Social Media, Traditional Media and Marketing Communication of Public Relations: A Study of Banking Industry

Datis Khajeheian^{1, *}, Fereshteh Mirahmadi²

¹Center for Communication, Media and Information Technology (CMI), Department of Electronic Systems, Aalborg University, Copenhagen Campus, Copenhagen, Denmark

²Department of Public Administration, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Public relations are undertaking more important role in the marketing communication and advertising. The present paper reports a survey conducted in three Iranian banks’ public relations departments to understand how they use different media in their marketing communications and other related functions. A classification of public relations functions including fourteen functions in three categories has taken as research framework and by using a questionnaire, eight media have been asked to rank for each function, includes Television, Radio, Newspaper, Magazine, Classified Ads, Internet Websites, Social media and finally Mobile and SMS ads. Findings show that traditional media still play a dominant role in media consumption of public relations, while new Web2.0 media consist of Mobile communications and Social networks, have never ranked better than fifth from eight. Some reasons have been argues in conclusion.

Keywords

Public Relations, Social Media, Marketing Communication, Iranian Banking Industry

Received: June 12, 2015
Accepted: July 5, 2015
Published online: July 22, 2015

@ 2015 The Authors. Published by American Institute of Science. This Open Access article is under the CC BY-NC license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

1. Introduction

According to a 2007 PRSAWired for Change Survey, Eyrich et al (2008) suggest the majority of public relations professionals state that the use of communication technology has made their job easier by expediting the circulation of information to reach broader audiences. They argue that it behooves public relations practitioners to begin engaging social media in preparation for the day social media may contribute to agenda building (p:412). As more forms of social media emerge, it is beneficial for public relations practitioners to understand how to use these tools as they relate to their jobs (Curtis et al, 2010:90). By popularity of new media and their pervasiveness in the everyday life, their presence in professional environments has increased and unsurprisingly they play significant role in Public Relations too. The emergence and increasing popularity of social media have changed the practice of public relations (Di Staso et al, 2011).

Public Relations also playing more important role than what they undertook before. Today they are playing significant role in the marketing communication and advertising. For example Muk (2012) examines public relations (PR) functions in a large Japanese corporation (Kao) and suggests that the company’s PR department functions more or less like an advertising department and also supports a new consumer product launch. Also Freitag and Stokes suggest that public relations (in the Middle East) is often associated with advertising and ceremonies (cited in Gaither and Al-Kandari, 2014:34).

Considering importance of Public Relations in marketing communication and also the increasing popularity of social media, the present research aims to study how public relations use traditional and social/digital media in performing their mission. For this purpose Iranian banking industry as representative of a huge industry with considerable everyday communication with public has investigated for understanding the level of usage of any particular medium by public relations practitioners.

2. Literature Review

In recent years and by increase of social media presence in everyday lives of citizens and organizations, the study of social media in public relations and its marketing performance attracted more research interests.

Stanyol (2012:835) in a qualitative assessment of Spanish PR consultancies considers the economic crisis and Web 2.0 context as a huge opportunity in four ways: (1) because they make organizations aware of the strategic value of PR (and the importance of looking after their online and offline reputation); (2) because advertising budget cuts have been partly allocated PR as better value for money; (3) because PR agencies that offer crisis communication specialty have seen an increase in demand for their services; and (4) because Web 2.0 is a natural environment for public relations, where new figures such as the community manager simply transfer the management of brand and company reputations to this new digital medium (Stanyol, 2012: 835).

Avidar (2013:448) argues that it is important that organizational representatives understand the relational potential of interactive responses. Despite she didn’t imply on social media explicitly, emphasize on interactivity and responsiveness in her research shows the importance of using social media and technological advances in public relations.

Solis and Breakenridge in their book (2009) argue that social media reinvents aging business of public relations and will put the public back in public relations. They believe social media provides a way for companies to communicate with its customers and established better relationship with them.

