Conversational Voice, Communicated Commitment, and Public Relations Outcomes in Interactive Online Communication

Abstract

Organizations face unique challenges in communicating interactively online with publics that comprise dauntingly large numbers of individuals. This online survey examined the perceptions of people who had experienced interactive communication with a large consumer-tech-industry company via organizational blogs. Those reporting the greatest exposure to the blogs in this study were more likely to perceive the organization as communicating with a conversational voice. Conversational human voice and communicated relational commitment (relational maintenance strategies) correlated positively with trust, satisfaction, commitment, and control mutuality (relational outcomes). Building on prior research, this survey supports a model of distributed public relations-one in which key outcomes of public relations are fostered by a wide range of people communicating interactively while representing an organization.Public relations scholars have heralded the Internet for its potential as a tool for dialogue and two-way communication. If public relations is about mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and publics, then the Internet holds tremendous promise for improving the communication that is an essential part of developing and sustaining such relationships when organizations and publics both have access to online media (Wright, 1998(Wright, , 2001. As Internet technologies emerged on the horizons of public relations scholarship in the 1990s and early 2000s many theorists and researchers were turning their attention to relational outcomes as important goals for public relations work, emphasizing the role of organizational and public behaviors while acknowledging the importance of communication in building and maintaining organization-public relationships (Ledingham, 2003).Many early studies of the Internet and public relations focused on the way large, for-profit companies were using the Web by analyzing the content of their Web

Does a Virtual like Cause Actual Liking? How following a Brand's Facebook Updates Enhances Brand Evaluations and Purchase Intention

“…Against this expectation, however, we observed no unique effects of these variables. Instead, and confirming H4, we observed strong significant effects of Conversational Human Voice (Kelleher, 2009) Although we did not find convincing effects of exposure and Facebook attitude, it seems reasonable to assume that a minimum amount of exposure to-and appreciation of the posts is required. It should be noted that respondents in our study on average indicated to have been exposed to the brand's Facebook posts 10-12 times during this month, and in general positively appreciated the content.…”

“…More than exposure, the perception of an engaging and natural style of communication in the posts (Kelleher, 2009) was associated with changes in brand evaluations. Several other studies have shown that the interactivity that brings about the perception of a conversational human voice is an important driver of positive effects of exposure to brands in social media (e.g., van Noort & Willemsen, 2011;Park & Lee, 2013;Sweetser & Metzgar, 2007;Yang, Kang, & Johnson, 2010).…”

“…Communicating in a conversational manner is, according to Searls and Weinberger (2000) (Kelleher, 2009, p. 177). In Kelleher's study, frequent visitors of a corporate blog perceived the conversational human voice of the organization behind the weblog as higher, which in turn was related to trust, satisfaction and commitment (Kelleher, 2009;Kelleher & Miller, 2006). …”

Building Stakeholder Relations Online: How Nonprofit Organizations Use Dialogic and Relational Maintenance Strategies on Facebook

“…Openness is about openly and freely discussing issues, thoughts and ideas. Assurance is another important feature in the sense that organizations assure their stakeholders that their concerns are legitimate, while also showing they are committed to maintaining the relationships with their stakeholders (Kelleher, 2009;Kelleher, Miller, 2006). Studying the effects of communicated relational commitment in weblogs Kelleher and Miller (2006) found that like the use of this strategy positively affected stakeholders' trust, satisfaction, and commitment (Kelleher, Miller, 2006).…”

“…Based on interpersonal communication literature two relational maintenance strategies have been studied regularly: communicated relational commitment and conversational human voice (Kelleher, 2009). Conversational human voice is used by organizations to connect with their stakeholders on a personal level.…”