, as it argues that sustainable companies must minimize or eliminate the negative en­ vironmental impacts and act in accordance with societal expectations through dialogue with stakeholders (Juholin, 2006). Leaders taking an Empower & Engage approach to convert a social media storm into a “leadership-in-action” approach, emphasizing customer empower­ ment through open and equal sharing (Zahra & Nambisan, 2012). By taking part in the social media storm, their companies create and maintain the social fabric and build a meaningful social connection between stakeholders. Some of the tenets of “communitarianism” are applicable here, as a community requires that all actors feel involved and empowered in decisions that bear on their lives (Juholin, 2006). Thus, this interpretation of business-customer interaction provides a more com­ plex theoretical understanding that discards the traditional raison d’être of business. A communal focus does not involve authoritative management, yet leadership is appreciated through role model behavior, which creates followers. The roles of customer, manager, and citizen amalgamate into a common quest for transfor­ mation, identity creation, self-realization, and influence. To summarize, the four social media sensemaking exist across cultures, com­ panies, and industries, where they continue to influence organizations and man­ agers and their strategic approach to the market in general, as well as incidents like a social media storm. When making decisions under emotional pressure, the manager is more adept at integrating inputs automatically and forcing them into the framework of existing mindsets. This leads to little mental adjustment (Ringberg & Reihlen, 2008). Being aware of the different ways the company can actually interact before, during, and after a social media storm widens the room for maneuver, reduces stressful emotions as it can give the manager insights into the potential opportunities the company has in terms of interacting with the stake­ holders in ways that promote resilience. Considering a social media storm strategy as a perspective (i.e., the type of sensemaking that influences the way an orga­ nization perceives and interacts with its customers and stakeholders) differs from the traditional “strategy-as-design” perspective, which mainly considers plans formulated by top management that are based on analyses of the internal and external factors. Obviously, such a strategic approach is still important but works best in relatively stable and predictable markets with set industrial norms and practices. When managers are not aware of their sensemaking, it undermines their ability to develop and maintain a framing of the social media storm that fits the

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actual circumstances. The social media sensemaking framework by Rydén et al. (2015) can give managers and organizations a tool for learning about other people’s underlying assumptions of social media storm strategy. Trying to take the per­ spective of colleagues will create a fruitful point of departure for scrutinizing the sensemaking processes that happen in the organization. With the right form of interaction, the social media storm can lead to increased understandings between the members of the organization and their stakeholders, too. Not surprisingly, to be mentally on the same page is a huge advantage in situations that require clear communication and coordination. Here, the framework provides a helping hand as it lists up the dimensions of the resistant versus resilient mindset. This step is essential to avoid groupthink (Janis, 1972) and to align the strategic actions. Dealing with either shared or conflicting emotions and mindsets creates more complex dynamics in the management of social media storms. For instance, a social media storm may scare some managers and trigger resistance, while others more calmly take a resilient approach. In such cases, conflicting dynamics may impede the company’s ability to manage the social media storm. There may also be cases where a management team is aligned in emotions and mindset. By reinforcing each other’s feelings, they are at risk of groupthink fallacies and eschewed management decision-making. A resilient ap­ proach may have its blind spots, e.g. if the manager becomes too optimistic about the situation and ignores signs of a risk that should be acted upon differently. Listening to resistant managers can, in some cases, provide a skeptical, albeit sound, take on the situation. The point is to avoid getting locked into certain ways of thinking for the wrong reasons, as it may harm the company over time.

Managing social media storm across cultures Due to the global nature of social media, a social media storm often moves quickly across the borders of where it originally started. This means that expectations and customs change, and managers should consider how they engage with customers and other stakeholders that are culturally different. At the cultural level, following the steps we have suggested in this chapter can help organizations foster a more receptive climate for a shift taking the cultural aspects into consideration. A global social media storm may also call for other types of EQ that can help develop resilient leadership in a global context, for example, Cultural Intelligence (CQ). CQ is related to EQ as they share the propensity to suspend judgment—to think before acting (Goleman, 1995). According to Earley and Mosakowski (2004), CQ picks up where emotional intelligence leaves off: A person with high emotional intelligence grasps what makes us human and at the same time what makes each of us different from one another. A person with high cultural intelligence can somehow tease out of a person’s or group’s behavior those features that would be true of all people and all groups, those peculiar to this person or this group, and those that are neither universal nor idiosyncratic. The vast realm that lies between those two poles is culture.

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The management of the Zoo had quickly noticed that there were cultural dif­ ferences in people’s reactions, and hence the emotional impact, arguing that the Danes had more pragmatic reactions vested in a more pragmatic Scandinavian approach to animal care in general. The Director also noticed that there were other practices at Zoos around the world. So, despite the massive negative attention, he was attentive to the potential that emerged during the social media storm. So, CQ defines managerial skills that can strengthen the business-customer en­ gagement during a global social media storm. Through cultural insights, tolerance, and empathy, the socially skilled professional helps customers solve, reframe, and understand their needs anchored in knowledge of the particular cultural contexts. Oftentimes, global social media storms require other forms of interaction than what the manager is used to. For example, consumer empowerment tends to be a Western phenomenon, and the “two-way” symmetrical power model (Connect & Collaborate) in Western societies may be less helpful in Asia, where asymmetrical power relationships with stakeholders are more common (Promote & Sell). Also, apology and correction action tend to be avoided in the crisis management (Cheng, 2018) as, for example, in the Sanlu milk contamination crisis, the company utilized its relationship with the local government and media to delete the negative publicities online (Veil & Yang, 2012) instead of admitting the quality problem of the products.