Berthon et al argue that technological changes of Web 2.0 (which created social media) can be thought of in terms of technology that has enabled a shift in focus from companies to consumers, individuals to communities, nodes to networks, publishing to participation, and intrusion to invitation. While Web 2.0 is technological, its effects are sociological and little short of revolutionary in their implications for business (2012:262). They show the locus of power has shifted from organization to collective. They also emphasize on the role of creative consumers and how social media can help organizations to benefit from customer contents. This can be valuable for public relations to use social media to understand what customers are thinking about their organization and how to communicate with them in the best interactive way.

Figure 1. Web 2.0, social media, and creative consumers (Berthon et al, 2012: 262).

Figure 2. Trend of four phases of social media research (Khang et al, 2012: 291).

Figure 3. Research Framework.

Khang et al (2012: 291) in their analysis of Social Media Research in Advertising, Communication, Marketing, and Public Relations, from 1997 to 2010 show that studies on social media have considered its role in communication, marketing and public relations. It is considerable that 82.4% of researches is social media in public relations have been done in "Uses and users of social media" area.

Steyn et al (2010) imply on the emergence of social media in the media platform as Social Media Release (SMR) which is a blend of the traditional press release and digital media. They argue that this has evolved as a response to the increase in interactivity permitted by social media and is the best conceived of as a digital press release that includes the additional elements a reporter or consumer would want to see before they create their own content to broadcast or transmit further (steyn et al, 2010: P 87). Today, media managers are not only faced with mass media, but they should manage a media matrix, which has very different and even contradictory characteristics. So media manager should use each kind of media for special group, and according to the media effect (Khajeheian et al, 2012).

Eyrich et al (2008) published an article focused on use of social media tools and communication technology in Public relations. Using an online survey they asked professionals about their use and perceived ubiquity within the industry related to social media. Results show that practitioners have adopted nearly six different social media tools. The most popular tool was used was email, followed by intranet, blogs, videoconferencing), podcast, video sharing, and PDAs. Lesser used tools were: instant message, events, social networking, text messaging, photo sharing, and wikis. Rarely used tools were: virtual worlds, social bookmarking, gaming, micro-blogging/presence applications, and news aggregation. However this Study not investigated how the practitioners use social media as a tool to better performing their duties as public relations staff. Just Explained that social media was being used in the industry some of the time. Steyn et al (2010) recognize Social Media as a public relations tool.

Weaver Lariscy et al (2009), investigates the agenda-building role of social media content in journalists’ work. They explained that more non-public relations content from user-generated and social network sites, like YouTube and Twitter, are fast becoming resources for journalists to get story ideas, break scandals, and find sources. According to this understanding, they work to determine the frequency of such uses of social media. Findings indicate very little use of social media by business journalists.

Eyrich et al (2008) introduce eighteen media as just Social media, includes blogs, intranets, podcasts, video sharing, photo sharing, social networks, wikis, gaming, virtual worlds, micro-blogging/presence applications, text messaging, videoconferencing, PDAs, instant message chat, social event/calendar systems, social bookmarking, news aggregation/RSS, and e-mail.

Despite the increasing importance of social media and new interactive media, the role and importance of traditional media should not be ignored. Khajeheian et al (2012) suggest that elder audiences groups spend more time with mass and traditional media like televisions, Radio and newspapers, while youth interests more on new media, thus media matrix management cause the media manager to not ignore any of media for its proper sector, and proper purpose, and not to overweight each of them, but preparing an optimum mix from available media to get the best result. They coin the phrase "Media Matrix Management" to emphasize on necessity of creating and managing of a combination of different media for communication with organization customers. In another study, Khajeheian et al (2010) explain that diversity in media channels and tools make it inevitable to use a mix of media to operate the function of creating a favorite image. McKie and Willis (2012: 851), argue that the concept of Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) combined advertising, sales promotion, and public relations tactics into one strategy overseen by marketing, is one prominent example of forced combination of traditional and contemporary public relations.

