The 2nd presidential debate took place just a couple days ago
and Twitter was exploding once again. Both candidates, Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton engage massively in social media especially Twitter. They use this platform
for various purposes such as communication with their followers, clarification
of facts and unfortunately also attacks on each other which always attract a lot of attention. Karmen Kert has compared their Twitter use in her blog on gendered social media. She stated that Trump’s active and constant engagement has brought him
success and popularity. Hillary’s Twitter account was
described as more controlled and conventional. Trump is indeed very active and rather uninhibited which is not always received
positively. Many of his tweets end up as a target of mockery and even make it
to programs like the Daily Show (forward to 4:50):
The previous blog did not go into much detail about the
effectiveness of social media for PR therefore I will elaborate and present
some findings on this topic. Several authors
such as Moreno et al. (2015) and
Valentini (2015) are rather
sceptical about the use of social media by PR professionals. Valentini claims that PR professionals tend to overestimate the
importance of social media for public relations. Social media can serve the basic
functions of PR but their effect is only weakly if at all
supported by empirical findings. Thus the positive attitude toward social media
and PR campaigns built around them might just be based on the favorable attitude
of PR professionals who use social media and therefore think they are
important. Just like Donald Trump stated during the 2nd debate after
being asked about his Twitter activity:
‘Tweeting happens to be a modern-day form of
communication. You can like it or not like it. I have, between
Facebook and Twitter, I have almost 25 million people. It's an
effective way of communication. So you can put it down, but it's a
very effective form of communication. I'm not unproud of it to be
honest with you.’
The same principle
was shown in the study by Moreno et al. on the actual use of social media by PR
professionals. Their results showed that 65.2%
of participants used social media daily for personal purposes and 55% used them
at work. The more active professionals held a stronger belief in the importance
of social media.
On the other hand, Veil et al. (2011) argued that
public agenda can be effectively spread on social media. This article mostly offers recommendations on how to use social media for
crisis communication but the general conclusion emphasizes the benefit of social
media since many consumers are already using these platforms to talk about important
issues such as presidential elections. They argue that it is a useful channel
to provide information and also to see reactions from the public and other
parties.
So the answer to the question whether social media are effective and
important for PR lays somewhere in-between. But even if you decide to be or not be active on social media, definitely don’t do what Trump’s PR team did after the 1st
presidential debate and that is to delete the tweets raised and criticized by
Hillary (see below).
 |
| Screenshot by Abby Ohlheiser retrieved from Washington post |
 |
| Screenshot by Abby Ohlheiser retrieved from Washington post |
Being active on Twitter gives politicians a great
opportunity to connect with their fans but it also works as huge library.
Therefore all claims made by the
candidates should always be well thought-out and formulated otherwise the
reputation and popularity will suffer.
Trying to save it afterwards will not help...
-------------------------
About
the author:
Bianka is a beginner PR blogger studying at UvA. Her passions include travelling, fashion and also #socialmedia. She is currently trying to balance work & school and hopes that you liked her little blog post.
Bianka is a beginner PR blogger studying at UvA. Her passions include travelling, fashion and also #socialmedia. She is currently trying to balance work & school and hopes that you liked her little blog post.
No comments:
Post a Comment