Concluding discussion It is important to understand what the right form of business-customer interaction is because the companies’ use of social media does not automatically encourage the managers to reflect on the appropriateness of their dominating mindset or rethink how to respond to customers’ needs suddenly expressed anger in public. Therefore, we provided the framework of four social media strategies that can help you rethink business-stakeholder interaction before, during, and after a social media storm. The social media sensemaking framework provided insights into the cognitive and strategic aspects of business-customer interaction during a social media storm. With an “Empower & Engage” sensemaking, management, and marketers can better design a resilient approach anchored in the shared values of the company and customers rather than anchored in the managers’ unfounded risk aversion. Moreover, companies can better navigate in a social media storm when managers can take a reflective perspective on the different social media storm strategies available and see which can best promote resilient leadership. From reading this chapter, you hopefully understand better what it takes to design a resilient organization anchored in the shared values of the company and stakeholders. The more general advantages of taking a resilient approach in terms of personal transformation and leadership should be highlighted because it involves professional and personal identity issues, not only corporate values. It is crucial that the management see the point of working with identity, values, and mindset to promote the strategy. It also provides learning opportunities at the organization level as it opens up for questioning how well it can mentally adapt and what

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internal and external changes enhance the company’s sensitivity and responsiveness to disruptive situations in the digital age.

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8 THE NEXT FRONTIER – SOCIAL MEDIA STORMS AS A MARKETING TOOL

Brand activism Sarkar and Kotler (2018) defined “brand activism” as an attempt by firms to solve the global problems their future customers and employees care about. Further, Bhagwat et al. (2020) named the companies’ involvement in societal and global issues as “corporate sociopolitical activism” (CSA) and defined it as “a firm’s public demonstration (statements and/or actions) of support for or opposition to one side of a partisan sociopolitical issue” (Bhagwat et al., 2020, p. 1). Brand activism is expressed through the vision, values, goals, communication, and behavior of the businesses and brands towards the communities they serve. In fact, brand activism can have different forms, varying from simply donating money towards a specific cause to making a clear stand through campaigns and public statements (Mukherjee, 2020). However, many times the consumers are the ones who put pressure on companies to take a stance for serious societal issues and who request a deeper understanding of what a brand or a company stands for (Bhagwat et al., 2020). A term often used when referring to brand activism tactics is the one of “woke advertising”. In general, “woke” indicates that someone is aware of social in­ justices, and woke capitalism and woke advertising refer to companies that openly advocate through their marketing actions that these injustices should be solved (Mirzaei, 2019). Moreover, in some cases, it is the companies and not the consumers that re­ quest higher levels of transparency from other companies. For example, more than 90 companies (including Coca-Cola and Ben and Jerry's) supported the “Stop Hate For Profit” campaign that was a call for boycotting Facebook ads and asking for more effective measures against hate speech (BBC, 2020b). The campaign has called on companies and advertisers to put pressure on Facebook to adopt stricter rules regarding hateful content on the platform. Coca-Cola’s CEO James Quincey

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stated, “There is no place for racism in the world and there is no place for racism on social media” and growing support of the movement led to a significant drop in Facebook’s market value (BBC, 2020a). In spite of what triggers the involvement in brand activism, it is a phenomenon that is of high interest as it can connect brands with consumers who share common values on a higher level and foster the creation of an emotional bond with them, increasing loyalty levels (Mukherjee, 2020). Studies have shown that the majority of consumers (87%) claims that they would purchase a product from a firm that advocated for a social issue that is close to their heart (Cone Communications, 2017 cited in Baar, 2018), and even though 66% of US participants in the Sprout Social survey said that posts from brands rarely or never influence their opinions on social issues, two-thirds of them indicated that they feel that it is important for brands to take a stand on sociopolitical issues (Sprout Social, 2017 cited in Baar, 2018). Nevertheless, for consumers who share different views or values compared to the brand that chooses to get involved in brand activism, the results could be the exact opposite, leading to disassociation with the brand, expression of negative sentiment, or even boycotting of the products or services (Bhagwat et al., 2020; Mukherjee, 2020). Those are characteristics and actions that are associated with social media storms, so we argue that brand activism can potentially lead to the initiation of social media storms. As many sociopolitical issues (for example, climate change, LGBTQ rights, immigration, gender equality) generate debates between polarized groups (Nalick et al., 2016, cited in Bhagwat et al., 2020), they also generate polarized responses by various stakeholders of companies that choose to get involved in brand activism (Kotler & Sarkar, 2017, cited in Bhagwat et al., 2020). In fact, scholars have pinpointed the difference between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Corporate Sociopolitical Activism (CSA) in the level to which an issue is favored by the vast majority or entails intense partisanship (Bhagwat et al., 2020). In some cases, strong customer reactions and boycotts have the strength to provoke an increase in turnover at firms that have been in the center of a storm, and directors are especially likely to leave a company after boycotts – particularly when there is an imbalance and conflict between their personal beliefs and the corporate values (McDonnell & Cobb, 2020). More specifically, research has shown that directors who have ideologies that belong closer to the ideologies of the activists are more likely to exit a company after boycotting occurs, while leaders who are not ideologically aligned with activists are less likely to quit their jobs (McDonnell & Cobb, 2020).

