In past decade, the popularity of social media sites is continuously growing along with the number of users. Many corporations use these platforms to interact with their audience and conduct market research in order to improve their product quality. On the other hand, many corporations are still skeptical about the use of social media sites into their marketing, research and communication strategy.
This file will focus on analysing two articles which research on social media use in modern corporations. The first article is by Selvamany P. Gabriel and Chia-Hern Koh on the use of social media sites by Malaysian companies. Another research conducted by Feng Xiong and Kim MacKenzie on use of Twitter by Australian firms which will be discussed in the report as well. Further, the role and impact of social media on strategies of corporations from Malaysia and Australia will be discussed.
The first article is titled “Social media use by public relations practitioners in Malaysia: An exploratory study” which is provided by Selvamany P. Gabriel and Chia-Hern Koh. The article researched on 26 PR practitioners in Malaysia by conducting reliability test which includes three questionnaires (Gabriel, and Koh, 2016).
The study provided that a large number of public relation practitioners (84.6 percent or 22) are actively engaged in using social media sites to communicate with various entities in their industry which constituents about their corporations. These PR practitioners use social media websites to communicate various organisational activities such as value statement, mission statements, business updates, the latest corporate news and other announcements. From 22 PR practitioners 16 (or 72.7 percent) agreed that using social media sites as a tool for communicating with various organisational entities provided them desired results.
The practitioners provided that using social media sites provided them various benefits including increase in awareness, popularity, and branding of the corporation, and it also assists in increasing sales of the firm (Payne, 2008). The majority of PR practitioners believe that by using social media, corporations can speared their business news faster than compared to other sources, and the social media sites also provide a wider audience to the firm since a significant number of people are actively connected to them. But, many PR practitioners were cautioned about using social media sites, and they believed that it cannot be a standalone tool for PR. The primary objective of PR is not only focused on which is the most effective tool but, it also concentrates on the type of content being distributed (Wright and Hinson, 2010).
In order to meet the PR objective, these PR practitioners believed that social media strategy should be coupled with other traditional media sources, and direct customer engagement is also necessary to achieve and support PR objectives (Gabriel, and Koh, 2016). The study collected valuable data from PR practitioners that are not easily available otherwise. Most importantly, the study contradicts the research conducted by Fitch (2009) which provided that most of the PR practitioners in Malaysia did not prefer to use new media because it lacks interpersonal or human connection.
The second article is titled “The business use of Twitter by Australian listed companies” which is provided by Feng Xiong and Kim MacKenzie. The article conducted research on top 100 Australian companies which are listed on Australian Securities Exchange in 2013 (Xiong, and MacKenzie, 2015). The study focuses on the rapidly increasing use of social media site ‘Twitter’ by Australian firms, and its impact on their business and to understand whether it has different influence in industrial corporations. The research provided that 60 percent of the Australian corporations from various industries have adopted the corporate use of Twitter.
The research was conducted through a thematic template approach which was based on a combination of previous researches and the result provided by the analysis of test pilot. There are 11 different business communication purposes including in the final template of the research. The study examines and researches the business content posted by 60 companies in the form of ‘tweets’ to understand the degree up to which Australian corporations use Twitter for fulfilling various corporate communication purposes.
The research also examines whether the use of Twitter varies in industry level. The study provided that Australian corporations use Twitter to fulfill various communication purposes and such purposes differ at industrial level (Cripps, Mejtoft and Singh, 2016). The most popular business purposes for which Australian companies use Twitter include corporate promotion, marketing updates and news and consumer service enquiries.
The emphasis of using Twitter by Consumer Discretionary corporations focus on ‘customer service enquiries’, whereas, the firms from industrial sectors such as energy and materials are more likely to use Twitter for sharing and disclosing ‘Potential Financial Information and ‘Financial Reporting’. The finding and observation of this study endorse the validity of using Twitter for performing various business purposes by different type of enterprises. The study provided evidence by analysing top ASX companies, different industries they represent and wider range of business purposes they possess.
The study also provides various normative guidelines for organisations which did not adopt Twitter for business communications, or for such corporations which are seeking to analyse and understand the effective use of social media technology adopted by modern companies in order to communicate and reach with their 21st-century audience.
