Engagement and Management of the Online Community - Case Study Example

Engagement and Management of the Online Community: Qantas Case Study Name: Course: Institution: Date: Introduction Qantas Airways Limited formed in 1920 is the leading carrier airline in Australia and among the oldest in the world. The airline based in Sydney controls 65% of Australia’s market with its subsidiaries operating the Qantaslink and Jetconnect operating under the Qantas brand. In 2011, the company underwent rapid structural modifications due to financial losses and subsequent loss in market share. Approximately 1000 employees lost their jobs as the company strategized into the Asian market through establishing airlines under different names. The following financial year spelled, doom for the company due to the intensified industrial disputes, fuel prices, and stiff competition. Qantas began a program, Qantas Frequent Flyer, to reward customer loyalty and encourage customer involvement. It began exploring the social media in 2010 to actively communicate with its customers and respond to their concerns. The loyalty program also aimed at connecting with the customers to gain feedback regarding their brand and customers’ attitudes towards their services (Fan et al, 2014 p.553). The company collaborated with the technology company, Communispace, to establish a private online community where only authorized users could communicate. This community engaged in discussions concerning crucial business decisions that yielded helpful feedback for the company regarding the improvement of online communication. Through this communication platform, the program developed into a successful public social media strategy that exploded into an active online community. Engaging and Managing Online Communities The success of every business relies on the relationship with its customers among other stakeholders. The establishment and development of stable relationships with the public relies entirely on the communication channels available. Traditionally, public relations only referred to the courteous behaviour of the receptionist to the customers who visited the business premises. The evolving industrial world however has changed the view of organizations towards public relations. The emergence of modern communication channels especially the internet has changed the view of the corporate world towards the public (Horowitz, 2010 p.461). The social media particularly increases the level of interaction between various organizations’ stakeholders hence it is the best interest for the organizations to join in the conversation. Social media has been a gold mine for business firms since it offers an efficient and cheap mode of communication with the public. The most active sites are facebook, twitter, and pinterest that allow the organizations to open up personalized accounts under their management (Porter et al, 2011 p.93). The facebook pages and twitter handles act as an interception for the online users as well as the organization. This creates an online community that the organization needs to monitor as well as manage. Engaging and managing online communities involves the establishment of a community that communicates online through the shared interest of the business (Kent & Taylor, 1998 p.330). These forums provide a platform for the business to promote its products, respond to queries regarding products and services, and collect valuable feedback from the consumers regarding their satisfaction levels. However, these forums do not entirely rely on conversation regarding the business and its commodities since it mostly operates on the social media platform. The business therefore strikes a balance between formal and informal conversations to encourage contribution of the public. This creates an active community comprising of customers and other related parties who engage socially in regards to the business’ operations (Fan et al, 2014 p.554). Engagement and management of the online community offers the business a competitive advantage since it ensures the maintenance of healthy relationships with the stakeholders. It also offers an opportunity for the improvement of the corporate image among the public due to the receptive nature of these relationships. Online communities involve both internal and external stakeholder who interact through the online platform. The major stakeholders of a firm include the suppliers, customers, employees, investors, competitors, and the government among others. The focus of online community management however is on the external stakeholders who include potential customers, currents customers, suppliers, and competitors among others. It involves the establishment of a healthy relationship with these stakeholders to promote the commodity brands, advertise services, inform of new pricing strategies as well as make the commodities part of their daily lives (Fan et al, 2014 p.554). The Relationship Management Theory The relationship management theory suggests that the public relationships balance the interests of both the organization and the public realized through the management of public relationships. The public relations act as a management function that relates the mutually beneficial relationships between the public and the organization from which success or failure emerges. The relational approach context applies in various public relations areas such as public affairs, issues management, community relations, media relations, and crisis management. The