Targeting in the era of brand activism Brands need to have detailed and updated insights regarding the characteristics, values, concerns, attitudes, and beliefs consumers of different generations and backgrounds carry in order to effectively align their vision for the brand with that

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of their targeted audiences (Mukherjee, 2020). Given the polarized nature of brand activism, we argue that it could lead to a more effective form of segmen­ tation and targeting of the audience – a new form of polarized targeting where consumers do not just belong to a certain target audience with certain char­ acteristics, but actually want and love to be identified as members of those seg­ ments with opinions, world-views and political stances that are close to their hearts and to what they stand for. On the other hand, by not belonging to specific segments and not consuming specific products or services, this generates, once again, a statement about who they are and what values they carry. This growing need for self-expression and also belongingness to specific tribes can lead politically vocal companies to lead the way beyond simple segmentation and towards the creation of spaces for tribal com­ munities to express in a more empowered way their collective voices: consumers now can choose if they are with the tribe or against it if they are with the brand and what it stands for or oppose it. However, leaders need to proceed with caution and carefully reflect on whether consumers should be further polarized or united and take into consideration the possible social consequences. Even though traditionally, many brands were expected to be openly apolitical in order not to harm their sales or/and their image, the reality is that several corporations, through lobbying, have not been apolitical at all. Now in the times of transparency and the era dominated by consumer emotions (Davies, 2018), companies simply are tempted or challenged to be more open about what they stand for (Alix, 2020; Baar, 2018). However, companies need to be cautious as consumers are not the only sta­ keholders, and research has shown that investors many times react in a negative way to corporate sociopolitical activism, particularly when it is not aligned with the values of the key stakeholders of the company and involves a high commit­ ment of resources to activist actions (Bhagwat et al., 2020). Also, corporate so­ ciopolitical activism has a strong impact on what the company should stand for in the future as well, and it is a long-term commitment. Therefore, leaders should have a very clear vision of the company and the brand before getting involved in such actions (Bhagwat et al., 2020). In an era when companies are challenged not to remain politically neutral (Smith & Korschun, 2018) and to openly demonstrate what they stand for (Burnett, 2019; BBC, 2020a), facing the risk of becoming victims of the cancel culture if they do not get involved in an authentic way (Liffreing, 2020), developing those navigation skills, balancing such opportunities and risks are new skills that managers are called to develop. Examples of cases of brand activism such as the Gillette campaign for toxic masculinity and Nike’s “Just Do It” campaign with the Black Lives Mattersupporting NFL athlete Colin Kaepernick are now considered classics (Stillman, 2019; Baird, 2019). Those campaigns aimed to sensitize the audience by struc­ turing a powerful social message around several plots (Milfeld & Flint, 2020). The outcome, particularly in the case of Nike, was a strong polarization in audiences’ reactions. Negative reactions were expressed by some consumers that felt clearly

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alienated and decided to boycott the products and to be quite vocal about it. Some consumers even tweeted photos of setting on fire their Nike shoes (Mirzaei, 2019; Vredenburg et al., 2020). Others questioned the motivation of the brand managers and criticized the absence of Black board members (Ritson, 2020, cited in Vredenburg et al., 2020). Further, when L'Oréal supported with a statement the Black Lives Matter movement, this action backfired because in the past, the company had fired a model over a post that spoke about white supremacy, and when this was pinpointed, consumers started to boycott the company’s products (Liffreing, 2020). Thus, leaders should carefully evaluate the company’s internal consistency in already practicing the cause they are preaching about (Baird, 2019). However, in the case of Nike, the risk seemed to have paid off as Nike’s online sales increased considerably, and Bloomberg reported an estimated free exposure equivalent of 43 million dollars media buy (Novy-Williams, 2018, cited in Sterling, 2018). Moreover, this campaign enabled Nike to position itself more effectively among the millennial consumers who often hold more liberal views of the world than previous generations and are more willing to work for companies that are more protective of the environment and aware of social issues (The Economist, 2019; Content Works, 2020). It is highly possible that the social media storm that followed Nike’s campaign was not unexpected, so as the attention it brought to the company. There are reasonable assumptions that Nike was aware that this campaign would cause controversy and potential reactions such as boycotts from a part of the audience but was expecting after weathering the storm to enjoy benefits from its targeted audiences, particularly the younger consumers (Sterling, 2018). In fact, one could argue that the social media storm was generated intentionally and led to positive outcomes for the company in terms of more effective repositioning and sales and financial outcomes. This case example demonstrates that the managerial mindset has taken many steps from the initial negative reaction to and fear of the social media storms. It seems that already some managers have moved from framing a social media storm as something dangerous for a company or a brand to reframing it as a powerful force that can potentially be used for engagement, effective communication, targeting, and other marketing purposes. Other managers might still view it as a potentially dangerous force but decided to play with fire. However, when de­ veloping such campaigns that entail the potential of unleashing a social media storm, brand managers need to be aware of the possibility for alternative inter­ pretations of a campaign’s storytelling (Milfeld & Flint, 2020) and allocate enough thought so as their message and storytelling to be as clear as possible.

Risks of brand activism and the role of authenticity Research has shown that positive attitudes towards brands engaged in brand ac­ tivism decreased considerably among consumers that did not agree with the brand’s sociopolitical stand, while surprisingly, there was not a substantial effect

