Managing the aftermath: Scapegoating as crisis communication strategy

Moisio, Risto; Capelli, Sonia; Sabadie, William

doi:10.1002/cb.1858

Cited by 7 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…Various studies demonstrate that the effectiveness of crisis response strategies is primarily influenced by the crisis's nature and the characteristics of the involved organization [46,51]. These studies also reveal that the efficacy of crisis communication strategies is dynamic and subject to continual change.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of Strategic Crisis Communication on Public Perceptions during Public Health Crises: Insights from YouTube Chinese Media

Sun,

2024

Behavioral Sciences

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Crisis communication plays a crucial role in preserving the national reputation during significant national crises. From the perspective of Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT), this research paper analyzed over 1,790,816 YouTube comments from Chinese-speaking audiences, using sentiment analysis alongside the Difference-in-Differences (DiD) model, in order to investigate the influence of strategic crisis communication on public perceptions during public health crises. The study findings indicate that during this public health crisis, YouTube Chinese media, whose audience mainly consists of overseas Chinese-speaking users, primarily incorporated the enhancing strategies, succeeded by the diminish strategies, with limited application of deny strategies, while the use of rebuild strategies was virtually absent in this context. In addition, the research analysis confirms that Chinese media effectively increased the public’s positive perceptions of crisis events through crisis communication. Particularly, enhancing strategies proved most effective in improving public perceptions, followed by diminish strategies. In contrast, deny strategies failed to influence public perceptions of the crisis, and rebuild strategies demonstrated a negative impact on public perception. Thus, the research findings of this paper extend essential insights for effectively managing potential public health crises in the future.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Influence of Strategic Crisis Communication on Public Perceptions during Public Health Crises: Insights from YouTube Chinese Media

Sun,

2024

Behavioral Sciences

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“…Underdog and top‐dog brands have been well studied in the contexts of brand positioning (He et al, 2020; Li & Zhao, 2018; Schmidt & Steenkamp, 2022; Tang & Tsang, 2020) and communication appeals (Antonetti & Baghi, 2021; Moisio et al, 2021). Tang and Tsang (2020) suggested that many marketers opt to position their brands as underdogs—emphasizing the brand's journey and challenges en route to their current success—because customers can easily identify with the struggles of underdog brands.…”

Section: Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of interaction between brand positioning and chatbot conversational style on perceived fit and brand attitudes

Cheng,

Toung

2024

Psychology and Marketing

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Although an underdog brand positioning can elicit positive consumer responses, maintaining a brand's positioning requires maintaining consistent brand associations. If the associations created by the company's service providers do not align with the brand's positioning, this discrepancy can lead to consumer confusion or to a decline in brand attitudes. Chatbots, as customer‐facing representatives, play a crucial role in how consumers perceive and evaluate a brand. However, the role of chatbots in shaping brand attitude has not been extensively studied. Therefore, this study investigates the effects of chatbot conversational styles on consumers' perceptions of the fit between a brand's positioning and its messaging, focusing on both “top‐dog” and “underdog” brands. This study demonstrates that underdog brands using chatbots with warm conversational styles and top‐dog brands using chatbots with competent (i.e., professional) conversational styles foster positive brand evaluations by consumers through perceived fit. Additionally, this study introduces the concept of power state—an individual's degree of perceived control over their surroundings—as a moderator in human–chatbot interactions, demonstrating that high‐power‐state consumers of top‐dog brands favor a competent conversational style, whereas low‐power‐state consumers favor a warm conversational style regardless of the brand's positioning.

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“…In other words, consumers try to determine why the product has failed and the reason they infer affects their attitudes and behavior toward the brand. When the crisis is determined to be intentional, consumers are more willing to complain and their evaluation of the brand deteriorates (Kim and Yim, 2021; Moisio et al , 2021), whereas when the crisis is deemed to be accidental, consumers are more inclined to be forgiving (Puzakova et al , 2013; Srinivasan and Sarial-Abi, 2021).…”

Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do products branded with handwritten scripts suffer more amid product-harm crises?

Bai

et al. 2022

JPBM

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Purpose This paper aims to explore whether products branded with handwritten scripts suffer more from the effects of product-harm crises than other brands. Most studies on handwritten scripts focus on their positive effects, such as humanizing a product or creating an emotional tie with consumers. However, seldom have researchers investigated the negative effects of handwritten scripts. This paper goes some way to filling this gap. Design/methodology/approach Five experimental studies were conducted to test three hypotheses. These experiments provide evidence of the negative effects of handwritten scripts. In addition, they reveal the mechanisms that lead to these outcomes and outline the boundary conditions of the negative effects. Findings Framed by attribution theory, three conclusions can be drawn from the experiments: when a product-harm crisis occurs, consumers react with greater negativity toward the brand using handwritten scripts than to those using machine typefaces. The negative effect is explained by a serial mediation process that follows the pattern: typeface → perceived humanization → brand responsibility → brand attitude. The negative effect decreases when the crisis is perceived to be an accident. Originality/value This paper enriches the theory of marketing in terms of both handwritten scripts and product-harm crises, providing valuable guidance for enterprises that use handwritten scripts in their marketing activities.

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Managing the aftermath: Scapegoating as crisis communication strategy

Cited by 7 publications

References 43 publications

Influence of Strategic Crisis Communication on Public Perceptions during Public Health Crises: Insights from YouTube Chinese Media

Influence of Strategic Crisis Communication on Public Perceptions during Public Health Crises: Insights from YouTube Chinese Media

Effects of interaction between brand positioning and chatbot conversational style on perceived fit and brand attitudes

Do products branded with handwritten scripts suffer more amid product-harm crises?

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