ALGUNAS PROPUESTAS DE REFORMA DEL

The research will be conducted among the managers and decision makers of Finnish companies that have successfully utilized social media in communicating with their current and potential customers. In order to dig deep into the mind-sets of these managers and decision makers, the research follows a qualitative approach. This approach helps to gain more in-depth information and understanding, when compared to the quantitative approach. The qualitative process is also less strict, because the researcher has a chance to influence the research process as it proceeds by posing spontaneous sub-questions or listening to the respondents’ narratives. It can be said that the qualitative approach provides a richer understanding of the phenomenon under scrutiny. (McCraken, 1988.)

The vast majority of research on corporate identity have been conducted based on the review of other researchers’ theoretical approaches, and by developing guidelines and frameworks based on these reviews. The research articles that investigate causalities have commonly used quantitative research methods, but there is only a handful of research on corporate identity using these kinds of methods. The qualitative methods used range from discourse analysis to ethnography, but the research has especially endorsed single case studies to investigate a certain industry or other context. The use of multiple research companies will provide more comprehensive, reliable and generalizable findings than single case studies. The research on social media, on the other hand, has a more balanced set of conducted research in terms of quantitative versus qualitative approaches. Most of the research investigating the concrete outcomes of social media relies on quantitative methods. However, when the focus turns to the more strategic or managerial sides of social media, the researchers have mostly used qualitative methods. Using the qualitative approach in this thesis research seems to be supported by the past academic research on corporate identity and social media.

The selected research method is interviews. In circumstances where it’s possible to identify people who are in key positions to understand a situation, interviews are a preferable method because they provide a significant amount of details and insights (Rowley, 2012). The realist approach recommends using multiple sources of data in order to get to good approximation of the “truth”(Sobh & Perry, 2005). Interviews have also been used as a method especially in studies, which investigate the logic in the formation of corporate identity. These interviews are mostly conducted among business executives and experts, which supports the method selected for this thesis.

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The research context refers to the setting where the research problem can be studied in most favorable terms. The research will be conducted among the social media managers and decision makers of major Finnish companies that have successfully utilized social media in their business activities. Managers have long been considered an important instrument of corporate identity. It is widely recognized that the way in which managers and decision makers connect with the organization affects how stakeholders feel about the organization (Melewar, 2008). This notion supports the decision on selecting company managers and decision makers as the object of study. The goal is to unravel rationales behind the corporate social media identity management decisions made by the company decision-makers. This way the research can provide more knowledge on how also other managers can harness their social media efforts for building and managing their corporate identity in a successful way. The selection of companies included in the research is based on a previous research conducted by a Finnish communication and media news website Mediaviikko.fi. The research studied the social media performance of the 500 biggest Finnish companies. It is the first social media index research conducted in Finland, published in January 2012. The assumption is that the companies that have performed well in this research have also been successful in harnessing their social media platforms for building and managing their corporate identity. The companies studied in the thesis are selected among the top 20 performers of the index research. These companies are likely to be relevant in studying the successful communication of corporate identity in company social media settings, because they are among the top 4 percent of performers of the index study. The index score was based on each company’s activity and engagement in social media. The platforms included in the study were Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google (which is only evaluated as the basic component of online communication). (Sosiaalisen median yritysindeksi 2012.)

The companies were selected on the basis that they provide consumer goods and/or services. Companies that operate mainly in business-to-business contexts are not included in the research, due to the different nature of communication compared to business-to-consumer communication. The total number of companies under study in this research is eight. The interviews will be conducted among the social media or communication managers (or equivalent) of each company. Since the companies operate in the area of consumer goods and/or services, the social media sites under scrutiny in this thesis research are those that especially enable interaction with the potential or current consumers of the company. These

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sites are the social media sites of the corporate brand, such as Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest. Sites such as LinkedIn, which is more of a professional networking site and not especially designed for consumer interaction, will not be included in the research.