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among consumers who agreed with that stand (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). Further, scholars have indicated that in cases where customers have heterogeneity regarding their political views, then becoming involved in corporate sociopolitical activism can be beneficial for small-share brands and harmful for brands with large shares, with perceived authenticity being a very important success factor (Hydock et al., 2020). Those findings might explain why a survey conducted in 2020 among marketing managers revealed that only 18.5% of participants agreed that it is appropriate for their brands to take a stance on politically-loaded topics (TheCMOSurvey, 2020; Moorman, 2020). Their concerns and hesitations are valid as research revealed that when a brand takes the “right” stand on an issue that causes controversy has limited upside, while when a company takes the “wrong” stand, it can cause significant harm to the brand (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). Authenticity and connecting the content and drive of brand activism with the core values and purpose of the company is crucial. If this does not happen, brand activism might be perceived as “woke washing” – an effort to mislead the shareholders, which can negatively impact the brand’s image (Vredenburg et al., 2020). According to Holt (2002, p. 85), “as firms compete to build their brands with postmodern branding techniques, they pursue more aggressive, riskier gambits to create perceived authenticity. Cumulatively, this heated competition is raising the bar on what is considered authentic”. In addition, brands that decide to detach their activist mes­ saging from their purpose, values, and practice are enacting inauthentic brand activism, potentially deceiving consumers with their claims and damaging the potential for actual social change (Holt, 2002; Vredenburg et al., 2020). Nevertheless, research has shown that consumers are willing to trade off im­ portant elements of the marketing mix such as price and quality for corporate sociopolitical activism (Hydock et al., 2020). Also, research shows that when such a stance aligns well with the values of customers, employees, and legislators, the investors react in a more positive way (Bhagwat et al., 2020). Marketing managers are expected to focus more on sustainability and launch into the market more sustainable products and services (McDonagh & Martin, 2015). With such high stakes, brand activism is here to stay, and it continues being slowly but steadily a growing phenomenon in this era of consumer empowerment. Research has shown that consumers perceive brands’ voices as most credible when the socio­ political issue that the brands decided to put actively in their agenda directly impacts their customers, employees, or business operations (Sprout Social, 2017). Thus, it is crucial for companies to identify a cause that is meaningful for the targeted audiences that has the dynamic to create synergies with the brand and to indicate a clear side (Baird, 2019). Choices on when, where and on what topics to get involved as an organization need to be made with strategic thinking lenses (Burnett, 2019). Leaders need to keep in mind the spectrum of emotions that this type of company involvement evokes in consumers because the range is vast. In fact, the participants of the Sprout Social survey indicated that 27% of consumers are getting intrigued, 24% impressed, 23% engaged, 21% annoyed, and 10% frustrated,

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among others (Sprout Social, 2017). In the same survey, US consumers indicated that the most effective ways for brands to take a stand on social media for a specific cause are, among others, the announcement of a donation, the encouragement of followers to take action, a clear statement of the firm’s official position on the sociopolitical issue, the lobbying for supportive legislation and the sharing of examples of company support (Sprout Social, 2017). Moreover, leaders are advised to examine whether this type of new activation can be connected with the pre­ vious corporate philanthropy, and they need to ensure that they have a long-term plan on keeping the conversation and the campaign going (Baird, 2019). Also, it seems that consumers do want companies to take a clear stand on controversial issues with their communication activities and not to play it safe (Burnett, 2019). This taps into the belief that most consumers have (75% of Americans) that companies should exist not only for making profits but also for making a positive impact on the wider community (Cone Communications, 2018, cited in Burnett, 2019). Moreover, leaders need to understand that involvement in non-controversial issues does not give a clear indication and insights into the moral foundations and the ideals of a brand compared to issues that cause polarization (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020).

Green brand activism and social media storms Several brands using their social media platforms, websites, and campaign content have been involved in green brand activism in order to highlight and foster the crucial importance of eco-friendly consumption and general way of living for the preservation of nature, generating higher levels of trust for the brands (Mukherjee, 2020; de Chenecey, 2020). Following, we present the example of Patagonia, Inc., a company that has been highly involved in environmentally friendly causes and brand activism.

Green brand activism – The case of Patagonia, Inc. Patagonia, Inc. is an American clothing company that markets and sells outdoor clothing. The company was founded in 1973 and is based in California. Patagonia commits 1% of its total sales to environmental groups through One Percent for the Planet, an organization that encourages businesses to commit 1% of their annual net revenue to nonprofit charity organizations focused on conservation and sus­ tainability. In 2016, Patagonia took this initiative to the next level and pledged to contribute 100% of sales from Black Friday to environmental organizations, to­ taling $10m. (Wikipedia, 2020). In September 2020, few weeks before the American elections, Outlander Magazine tweeted a photograph showing a Patagonia clothing tag reading “Vote the @##holes Out” and it started to circulate on social media (see Figure 8.1) (Evon, 2020):

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FIGURE 8.1

Patagonia’s clothing tags – Outlander Magazine’s tweet

Source: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/patagonia-vote-the-assholes-out/

A spokesperson for Patagonia confirmed that “the tags are real” and that they can be found on the company’s Regenerative Organic Stand-Up Shorts. The Patagonia Founder has been saying this slogan for several years, and it refers to politicians who deny or disregard the climate crisis and ignore science, not because they are not aware of it, but because of their personal oil and gas interests (Evon, 2020). This was consistent with the previous actions of Patagonia (Kannenberg, 2018). Indeed, in 2017 the company openly criticized the decision for reduction of the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments by nearly two million acres and joined the fight for public lands (Burnett, 2019). Discussion: Based on the above mini-case study and the aforemen­ tioned discussion regarding the risks of brand activism and the role of authenticity, here are some reflective questions for brainstorming: 1.

As a marketing manager, would you advise Patagonia to be involved in brand activism of this form? Why/ Why not?

Social media storms as a marketing tool 147

2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

In your opinion, what are the issues that a company needs to think of before being involved in brand activism? Do you think that brand activism can generate a social media storm for a company? Why/ Why not? How do you think consumers perceive brand activism? How about in this case (Patagonia)? Try to find another example of brand activism and analyze whether you think it is a successful case or not, and explain why. What are the steps you would take to initiate brand activism?

