Threat or treat for tourism organizations? The Copenhagen Zoo social media storm

Abstract

Social media have emerged as a game changer for tourism by empowering consumers to collectively approve or oppose organizational behaviors. When consumers rise against organizations, social media storms (SMSs) can be an outcome. This research proposes a conceptual framework to help tourism organizations understand SMSs and to guide more effective decision making. Contextualized by a case study of the Copenhagen Zoo, it is shown how and why SMSs are an expression of negative consumer empowerment that brings challenges as well as opportunities. As demonstrated, an SMS can lead to a helix for value creation for the organization, consumers, and society. KEYWORDSSocial media storm (SMS); tourist attraction branding; consumer empowerment; negative customer emotions; marketing management; Copenhagen Zoo 1 | INTRODUCTION Social media have profoundly impacted tourism and marketing (Leung, Law, van Hoof, & Buhalis, 2013) by fundamentally changing the way organizations interact with customers. Booking sites have diminished the role of travel agents as consumers can plan their holidays more expediently, conveniently, and cheaply. Social media and sites based on customer reviews, like TripAdvisor, have gained momentum (Oriade & Robinson, 2019). Tourism organizations may benefit from their global range, but Wee (2017) warns organizations and researchers not to ignore the role of social media as they enable consumers to become critics in their own rights. Though social media communication strongly impacts tourism firms and tourist decision-making (Moro and Rita, 2018), it is scarcely investigated in tourism research.This research aims to fill this void by showing why consumer empowerment in the tourism sector is not only realized through online consumer-centric marketing (Niininen, Buhalis, & March, 2007), but also by openly sharing opinions, attitudes, and emotions towards service providers. While consumers embrace the empowerment, organizations struggle to manage the process (Shankar, Cherrier & Caniford, 2006). In an increasing number of cases, negative emotions having retaliatory intent and anger (Grégoire & Fisher, 2008) accumulate on social media, and are being referred to as social media storms (SMSs).An SMS refers to a sudden and explosive social media dissemination of negative consumer emotion towards an organization (Pfeffer, Zorbach, & Carley, 2014). Consumer empowerment is defined as a state of mind, often accompanied by a physical act, which enables consumers to push through their needs, wants, and demands with other individuals or organizations in the marketplace (Pires,

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