organization must communicate with different groups of the public since its actions have an effect on the people and the organization cannot exist in the absence of people. A single action of the organization however does not create sufficient interaction with the public hence the organization must create constant, consistent, and efficient communication channels to engage the various groups of audiences (Porter et al, 2011 p.97). The relationship between the organization and the public has therefore offered a central point for the public relations research to determine the effectiveness of the engagement structures. Traditionally, firms viewed public relations as communication endeavor while relationship management appeared as a management function used in strategic communication. Analyzing a firm’s public relations status was in terms of what they could do or not do as well as the experiences of the firm. The concept of relationship management transformed this view through focusing on the current position of the firm. (Broom et al, 2000) researched on the organization’s relationship with the public and identified three types of relationships: personal, professional and community relationships. The two professors identified the difficulties encountered in analyzing complicated human relationships through the cause and effect model due to the lack of definite answers to certain problems. The researchers in the PR field used quantifiable measures in the analysis of human behaviour to assess the complex relationships as a mix of various variables. According to (Broom et al, 2000), the analysis of public relations in terms of relationship management demands the integration of concepts from the interpersonal communication, mass media, organizational behaviour, marketing, management, and social psychology concepts. The basic purpose of public relations is the inception and development of consistent long-term relationships with the key stakeholders of the organization. It is therefore important for the organization to assess the existing relationships in addition to the measurement of the results of public relations work. The concept of relationship management is consistent with other management theories such as systems theory and other middle-range management theories (Porter et al, 2011 p.96). (Ledingham 2001) suggested that there exist four major structural developments that led to the emergence and development of the relational perspective to public relations analysis, teaching, and practice. According to this analysis, organizations realized the crucial role of relationships in public relations since the existence of the organization; the public and the communication channels in isolation do not promote the public relations. The redefinition of public relations as a management function placed the need for public relations managers to adopt standard management principles in their activities. According to this, the managers had to adopt the four key management principles of analysis, planning, implementation, and evaluation. The other suggestion involved identification of the major components of the organization-public relations and their connection to the public perceptions, behaviour, attitudes, and knowledge. Firms developed measurement tools of the relationships in order to predict public satisfaction, behaviour, and loyalty. Finally, Ledingham suggested the construction of relationship management models promoted the development of the relational perspective to management. The models covered the consequences and processes involved in relationship management, which led to the development of the 10-phase and 5-step models. (Toth 2000) identified two approaches to public relations; a pure personal influence and pure interpersonal influence. The first approach involves the influence on an individual to accept their firm’s or the public position with static attributes. The second approach involves the role of interpersonal relations in finding a mutual understanding, consensus, and agreement in the open and dynamic attributes (Toth 2000 p.214). According to his approaches, the final objective of interpersonal communication is the establishment and development of successful relationships. Some crucial elements to consider include trust, emotion, understanding, intimacy, similarity, and dominance-submission. The research recommended further study on the interpersonal model in public relations to determine the impact of public relations on the public’s loyalty, behaviour, and attitudes. However, the findings suggested that individuals rarely rely on their instincts when faced with a negotiation situation but rather make consultation from others (Toth 2000 p.217). Qantas and Its Online Community In 2010, the company faced a crisis caused by engine failure forcing the airplane to engage an emergency landing in Singapore. This caused panic among the families and relatives of the passengers and there was a social media outburst with the public expressing their concerns regarding the situation. This offered the company an opportunity to explore the social media as a platform to interact with the customers to update them on the unfolding events and respond to the numerous queries (Porter et al, 2011 p.97). The Qantas online community came into existence due to the high level of traffic of online users engaging in the firm’s conversations. The company became serious about management of the online community and employed a numbers of staff members to follow