NGOs and social media storms Social media storms as communication tools – The case of Greenpeace Not only corporations have flirted with the idea of using social media storms as powerful communication tools. In fact, NGOs have for a long time embraced the newly empowered consumers and joined their collective voices towards achieving strategic goals. Actions from activists usually aim to be effective by causing serious disruptions in the relationships of companies with important stakeholders (McDonnell & Cobb, 2020). This can lead to serious consequences for a company, including shareholder divestment (King & Soule, 2007, cited in McDonnell & Cobb, 2020) and increased regulatory actions (Hiatt & Park, 2013, cited in McDonnell & Cobb, 2020). In some cases, NGOs have started exploring the potential use of a social media storm as a tool that could help them fight more effectively for their causes (Baker, 2012; Craighill, 2013). A striking example is the one of Greenpeace who launched its campaign “Detox my Fashion”, trying to put pressure on fashion brands such as Burberry to commit against the use of hazardous chemicals (See Figures 8.2 and 8.3) (Still, 2014). In fact, Greenpeace orchestrated an actual social media storm against Burberry with the involvement of thousands of consumers. More than 10,000 tweets were generated within few days, and the social media storm took place on Instagram, Facebook and also had the form of street protests outside of Burberry stores (Still, 2014). The outcome was that Burberry committed to dropping those toxic chemicals by 2020 (see Figure 8.4), and even more brands followed (like Zara, Valentino, Victoria’s Secret, and H&M) that committed as well to “Detox” their manu­ facturing process from toxic chemicals that were polluting waterways (Still, 2014; Greenpeace International, 2014; Roloff, 2018; Greenpeace International, 2020). According to Greenpeace reports, most of the 80 companies that committed to phasing out these chemicals from their production processes have actually achieved significant progress in terms of transparency (for example, implementa­ tion of regular wastewater testing and disclosure of suppliers) and elimination of such chemicals (Greenpeace International, 2018).

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FIGURE 8.2

Greenpeace’s “Detox My Fashion” campaign

Source: https://www.greenpeace.org/international/act/detox/

FIGURE 8.3

Greenpeace’s “Detox My Fashion” campaign – The pressure

Source: https://wayback.archive-it.org/9650/20200331234333/http://p3-raw.greenpeace.org/international/ en/news/Blogs/makingwaves/burberry-detox-twitter/blog/47937/

That was one vivid example regarding how Greenpeace taps into the dynamics generated within a social media storm and reflects its overall embracement of the era of social media and the recognition of the crucial role that communication means play in the spreadability and success of NGOs’ campaigns. In the words of Birgitte Lesanner, the campaign manager of Greenpeace Denmark and communication manager for Greenpeace’s Nordic division: “When we design campaigns today, we think a lot more about

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FIGURE 8.4

Greenpeace’s “Detox My Fashion” campaign – The outcome

Source: https://wayback.archive-it.org/9650/20200401154826/http://p3-raw.greenpeace.org/international/ en/news/Blogs/makingwaves/burberry-detox-victory/blog/48027/

integrating something cool or fun that people can share on Facebook and about providing links to articles where you can get further information. So, rather than considering the production process of media, we consider what will make people share our content” (Reestorff, 2015, p. 32). Moreover, NGOs have fostered co-creation. Many times they ask for parti­ cipants’ ideas that help develop campaigns of higher relevance, involvement, reach and appeal, which is in line with the Connect & Collaborate mindset we discussed in Chapter 7. For example, Greenpeace, with the campaign “The Arctic needs your imagination, what would you build to save it?” asked supporters to create content for this cause (Reestorff, 2015). Reflecting the NGOs’ modern ethos that “new movements don’t need charismatic leaders; any small group of people can create change themselves” (Shepard & Hayduk, 2002, p. 201, cited in Reestorff, 2015, p. 35), Greenpeace asks for active parti­ cipation in the designing of its campaigns offering guidance on its website. It seems that asking social media users to generate a social media storm is the next step after empowering supporters through involving them in co-creation (see Figure 8.5). In addition to creating or even co-creating with participants interesting content, understanding the differences among participants and the variation of motivations is an important topic for NGOs’ communication managers. Knowing in a deeper level the participants helps mobilize more effectively different types of activists and prompt them to be more engaged in relevant to them causes and suitable forms of actions. Lesanner reveals that “The field of participants is definitely diverse, and in Greenpeace we talk about a ladder of engagement”… “We have made analyses and tried to categorize people” (Reestorff, 2015, p. 33). Even people with little involvement can be part of collective efforts by engaging in clicktivism, even if this simply means just sharing content. However, low active involvement can actually generate a cycle of

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FIGURE 8.5

Greenpeace empowering supporters through co-creation

Source: https://planet4.greenpeace.org/content/

empowerment as more people from the comfort of their home can now be part of something bigger; as Lesanner states: “Furthermore, it underlines that people can parti­ cipate in multiple ways, not just by participating in a demonstration” and clicktivism could be a good starting point as “If you give people opportunities to act beyond the ‘click’, it is very likely that they will” (Reestorff, 2015, p. 36). This was demonstrated in the case of Greenpeace against Lego, where click­ tivism resulted in one million emails being sent to Lego’s inbox asking the company to end its collaboration with Shell (Reestorff, 2015). The background story is that initially, Lego agreed with Shell to make Lego sets with the Shell logo available at gas stations. Actually, more than 16 million such toys were sold (Griggs, 2014). Greenpeace claiming that Shell was tapping into Lego’s image (an image associated with children) in order to improve its reputation, generated a social media storm that put so much pressure on Lego that it eventually decided to end the partnership (Griggs, 2014; Vaughan, 2014; Freisleben, 2015). In the case of NGOs, through the example of Greenpeace, it is quite evident that social media storms have already started to being used as communication and pressure tools with high levels of effectiveness towards reaching one’s goals (in this case making powerful organizations pay attention and alter corporate wrongdoings and behaviors). This context of NGOs unfolds the potential dynamic that social media storms entail that can lead to a more sustainable way of doing business as companies now cannot afford to operate in questionable ways. However, the role of authenticity and genuineness of intentions is crucial as one could skeptically argue that “since the market feeds off of the constant production of difference, the most creative, unorthodox, singularizing consumer sovereignty practices are the most productive for the system. They serve as grist for the branding mill that is ever in search of new cultural materials” (Holt, 2002, p. 88).