Functions of Public relations in organizations is an important part of this research, to understand and measure the usage and application of different media for any specific function. Strang and Gutman (1980) determine the functions of public relationship as promotional activities involved the ‘informing’ the enthusiasts, ‘persuading’ the interested and ‘educating’ the non-attendees. Informing involves providing basic information on the event itself, its location, date, time, and cost of tickets and how they may be obtained. Informing involves providing basic information on the event itself, its location, date, time, and cost of tickets and how they may be obtained. Educating, on the other hand, involves educating the prospective patrons about the value of the art form, and therefore most likely requires personal contact, though it has high cost. There are a lot of functions explained for Public relations.

One of aging material which clearly implies on functions of public relations is the study of Cutlip et al (1985) which define public relations as "the management function that identifies, establishes, and maintains mutually beneficial relationships between an organization and the various publics on whom its success or failure depends" (Cutlip et al., 1985:4). Also in early days of presence of interactive media Adam (1983) appreciated two way communication of public relations by new media and implied on exchange of information as emerging concept which changes the tradition of public relations and enable them to listen to the voices of customers and response them. Here the functions of listening and exchange of information have been emphasized. Weaver Lariscy et al (2009), articulated the functions of media mix in following intents: utilizing for writing a story, information gathering, surveillance, research, collect objective information, investigate a rumor or negative news story, monitor other journalists, find stories, interpret information and events, establish professional relationship, determine public opinion, track competition and finally, entertainment. Also Avidar (2013) implies on interactivity and responsiveness as two main functionality of Public Relations.

Advertising and marketing professionals have tapped into social media in a different way, recognizing the potential of these venues for conveying their campaign strategies (Khang et al, 2012: 281). Study of Papasolomou et al (2013) perceived Marketing Public Relations to be more cost effective and efficient in achieving campaign objectives. Bruning et al (2008:26) imply on public dialogue, which generally focused on either interaction – where an organization and a public exchange information – or debate – where organizations and public engage in a process of statement counterstatement, and suggest that organizations and public alike gain benefit by participating in dialogue.

3. The Research Framework

By a panel of experts of Media Management and Marketing, a list of Public Relations functions created, reviewed, reconsidered and refined. The list forms the research framework, including fourteen functions which classified in three categories: Information Seeking, Public Communications, and Advertising. Information Seeking comes from society and Public Relations is mainly the receiver of information. By this group of functions, public relations aims to collect the organization- related information from society (communication-in). Advertising comes from communication with Advertisers and mostly includes the possibilities and capacities which organization offers to advertisers (Communication-out). Public Communication and responsibilities are the functions which treat with customers, stakeholders, companies, and society. By those three groups of functions, public relations department performs the expected mission. The classification has been shown in Table 1.

Table 1. The Classification of Functions in Bank PR Department.

The research framework has been illustrated in the figure 1, while the communication of public relations with different partners and also related functions have been depicted.

4. Materials and Methods

Despite Daymon and Holloway suggested that there is an increasing awareness in contemporary public relations and marketing communications of collaborative dialogue (2002:3), but an analysis of Ye and Ki in Internet-related research in public relations shows that those kind of studies lacked theoretical applications and displayed a propensity for quantitative methodological approaches (Khang et al, 2012). Therefore it is not surprising that the current research approach is quantitative too, by using survey. Survey research refers to the set of methods used to gather data in a systematic way from a range of individuals, organizations, or other units of interest (Jullien, 2008: 846).

Data Collection and Sample

Population of the research includes all public relations of Iranian banks and authors tried to access to as much as possible number of banks’ PR departments. After considerable efforts to persuade the public relations managers in different banks to take part in it, just three of them accepted to allow their personnel to participate. Researchers guaranteed the confidential of personalities and critical information. Thus the banks involve in this research include Bank Saderat Iran, Bank Mellat and Bank Refah Kargaran. The Sample in two former banks includes staff operating in Public relations department, while in the latter, Bank Refarh Kargaran, personnel operate in two departments includes public relations headquarter and Faraz Center; a telephone response communication center for CRM.