Twitter has become a part of people’s lives, and they use the platform to communicate, interest and share with others. Modern corporations take advantage of this opportunity and use Twitter to interact with their audience since it provides a low cost and easily platforms when compared to traditional sources (Xiong, Prasad, and Chapple, 2015). It provides a large audience to firms, and it is also a two-way communication channel, unlike other traditional sources. Australian organisation can take advantage of this platform to improve their customer engagement and gain a competitive advantage.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the role of social media strategy has increased in modern corporations, and many firms use this strategy to gain competitive advantage. Both the articles focus on the implementation of social media strategy by modern corporations from Malaysia and Australia into their business structure to effectively perform various business functions relating to business relations and communications. The first article contradicts the study which provided that Malaysian PR practitioners did not prefer to use social media marketing because it lacks interpersonal or human contact (Kim and Johnson, 2011).
The research provided that majority of PR practitioners use social media strategy while communicating with different business entities, and they have gained desired results which increase in branding, popularity, and awareness of the firm along with its sales. The second article analyse top 100 Australian ASX firms to understand the use of Twitter by them for performing various communication purposes. The study provided that 60 companies use Twitter and the use of Twitter varies in industrial level. The Consumer Discretionary corporations use Twitter for various performing various operations such as sharing market news, corporate promotion and customer service enquiries. The industrial firms are more likely to disclose Financial Information through Twitter (Chapple, Prasad and Xiong, 2016).
Both the articles show the popularity of social media strategy use in modern corporations and how companies use it to perform various business functions. Most of the top corporations use social media strategy since it improved the efficiency of operations and gained them a competitive advantage. Both the study provided that social media sites provide a new and effective platform to modern organisations that they can utilise to their advantage. The corporations are requiring to effectively planning their social media strategy to achieve desired results (Prokofieva, 2014). Social media has become an integral part of modern organisations and corporation did not consider it an interpersonal method. The number corporations which use social media are increasing along with the number of social media users.
Although social media sites provide a large audience to firms, many corporations and experts are still skeptical about using them as the only method for communication and customer interaction. Many experts provide that corporations should use social media along with traditional sources to achieve their desired results (Thangavel and Vanmathi, 2015). The companies which effectively implement social media strategies into their business structure are able to gain competitive advantage; therefore, modern firms should implement an effective social media strategy. The popularity of social media sites make them a potential tool for communication and interaction with various corporate entities and customers, and modern corporations should implement an effective social media strategy into their business along with traditional sources to gain competitive advantage (Haigh, 2014).
References
Chapple, L.J., Prasad, A. and Xiong, F., 2016. Financial reporting on social media (including Twitter)-reviewing the challenges.
Cripps, H., Mejtoft, T. and Singh, A.K., 2016. The role of Twitter in B2B Knowledge Exchange and Innovation. on knowledge, Innovation and Enterprise, p.27.
Fitch, K., 2009. The new frontier: Singaporean and Malaysian public relations practitioners’ perceptions of new media. Asia Pacific Public Relations Journal, 10, pp.17-33.
Gabriel, S.P. and Koh, C.H., 2016. Social media use by public relations practitioners in Malaysia: An exploratory study. The Journal of Developing Areas, 50(5), pp.469-477.
Haigh, M.M., 2014. Comparing how organisations use websites and social media to maintain organisation–public relationships. Prism, 11(2).
Kim, E. and Johnson, T.L., 2011, March. Making the Grade: What Constitutes a Successful PR Education?. In 14 TH INTERNATIONAL PUBLIC RELATIONS RESEARCH CONFERENCE (p. 458).
Payne, K., 2008. Much ado about something: Web 2.0 acceptance and use by public relations practitioners. Pedagogy Posters _ 108, p.76.
Prokofieva, M., 2014. Twitter-based dissemination of corporate disclosure and the intervening effects of firms’ visibility: Evidence from Australian-listed companies. Journal of Information Systems, 29(2), pp.107-136.
Thangavel, N. and Vanmathi, M., 2015. Impact of marketing opportunities with social media networks. International Journal of Economic Research, 12(2).
Wright, D.K. and Hinson, M.D., 2010. IMPACT OF NEW COMMUNICATIONS MEDIA ON PUBLIC RELATIONS. Public Relations Journal, 4(3).
Xiong, F. and MacKenzie, K., 2015. The business use of Twitter by Australian listed companies. The Journal of Developing Areas, 49(6), pp.421-428.
Xiong, F., Prasad, A. and Chapple, L.J., 2015. The nature and extent of use of Twitter for financial reporting by ASX listed companies: An exploratory study.
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