A tale of two platforms: A comparative analysis of language use in consumer complaints on Reddit and Spotify Community

Abstract

Consumer complaints play a crucial role for companies in understanding customer needs and spotting possible areas of improvement. In the digital era, online platforms have become popular venues for users to voice their concerns. According to Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) and recipient design, consumers may have different recipients in mind when writing a complaint and tailor their language accordingly. This study aims to examine language variations in consumer complaints on an independent platform and a corporate platform, exploring how consumers adjust their language based on the intended recipients of their complaints. Comments under complaint posts from Reddit's dedicated subreddit, r/Spotify, and from the Spotify Community were extracted and analyzed using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC), a text analysis tool. This comparative analysis identified and compared various linguistic categories within the consumer complaints from the perspectives of formality, emotion, and assertion. The results showed that complaints on the corporate platform (1) used more formal language, (2) contained more negative emotional tones and emotion words, and (3) exhibited more assertiveness compared to those on the independent platform. Understanding the distinct linguistic features in consumer complaints on different platforms can help companies tailor their responses and address customer concerns effectively. This research contributes to the growing field of online consumer complaining behavior by uncovering how language is employed within different online communities depending on the message recipient. Furthermore, it demonstrates the potential of LIWC as a valuable tool for analyzing unstructured consumer‐generated content across diverse digital platforms, offering insights into user sentiment and experiences.