The online presence of Turkish banks: Communicating the softer side of corporate identity

Abstract

a b s t r a c tThis study tries to understand the process of organizational identity construction and the role of public relations in assisting this process. This study focuses on Turkey's banking sector to understand how organizational identities are constructed and supported by corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities in addition to how they are communicated to stakeholders. The corporate websites and social media accounts (Facebook and Twitter) of the eight largest banks in Turkey are examined through thematic content analysis to understand their identity construction processes and how much they benefit from CSR activities in this process. Institutional theory is utilized in this study to get a deeper understanding of the role of CSR in organizational identity construction. The results reveal that online presence of banks in Turkey tends to emphasize the softer, especially socially responsible side of their organizational identities.

Reshaping traditional marketing mix to include social media participation

“…For the purpose of this study, companies' Facebook websites were used since Facebook is the market leader among the social media (Galati et al, 2017;Lindsey-Mullikin and Borin, 2017;Sharma et al, 2017) and previous studies in various business contexts employed Facebook as a research method (e.g., Galati et al, 2017;Kwok and Yu, 2013;Ozdora-Aksak, and Atakan-Duman, 2015;Sharma et al, 2017;Wang, and Kim, 2017). In particular, the primary data-collection method was based on observation of each activity (or updates) that took place on the profile or page on Facebook over a period of three months (October to Table 1 shows the sample profile (considering company size based on sales per year), with the related number of followers on the ad hoc page on Facebook.…”

Gaining legitimacy through CSR: an analysis of Turkey's 30 largest corporations

“…; Gallego‐Alvarez et al . ; Verboven ; Du & Vieira ; Bonsón & Ratkai ; Ozdora‐Aksak & Atakan‐Duman ). Corporate websites are an important tool for companies to engage with their stakeholders (Verboven ) and they are commonly used for CSR reporting (Maignan & Ralston ; Moreno & Capriotti ; Lee et al .…”

“…(: 303) grouped CSR activities according to type of practice such as ‘contributes resources to the arts and cultural programs in the community’, ‘contributes resources to raise social awareness of issues such as hunger and domestic violence’, ‘supports children and family issues’, ‘treats employees fairly’, ‘acts responsibly toward the environment’, ‘supports public health programs’, and so forth. In addition, the CSR coding system used by Ozdora‐Aksak & Atakan‐Duman () was also utilized to categorize CSR initiatives. Furthermore, the companies analyzed had also grouped their CSR initiatives under various categorization systems on their websites and these categorizations were also integrated into the data coding process.…”

“…In addition, the most popular industry is manufacturing with 12 companies. CSR data was collected from corporate websites, which are increasingly being used in academic research(Ettredge et al 2001; Maignan & Ralston 2002; Bons on et al 2008; ............................................................................................................................................................................................ Turkey's 30 largest companies by industry and revenue ...........................................................................................................................................................................................WanderleyMoreno & Capriotti 2009;Waters et al 2010;Gallego-Alvarez et al 2011;Verboven 2011;Du & Vieira 2012;Bons on & Ratkai 2013;Ozdora-Aksak & Atakan-Duman 2015). Corporate websites are an important tool for companies to engage with their stakeholders(Verboven 2011) and they are commonly used for CSR reporting(Maignan & Ralston 2002;Moreno & Capriotti 2009;Lee et al 2009;Du et al 2010).…”

What do people “like” on Facebook? Content marketing strategies used by retail bank brands in Australia and Singapore

“…Studies of the impact of different types of content in the retail banking sector have yielded similarly contrasting findings. On the one hand, there is evidence that banks use social media to highlight their socially responsible side to gain legitimacy (Ozdora-Aksak and Atakan-Duman, 2015). On the other hand, industry reports suggest that providing informational content on financial products and services can drive engagement (ABA, 2017).…”