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Concluding discussion In this chapter, we explored the potential initiation and use of social media storms by companies and NGOs as effective communication tools that can help them reach their goals. In the case of companies, we saw that involvement in brand activism through taking a clear stand on a socio-politically loaded issue that causes polarization could potentially generate a social media storm that creates much attention, both positive and negative reactions by stakeholders and can in some cases lead to more effective targeting and repositioning (see Nike’s case in this chapter). However, leaders should reflect on the societal impact of polarization and be aware that research has shown that even when a brand takes a stance that is aligned with the values of their targeted audience, this involvement can still have a limited upside, while when a company takes the opposite stand, it can actually harm the brand (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). Nevertheless, a series of surveys have also shown that the majority of consumers nowadays expects companies to communicate their values more clearly and sees those organizations as part of the solution of social issues. Therefore, many managers will face the dilemma of whether their brand should be more vocal and more openly involved in brand activism. In such cases, it is crucial to choose causes close to the core values and relevant to the company's activity and pay much attention to the authenticity of their effort. Moreover, they need to ensure that they have a clear understanding of their goals and their audiences, a careful craftsmanship of their narrative so as to avoid misinterpretations by the stakeholders, to be mentally prepared for a po­ tential generation of a social media storm, to allocate the resources in order to deal with it and to have a plan regarding how to keep the conversation going. As in the Zoo case we discussed in Chapter 6, a key element is to adhere to the company’s vision and mission. Further, we explored how NGOs have successfully embraced consumer em­ powerment. It seems that they have evolved from just involving the audience in the co-creation of content to encouraging them in some cases to generate social media storms. This use of social media storms by NGOs as effective pressure tools on companies and other organizations in order to correct wrongdoings that are in their agenda of interests is another manifestation of the fascinating dynamics that are involved within the storms and represents a prelude of what the future will unfold regarding experimentation with such strong forces.

References Alix, L. (2020). Young workers, clients press banks to take stand on social issues. American Banker, 6–7. Baar, A. (2018). The case for brands taking a stand. The Wall Street Journal. https://deloitte. wsj.com/cmo/2018/12/12/the-case-for-brands-taking-a-stand/ Baird, N. (2019). When brands take a stand: A checklist. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/ sites/nikkibaird/2019/01/28/when-brands-take-a-stand-a-checklist/?sh=6b094b045d6f

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INDEX

Note: Italicized page numbers refer to figures, bold page numbers refer to tables

A accident 5 accuracy of data 53 action-based models of theories 7 activism 30, 142; see also brand activism; corporate sociopolitical activism activist 141–2, 144, 147, 149 adequate reasoning 8 Adidas 30 Alphabet Inc. 27 Amazon 54, 56 anger 10–11, 32–4, 38–9 anti-branding 10, 12, 34–6, 57; anti-brand websites 35–6 anti-consumption 30; groups 35 Apple 30, 54 Asana 21 attribution 9 authenticity 143–4, 146, 150–1 Axe 28 B Benoit 8 betrayal 66 big data 43, 45, 48–54, 132; see also social big data; variety, of big data; velocity, of big data; veracity, of big data; visuality, of big data; volume, of big data Big Tech 3, 27 Black Lives Matter (movement) 30, 143 blogs 18–19, 23 blogging platforms 21 boycott 1, 4, 10, 12, 25, 33, 46, 58, 61, 66, 129, 140–1, 143; boycott-based action 55 brand activism 30–1, 140–7, 151; green 145; inauthentic 31, 144

brand communities 20, 24 brand crisis 56, 58, 60, 64 brand equity 4, 31, 66, 67 brand hate 46, 57 brand loyalty 62, 66–7 brand management 10, 34–6, 39 brand parodies 35 ByteDance 24 C cancel culture 33, 142 clicktivisim 149–50 co-creation 19, 25, 27, 149, 150, 151 cognition 6, 88, 102, 129, 130 cognitive adjustment 82 cognitive dissonance theory 6; see also cognitive theory cognitive framing 75, 83 cognitive psychology 75, 85, 95 cognitive skills 92–3 cognitive strategies 89 cognitive theory 83, 90; see also cognitive dissonance theory collaborative brand attacks 2, 56 collaborative projects 22–3 communication technology 42–3 community managers 24 complaint 2, 4, 10, 34–6, 46–7, 57–8, 79–80, 96, 130 complementary model 44, 64 concession 7, 79 conflict 6, 62, 79, 91 conservative approach 39, 50 consumer behavior 10, 28, 30–2, 75–6, 79, 116 consumer empowerment 3, 10–11, 25–7, 29, 35, 39, 58, 95, 106, 133, 137, 144,