Sample of study includes 16 responses from Bank Saderat Iran, 9 responses from Bank Mellat, and 11 responses from Bank Refah Kargaran. The rate of return was 66%, means 36 returned and filled correctly from 54 in total.

Survey Instrument

A questionnaire designed in two sections to measure usage of each medium in any given function. The research question helps to identify variables and collect both specific and concrete information related to those variables. In fact, the research question provides the direct link between the abstract concept in objectives and the raw data that is collected through a survey (Miller and Yang, 2008: 242). Therefore research questions designed in two sections. The first section request for using seven points likert scale to rank the suitability of any given medium in every function, while 1 represents least suitability and 7 represents most suitable of the medium for that function. The second section of questionnaire asks respondents about their familiarity with any medium and their perception about the medium’s applicability and effect in public relations performance. All questions wrote in clear Persian, as native language of country. Questionnaire printed and asked respondents to fill them in presence of one of authors.

5. Findings

A total of 36 respondents from three different banks completed the questionnaire. Table 2 depicts the characteristics of respondents by gender, age, education, and work experience.

Table 2. Characteristics of the Sample of study.

Following is the findings for any function. Average and standard deviation for each class is calculated.

Task1: To Know Customers Expectations from Organization

Television (M=4.83, SD=1.99), Internet websites (M=4.69, SD=1.68) and Newspapers (M=4.55, SD=1.59) are the most popular media for performing this task. Next ranks belong to Radio (M=4.08, SD=1.85), Social Networks and Forums (M=3.27, SD=2.03), Mobile and SMS ads (M=3.27, SD=2.10), Magazine (M=3.17, SD=1.83) and Classified Ads (M=2.48, SD=1.78).

Task 2: Getting to Know Rumors and Favorite articles in public opinion

Most popular medium for this task in public relations staff includes TV (M=5.27, SD=2.03) and then Newspapers (M=5.19, SD=1.78). Internet Websites (M=5.05, SD=2.04) and Radio (M=4.30, SD=2.16) ranked as next useful mediums, following with Social Networks and Forums (M=3.61, SD=2.53), Mobile and SMS ads (M=3.58, SD=2.32), Magazine (M= 2.8, SD=1.84) and Classified Ads (M=2.11, SD=1.69).

Task 3: Measuring the Customers satisfaction from Organization

Results placed Internet Websites at the top of useful media by M=5.11 and SD=1.68, following by Newspapers (M=4.63, SD=1.75), Television (M=4.36, SD=2.28) and Mobile and SMS ads (M=3.77, SD=2.40). Social networks and Forums (M=3.44, SD=2.07) as well as Radio (M=3.75, SD=2.07) are at the next placed and Magazine (M=2.36, SD=1.62) and Classified Ads (M=1.55, SD=1.13) located at the bottom.

Task 4: Establishing Connections for New Co-operations

Newspaper (M=4.48, SD=2.09) placed at the top, and Internet Websites (M=4.31, SD=2.09) and Magazine (M=3.97, SD=2.02) recognizes as most popular media in sequence. Television (M=3.88, SD=2.33) and Radio (M=3.5, SD=2.33), followed by Classified Ads (M=3.11, SD=2.37) and Mobile and SMS ads (M=3.0, SD=2.26). Finally Social Media and Forums (M=2.62, SD=2.0), placed at the bottom of the table.

Task 5: Designing New Advertising Campaigns

TV (M=4.63, SD=2.36), Newspaper (M=4.57, SD=1.76), Internet Websites (M=4.18, SD=1.95), Radio (M=4.09, SD=2.10), Magazine (M=4.06, SD=1.65), Social Media and Forums (M=3.09, SD=2.21), Mobile & SMS Ads (M=3.06, SD=2.22) and Finally Classified Ads (M=2.25, SD=1.84).