up the conversation and continuously engage the online users. Managing the online community offered the company a competitive edge in the highly competitive market. The history of Qantas financial performance reveals that the company suffered heavy financial losses in the past and the management is therefore keen on escaping the rerun of the same situation. Engaging and managing the online community promotes the company’s corporate image in addition to its excellent customer service, reliability, and safety standards (Wilson, 2000 p. 112). Capitalizing on this strategy therefore offers the company an opportunity to stay ahead of its competitors and maintain its top position. Qantas uses the online community to promote its level of communication with its stakeholder. Through the platform, the customers make enquiries about the flight schedules, prices, offers, among others. In case of difficulties, the company utilizes the medium to inform the public and give updates on emerging situations (Porter et al, 2011 p.98). The company places posts on social media through its twitter and facebook accounts to pass information and invites the public’s comments and feedback regarding the information. The Online Community Management Process Qantas divides its online community among the available employees to ensure active engagement of the public with the company. The employees act as the company’s representatives and respond to the online conversations regarding the company and its services. The management process begins with the segmentation of the community into various manageable groups managed by 300-500 staff members. The group segmentation occurs based on age, interests, and social medium among others (Ren et al, 2012 p. 852). Segmentation creates room for intimate personal conversations between the members and with the company’s representative. The tight knit community interacts actively through the airing of views, opinions, and concerns hence offering a wide variety of voices addressing issues such as the branding, service quality, and customer satisfaction. The members to sign up to the company’s online platforms and can log in whenever they feel the need to interact with others. The company offers a wide range of involving activities to keep the participants engaged hence encouraging continuous involvement. Presence of a private and secure site enables the maintenance of confidentiality on crucial matters discussed during the interaction. The effective planning strategies of engaging activities ensure that the community consistently has issues to address and situations that require their opinions. These activities cover the crucial areas of the organization that it requires to make decisions hence requiring the opinions of the stakeholders. The engaging activities cover the current trends, insights, emerging ideas that put the community’s ideas and opinions into perspective (Miller et al, 2009 p.311). The continuous nature of the conversation enables the members and the coordinator to log in at any time and contribute. Conclusion The management of the organization-public relationship enables the establishment of long-term relationship with the stakeholders (Porter et al, 2011 p.99). The relationship management theory affirms the need for the organization to establish these beneficial relationships through continuous and consistent communication. The social media offers a platform for the organization, Qantas, to engage with online users. The management of the communication with the online community has offered the company a competitive edge and its efficient public relations management has proved crucial in the development of its relationship with the public. References Broom, G., Casey, S., & Ritchey, J. (2000). Public Relations as Relationship Management: A Relational Approach to Public Relations. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Fan, H., Lederman, R., Smith, S. P. & Chang, S. (2014). How Trust is Formed in Online Health Communities: A Process Perspective. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 34(28), 531-560. Horowitz, M., D. (2010) .The New Community Rules: on the Social Web. Marketing Journal of Product & Brand Management 9(6) ,461 – 463. Kent, M. L., & Taylor, M. (1998). Building Dialogic Relationships through the World Wide Web. Public Relations Review, 24(3), 321-334. Retrieved from: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036381119980143X Ledingham, J. A., & Bruning, S. D. (2001). Community Relations. In R. L. Heath (Ed.), Handbook of public relations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Miller, K. D., Fabian, F. & Lin, S. (2009). Strategies for Online Communities. Strategic Management Journal, 30, 305-322. Porter, C. E., Donthu, N., MacElroy, W. H. &Wydra, D. (2011). How to Foster and Sustain Engagement in Virtual Communities. California Management Review, 53(4), 80-110. Ren, Y., Harper, F. M., Drenner, S., Tarveen, L., Kiesler, S., Riedl, J. & Kraut, R. E. (2012). Building Member Attachment in Online Communities: Applying Theories of Group Identity and Interpersonal Bonds. MIS Quarterly, 36(3), 841-864. Toth, E. (2000). From Personal Influence To Interpersonal Influence: A Model For Relationship Management. Public Relations As Relationship Management: A Relational Approach To Public Relations. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Wilson, L. J. (2000). Building Employee and Community Relationships through Volunteerism: A Case Study. Mahwah, NJ: Sage. Read More