156

Index

151; see also consumer empowerment/ disempowerment paradox; consumer power; controlled empowerment; interactional empowerment; uncontrolled empowerment consumer empowerment/disempowerment paradox 27, 39 consumer engagement 28, 33, 80, 120, 113, 137 consumer negative communication 6–7 consumer power 25, 35, 104; sources of 25, 35; see also consumer empowerment; consumer sovereignty; cultural power; discursive power consumer protection organizations 29 consumer punitive actions/behavior 33–4 consumer satisfaction 28, 32; see also customer satisfaction consumer sovereignty 25, 150; see also consumer power consumerism 83; movements 25 consumption 24–6, 28–30, 42–3, 66; ecofriendly 145, green 30; sustainable 30; see also anti-consumption contempt 10, 33–4, 38 contents 47, 51–3; see also firm-generated content; user-generated content controlled empowerment 27 Copenhagen Zoo 22–3, 111, 113, 115 corporate social responsibility 120, 135, 141 corporate sociopolitical activism 140–2, 144 corporate wrongdoings 1, 10, 33–4, 150–1 crisis communication 4–9, 11–12, 47, 78, 90, 118 crisis situation 5–6, 9–10, 12, 77, 85, 93, 113 criticism 10, 28, 34, 80, 84, 91, 115 Croatian Railways 36–7, 104, 134 crowd-based power 26, 57, 60, 63–4, 66; see also consumer power crowdfunding 26 crowdsourcing 26, 34, 36, 38 cultural power 25; see also consumer power culture 28–9, 55, 61, 81, 102, 104, 107, 116, 135–6; see also cancel culture customer engagement see consumer engagement customer management of relationships 26 customer relationship management 26 customer satisfaction 3, 119; see also consumer satisfaction customer self-service 26

D dark social 21 data 42–5, 47, 52 data-based literacy 53 data-dependent technologies 43 data-driven technologies 43 data visualization 52–3 Dave Carroll 23 deep-seated 5, 55–6, 117 Deezer 21 defensive 9, 51–3, 120 demand-based power 26, 66; see also consumer power digital media 26, 44, 64 discursive power 25; see also consumer power disgust 33–4 displacement model 44 dissatisfaction 3, 10, 12, 23, 35, 37–8, 97, 119 Dove 28 E electronic word-of-mouth 3–4, 11, 48, 51 emotional (non-scientific) route 7–9 emotional motives 32 emotional perspective 32, 85 emotions 1, 3, 7, 10–12, 24, 31–3, 38–9, 45, 47, 53–4, 57, 79–82, 84, 89–92, 95, 97, 99, 102, 105, 107, 113–14, 116–25, 135–6, 142, 144; see also moral emotions; negative emotions; on-the-go emotions empowered consumer 1, 10–11, 24, 27, 35, 106, 128, 147; see also consumer empowerment; consumer power; interactional empowerment; uncontrolled empowerment empowerment see consumer empowerment engagement 11, 12, 30, 44, 53, 60, 64, 95, 100, 113, 125, 143; see also consumer engagement; proactive engagement engagement theory 32 environmental (pressure) groups 29, 145 episodic memory 11, 105 ethics 29–30, 65, 83, 88, 103, 111, 115 eWord of mouth see electronic word-ofmouth exchange paradigm 28 exponential growth 51, 59–60, 81

Index

F Facebook 18–21, 23–4, 27, 38, 46, 49, 54, 56, 62, 76, 96–7, 99, 103, 112, 115, 118, 124, 128–9, 140–1, 147, 149 Facebook Inc. 24, 27 failure 91, 94, 126; communication 55, 65; social 56, 65–6; see also product failure; service failure fear 32, 59, 62, 79, 88, 99, 102, 105–6, 112–15, 119–20, 122, 125–6, 132, 143 feedback 21, 32, 76, 91, 107, 132; see also negative feedback firestorms 2, 47, 78 firm-created content see firm-generated content firm-generated content 19 Fred Cavazza 21 freedom of press 2–3 G Giphy 21, 23 Google 27, 50, 54, 112, 115 Greenpeace 31, 131, 133–4, 147–50 H hate 3, 33–4, 46, 57–8, 140 human well-being 30, 56, 59, 62, 92 I image repair theory 7–8 image 7–8, 47, 79, 94, 122, 142, 144, 150; see also repairing image Imgur 21 influencers 22, 132 information-based power 26, 63, 66; see also consumer power Instagram 19, 21, 23, 24, 27, 49, 147 interactional empowerment 47; see also consumer empowerment Internet of things 48, 50 L L’Oréal 30, 143 leadership 118, 120–1, 123, 125–6, 135, 137; -in-action 95; emotional 120; strategic 12; thought 23; traditional 116, 126; see also resilient leadership legacy media 43–4, 47, 49, 58–61, 64 LinkedIn 18, 23, 24 lobbying 142, 145 location 61, 67 location-based services 27 love 32–4, 50, 112, 142

157

loyalty 28, 33, 66–7, 84, 118, 120, 133, 141; see also brand loyalty M market-driven decisions 51 Mastercard 35, 65–6 Me Too (movement) 30 media richness theory 21–2 Medium 21, 23 microblogging 23–4 Microsoft Corp 24 moral: content 81; emotions 33, 38; foundations 145; issues 25; judgments 33; outrage 64; panic 59; standards 33; values 30; violations 33, 66; see also negative moral emotions motivation 6, 31–2, 59, 116, 118, 122, 143, 149; see also social motivation for change motive 5–6, 31–2, 84, 118, 122; see also emotional motives, rational motives N negative brand identity 35 negative emotions 10, 12, 24, 32–4, 38–9, 57, 79, 82, 90, 105, 107, 120–1 negative event 5, 57, 80 negative feedback 34 negative moral emotions 33 negative reviews 4, 11, 97 negative word-of-mouth 1, 2, 4, 6, 11, 46, 58, 60 network-based power 26, 63, 66; see also consumer power new media 3, 18–19, 26–7, 44 NGOs 13, 147–51 Nike 30, 50, 142–3, 151 No Ban No Wall (movement) 30 normative standards 58, 62–3 nWOM see negative word-of-mouth O online social network see social network on-the-go emotions 54 oversupply 43 P parody 10, 27–8, 34–5, 37–9, 80 peak 55, 60, 66 permissive 52–4 Pinterest 22–3 polarization 145, 151; groups 141; reactions 142; targeting 142 Priceless campaign 35

