Hateholders and Brandjacking : Negative Engagement of Customers and Stakeholders

Abstract

Social and real-time media allow customers and other stakeholders to easily voice their opinions online when brands or organisations fail to meet their expectations. Such outbursts, which are often addressed through corporate public relations and crisis communication, are labelled negative stakeholder engagement. This study focuses on negative stakeholder engagement behaviour on the social media platform Twitter. Data collected from discussions on two telecommunication companies’ Twitter accounts, one in Finland and the other in Australia, are used to illustrate the different forms of negative engagement behaviours.