Task 6: Knowledge about New Public relations and Advertising Techniques

TV (M=5.38, SD=1.89), Internet Websites (M=5.26, SD=1.89), Newspaper (M=5.17, SD=1.80), Magazine (M=4.61, SD=2.01) Radio (4.61, SD=1.95), Social Media and Forums (M=3.35, SD=2.35), Mobile & SMS Ads (M=3.08, SD=2.16), Classified Ads (M=2.18, SD=1.75).

Task 7: Acquiring information and data

Internet Websites (M=5.08, SD=1.78), Newspapers (M=4.22, SD=1.88), Magazines (M=3.94, SD=1.98), TV (M=3.34, SD=2.08), Social Media and Forums (M=3.23, SD=2.24), Radio (M=3.05, SD=2.01), Classified Ads (M=2.78, SD=2.01), Mobile and SMS ads (M=2.74, SD=1.94).

Task 8: Acquiring Interferences and interpretations about Social Trends

Newspaper by M=5.68, SD=1.47 and Internet websites by M=5.05 and SD=2.15 placed at the top of the ranking for this task. Not surprising that Magazine, as a specific and professional media ranked at the next place (M=4.85, SD= 2.34). Next ranks belong to Television (M=4.25, SD=2.47),

Next places belong to Social Media and forum (M=3.6, SD=2.43), Classified Ads (M=2.5, SD=1.86), TV (M=4.25, SD=2.47), Mobile and SMS ads (M=2.42, SD=1.80), and Finally Radio (M=3.57, SD=2.20).

Task 9: Screening Competitors

TV (M=4.80, SD=1.99), Newspaper (M=4.77, SD=2.00), Internet Websites (M=4.51, SD= 2.31), Radio (M=4.20, SD=2.12), Magazines (M=4.11, SD=2.27), Social Media (M=2.97, SD=2.10), Mobile and SMS ads (M=2.74, SD=2.17), Classified Ads (M=2.588, SD=1.84).

Task 10: Public Response about Organizational issues

Newspaper (M=5.47, SD=1.74), TV (M=5.30, SD=1.78), Radio (M=5.27, SD=1.84), Internet Websites (M=4.94, SD=1.94), Magazines (M=3.88, SD=1.96), Mobile and SMS ads (M= 3.37, SD= 2.41), Social Media & forums (M=3.33, SD=2.28), Classified Ads (M=2.08, SD=1.72).

Task 11: Public Announces

TV (M=6.13, SD=1.51), Newspaper (M=6.02, SD=1.38) and Radio (M=5.97, SD=1.48) found out as most popular media to design and run a new advertising campaign. Internet Websites (M=5.38, SD=1.66), Magazine (M=4.13, SD=2.31), Mobile and SMS ads (M=4.00, SD=2.36), Social media and forums (M=3.52, SD=2.34) and finally Classified Ads (M=3.05, SD=2.09) acquired the lowest ranks.

Task 12: Responsibility to Stakeholders

Internet Websites get the most grad by (M=5.02, SD=2.03), followed by Newspapers (M=4.36, SD=2.11) as well as TV (M=3.91, SD=2.37). They are followed by Radio (M=3.80, SD= 2.38), Mobile and SMS ads (3.69, SD=2.33), Social Media and Forums (3.61, SD=2.44), Magazine (3.16, SD=2.04), Classified Ads (2.70, SD=2.03).

Task 13: Promotion of Services

TV (M=6.41, SD=1.36), Newspaper (M=6.00, SD=1.33), Radio (M=5.97, SD=1.55), Internet Websites (M=4.80, SD=2.10), Magazines (M=4.38, SD=2.15), Mobile & SMS ads (M=4.11, SD=2.45), Social Media and Forums (M=3.58, SD=2.57), Classified Ads (M=3.22, SD=2.40).

