Social media at the disposal of the police and the power of the apology

Recently, the researchers from different parts of the world attended the Netherlands to share their discoveries in the field of corporate communications. I was also lucky to be there. Let me summarize the main conclusions, which were best remembered.

Anyone, who performs in public, should know how the audience is reacting to the different presentation techniques. A group of scientists has investigated this issue and found that settling down directly the essence of the presentation is less efficient than the progressive bringing of the public into topic. The emphasis on the competence, as well as the use of pictures in the presentation increases the effectiveness of the presentation, but flattery does not really give some kind of effect. It was recommended also to announce the end of the presentation in order to refresh the attention of the audience.

Another study showed that the statistics is a little more convincing than the “bare” arguments, but even more persuasive effect can be caused by a story about a particular man and his experiences in relation to the concerned topic. This is connected to the fact that while listening to the story, the audience perceives it more emotionally that cognitively.

In the books about crisis communication we read that when a company makes a mistake, its representatives can save the situation with an apology. It was very interesting for me to listen to the results of a study, which showed that the apology can’t make people think about your business in a good way, but it helps to reduce the client's level of anger, which is already significant. Perhaps, a timely apology can stop an angry tweet, which can show a link with a reputation.

It turns out that over time the texts of direct mail have become more earthbound and concrete. Having explored the aspects of persuasive communication in this field, the researchers have found that creation of comfort with the communication tools (such as highlighting your service or product safety, absence of risks, etc..)

have a more favourable impact than creation of discomfort (description of problems or threats and offering goods or services as the solutions).

Based on the research results, the authors offer the promotional texts to create more comfort than stress for the clients.

At the conference, a lot of attention was devoted to social media. I was once again convinced that the significance of social media is increasing in the work of different companies and organizations; this environment is more responsive to the friendly and less formal language. It was interesting to learn that the Netherlands police are actively using Twitter to inform the public about current events, as well as monitor its mood in order to identify and solve the problems.

At the conference was also held a very important discussion, when practitioners and researchers tried to understand how to fill the gap that exists between them. In my opinion, this issue is very relevant in Latvia as well: how the researcher's work can be useful for improvement of the work of practitioners, in turn, how the practitioners can help researchers to find valuable vectors for researches? The question remains open so far.