Show us you are real: the effect of human-versus-organizational presence on online relationship building through social networking sites.
This study examined how creating a human presence in organizational online communication affects organization-public relationships and publics' favorable behavioral intentions to engage in word-of-mouth (WOM) and dialogic communications. Four hypotheses were tested in the context of Twitter through a 2×2 (presence: human vs. organizational×organization type: nonprofit vs. for-profit) within-subjects design. The results revealed that conversational human voice was perceived to be higher for Twitter pages of organizations with a human presence than for those with an organizational presence. Providing a human presence on social media through the use of social media managers' avatars and names appeared to promote favorable organization-public relationships and positive WOM communication. However, dialogic communication intentions did not significantly differ between organizations incorporating a human presence versus an organizational presence into their Twitter pages. The proposed dynamic role of human presence versus organizational presence adds a new perspective as to how organizations can take better advantage of interpersonal aspects of social media.
Manship School of Mass Communication, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA. hjpark6@lsu.edu
Hyojung
H
Park
Hyunmin
H
Lee
D003142:Communication; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D009938:Organizations; D009939:Organizations, Nonprofit; D061108:Social Media; D060756:Social Networking