Task 14: Specific Ads

TV (M=5.47, SD=2.04), Internet website (M=5.36, SD=1.98), Newspaper (M=5.11, SD=1.86), Radio (M=4.86, SD=2.11), Magazines (M=4.63, SD=2.40), Mobile and SMS ads (M=3.83, SD=2.52), Social Media (M=3.52, SD=2.04), Classified Ads (M=3.22, SD=2.32).

6. Analysis

This Study provides a quick snapshot from adoption of different Media in the Public relations in banking industry. As declared, the purpose of this study was to find out how public relations staffs in Iranian banking industry’ public relations departments are adopting social media tools compare with traditional media and in what extend consider those as appropriate mean for performing public relations functions and especially marketing communications.

The results show that for sample of Public relations practitioners, Traditional Media, especially Television and newspapers, are still playing the determinant role in designing the marketing and advertising campaigns. Most of the practitioners still rely on these media to perform the allocated tasks and expect them to reach the target audience and deliver the intended message. Social Media and Forums, despite the considerable amount of users and their popularity, have not recognized yet for staff as the effective means for PR functions.

The findings become surprising when consider the age of respondents, which most of sample consist of young and mid-aged people with lower than 40 years old. It was expected to observe a high rate of digital media popularity and considerable domination of new media in the Public Relations communication. However results show that despite the popularity of new media, they have not yet adopted by Public Relations. It seems the familiarity of staff and practitioners is not sufficient to expect them to use social and digital media in performing their professional tasks. Other factors, like procedures, regulations, risks, the environment, customers’ habits, trust, technical issues, language issues, etc can be influencing in this decision. Table 3 show the rank of any medium in any function.

Table 3. The rank of each medium in performing public relations function.

Television ranked at the top and is most popular media for performing eight functions. Except the function of ‘Acquiring Interferences and interpretations about Social Trends’ which television placed in the lower ranks, for all other functions this medium placed at the top four places. Therefore we conclude television is a pervasive and popular medium for most Iranian customers.

Newspapers never ranked lower than third in any function. It bolds newspaper as the traditional mass medium which still plays an important role in the media usage of Public relations. It also confirms that Iranian society still depend on traditional mass media.

Internet Websites have gained a considerable place too. They are considering as former generation of technology, while Social Networks are the new generation, web 2.0. Internet websites mostly use as the major tool of measuring the customer satisfaction, Acquiring information and data and also Responsibility to stakeholders. Also they are second most-used tool for getting familiar with customers’ expectations, establishing new Connections, to learn new techniques for Public relations and advertising, and for performing specific ads.

Two media represent new generation of information technologies, include Web 2.0. Mobile and SMS ads, and Social Media. None of them ranked better than fifth in any function. It reveals that new interactive digital media still not to play significant role in public relations in Iranian banks’ Public relations, even in Marketing communication and advertising.

7. Discussion

The low rank of interactive and social media in the media usage in research sample shows that despite the pervasiveness of those media in a huge population of society, public relations practitioners have not appreciate their usefulness in their job. This may confirm the idea of Eyrich (2008) which labeled Public relations as laggards in regard to adoption of communication technology, and Avidar (2013) who argues in spite of the advantages of online public relations, both businesses and nonprofit associations fail to utilize the Internet’s advantages as a tool for relationship building. The findings and analysis of data shows that Iranian banking industry has not updated its public communication by advances in communication technology. It may be argued that the bureaucratic structures of Iranian banks, is a main preventive factor for practitioners to flexibly adopt with new communications technologies. Also it is possible to connect the high level of traditional media in public relations with media consumption of audiences and target customers. Despite many evidences about huge consumption of new media and mobile telecommunication by Iranian population, no research found about target customers of banks.

Authors suggest the future researchers to study the appropriateness of the media mix of public relations with the media consumption patterns of target audiences and customers. Also it is interesting research subject to investigate the internal and external drawbacks and challenges in increasing the usage of new media and technologies in public relations sector of banking industry.

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