158

Index

proactive engagement 30 product evaluations 3 product failure 11, 55, 65–6 product harm crisis 8, 47, 66 product recall crisis 57 protests 30, 46, 111–12, 116, 147 punishment 28, 57–8 Q quintillion bytes of data 48–9 R rational motives 32 rational (scientific) route 7–9 real-time: analysis 51; cognition 6; connectivity 45; data 49, 51–2, 76; interactions 42; involvement 44; media 19; technologies 77 relationship paradigm 28, 33 reliability 9, 53 repairing image 7–8; see also restoring image repositioning 143, 151 resilient action 99 resilient approach 37, 81, 92, 95, 97–8, 133, 136–7 resilient coping strategies 80 resilient crisis management 81 resilient framing 113–14 resilient leaders 121 resilient leadership 111, 113–14, 116, 121, 136–7 resilient management 105, 111, 114, 131 resilient managers 94–5, 107, 118 resilient mindset 54, 89, 136 resilient organization 137 resilient perspective 100 resilient response strategy 126 resilient thinking 92 resistant approach 92, 94–5, 98, 105–6, 116, 123 resistant behavior 133 resistant framing 114 resistant management 105, 123 resistant manager 92, 94, 98, 131, 136 resistant mindset 39, 54, 132 resistant stakeholder 102 resistant thinking 116, 126, 131 responsibility 8–9, 25, 29, 66, 83–4, 91, 96, 100, 106, 134–5 restoring image 7–8; see also repairing image revenge 46, 57–8, 97, 99, 116, 122 reviews 27, 97; see also negative reviews

S sabotage 56 Sascha Lobo 1 SCCT see situational crisis communication theory Second life 23 self-disclosure 21–23 self-presentation 21–23 service failure 6, 11, 54–5, 60, 65–6 sharing economy 26, 43 sharing sites 18–19, 21, 23 shitstorm 1, 132 situational crisis communication theory 7–9 Slack 21 social awareness 11 social big data 45–7, 52–4; see also big data social collective 34, 82 social injustices 30, 33, 140 social justice 28–9 social media: classification of 21–24; definition 18–20; functional building blocks 20; landscape 21, 22–4, 39, 58, 60; properties 18; sensemaking 129–31, 133–7; strategies 12, 98, 128–9; see also social media platform; trigger for the social media storm social media platform 2, 11–12, 18–23, 27, 34–5, 39, 46–7, 49–50, 53–5, 57, 59, 62–4, 67, 145; classification of 21–24; types of 21–24 social media storm: categorical variations of 54, 67; concept of 1–2; constituents of 62; data 42, 47; duration of 55, 59–61, 67, 79; emotional coping perspective 82; insights into 42; intensity of 33, 67; managing across cultures 136; as a marketing tool 140; as an opportunity 10, 121; preconditions of 18; properties of 62, 67; resilience towards 94; resistance towards 92 social motivation for change 28, 37 social networking site 18–19, 23–4, 27 social presence theory 21–2 social responsibility 25, 134 societal injustices 30 societal marketing concept 29 Spotify 21, 30 stress 6, 62–3, 79–80, 82, 84, 89, 91–2, 99, 100, 135 stressful situations 6, 60, 107 subjective views 6 sustainability 25, 28–30, 111, 120, 134, 144–5 sustainable marketing 30

Index

T targeting 92, 142–3, 151 targeted audiences 142–4, 151 tension 28, 31, 62–3, 79, 82, 121–2 TikTok 23–4 Tolstoy 34 traditional media 18, 38, 56, 58, 62, 64–5, 104, 118 transparency 10, 26, 34, 83, 92, 95, 112, 115–8, 134, 140, 142, 147 tribe 142 trigger for the social media storm 10, 12, 23, 28, 31, 36, 38, 54–6, 63, 65, 67, 78, 80, 102, 105, 114, 118, 122 Twitter 19, 23–4, 37–8, 46, 97, 103–4, 112, 118, 128–9 U UGC see user-generated content un-controlled empowerment 27 unethical 28, 30, 35 Unilever 28 United breaks guitars (social media storm) 23 unpredictable crisis/event 5, 7, 75, 77 urgency 7, 31 user-generated content 19, 24, 26, 132 V values 5–6, 11–12, 30, 76, 88, 101, 112, 115, 123, 135, 137, 140–2, 144, 151 variety 49–50, 57, 104; of big data 43, 50–2, 67 velocity 20, 51, 55; of big data 43, 51 venting behavior 33

159

veracity 53; of big data 53–4, 67 Viber 21 viral marketing 23 virality 51–2, 67 virtual communities 20 virtual game worlds 23–4 virtual social worlds 23–4 visuality 52; of big data 52, 67 volume 42, 48, 65, 112; of big data 42–3, 45, 48–52, 67 voluntary simplicity 30 vulnerable 6, 89 W Web 1.0 19 Web 2.0 19 WhatsApp 21, 27, 49, 62 Wikipedia 19, 22–3, 112 win-win-win 11–12, 81, 106 woke 30, 140; advertising 30, 140; capitalism 140; movement 29–30, 35; washing 31, 144 WOM see word-of-mouth word-of-mouth 4, 11, 18, 25, 51, 58; see also electronic word-of-mouth, negative word-of-mouth World of Warcraft 23 Y YouTube 19–21, 23, 27, 49, 62, 133 Z zettabytes of data 44, 48 Zoo see Copenhagen Zoo