A study on UK animal NGOs engaging with stakeholders on Facebook

Transcription

1 A study on UK animal NGOs engaging with stakeholders on Facebook - A focus on status updates By: Tina Sloth Madsen Cand.ling.merc Supervisor: Leila Trapp Number of characters, without space: 127,606 September 2015

2 Abstract This qualitative study seeks to investigate UK animal NGOs engagement with stakeholders on Facebook. The focus is on the status updates, and how many likes, comments and shares the different updates receive. The updates are analysed on the basis of three microblogging functions (information, community and action) and Roman Jakobson s language functions to determine what the most popular updates have in common language vice. For data collection, four UK animal NGOs Facebook pages were chosen. All updates from May 2015 were gathered and used in the analysis. It was found that about 75% of the updates try to engage with stakeholders in some way as most updates could be categorized as community function or action function, which generate engagement according to Lovejoy et al (2012). In terms of language functions, it was not conclusive whether they had an impact or not. However, it was found that the content is very important to how many likes, shares and comments an update receives. Updates with stories about a recovery or a sick animal, baby animals and updates with videos were some of the most shared, liked and commented on. Future research should investigate that aspect further, as well as incorporate picture analysis in the study to see whether the pictures/videos mean something to the amount of shares, likes and comments an update receives.

3 TABLE OF CONTENT 1 INTRODUCTION LIMITATIONS BACKGROUND INFORMATION: NGOS AND THE UK 7 3 METHODOLOGY WORLDVIEW AND RESEARCH APPROACHES RESEARCH METHOD SAMPLE CODE-DEVELOPMENT ETHICS RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY RELIABILITY VALIDITY THEORETICAL BACKGROUND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK STAKEHOLDER THEORY LITERATURE LITERATURE ON LANGUAGE FUNCTIONS SOCIAL MEDIA LITERATURE STAKEHOLDER THEORY STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT STAKEHOLDERS AND NGOS ORGANIZATION- STAKEHOLDER COMMUNICATION TEXT IN STATUS UPDATES LANGUAGE FUNCTIONS SOCIAL MEDIA SITE FACEBOOK ANALYSIS STAKEHOLDERS ON FACEBOOK THREE KEY FUNCTIONS TO MICROBLOGGING LANGUAGE FUNCTIONS LANGUAGE FUNCTION REFERENTIAL LANGUAGE FUNCTION EMOTIVE LANGUAGE FUNCTION CONATIVE... 42

4 5.3.4 LANGUAGE FUNCTION POETIC LANGUAGE FUNCTION PHATIC THE POPULAR UPDATES RESULTS 55 7 DISCUSSION AND FUTURE RESEARCH 57 8 CONCLUSION 59 BIBLIOGRAPHY 61 APPENDIXES: APPENDIX 1 ROMAN JAKOBSON S COMMUNICATION MODEL FEJL! BOGMÆRKE ER IKKE DEFINERET. APPENDIX 2 BATTERSEA DOGS AND CATS HOME FEJL! BOGMÆRKE ER IKKE DEFINERET. APPENDIX 3 WOOD GREEN ANIMAL SHELTERS FEJL! BOGMÆRKE ER IKKE DEFINERET. APPENDIX 4 DOGS TRUST FEJL! BOGMÆRKE ER IKKE DEFINERET. APPENDIX 5 BLUE CROSS FOR PETS FEJL! BOGMÆRKE ER IKKE DEFINERET.

5 1 Introduction In the first decade of the 21 st century the emergence of social media has been inevitable. Today, there are many social media network sites, like Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook, just to mention a few. On March 2013, Facebook had 1.11billion users worldwide and it seems the numbers continue to increase (statistic Brain 2015). This is a very important and big opportunity for companies, including non-governmental organizations (NGO) to reach many potential stakeholders. Due to NGOs economic situation some might not have the financial or educational background to use the various traditional media to raise awareness about their issues. However, with the growth of social media a new way of connecting and sharing information with stakeholders has emerged. For many NGOs it means a new and cheaper way to communicate and maintain a connection with beneficiaries, gather feedback, mobilise the public and address concerns that the public might have. Social media is used by many NGOs with positive results, and Paul Witman s article Social Media for Social Value (Witman 2013) is an example of that. Here two NGOs, the American Red Cross and Kiva, are presented as two NGOs who have successfully used social media to better reach their mission. However, social media does often not carry any direct financial cost to the NGO, and as a result, might not get the attention, time and management it needs as staff and volunteer time is a cost. As a consequence the NGO might believe that their time should be used in other tasks than Facebook and other similar social media network sites. NGOs have to be aware of the fact that social media reaches many different people, including stakeholders, and as a consequence the NGOs reputation is at risk if the social media do not get the time it needs, or if the sites are not used correctly and if it is not in connection to the NGOs communication strategy. As NGOs often rely on donations from the public and companies, social media networks are a very important opportunity to reach and create awareness among stakeholders to gain more donations. To be able to do this NGOs have to know what to communicate and how to engage with their stakeholders on the social media. By creating a place where stakeholders can communicate easily with the NGO, the NGOs create a feeling of belongingness and a way people easy can help. A study from 2014 on the social network effect: the determinants of giving through social media, has found promising results on social media and crowdfunding (Saxton et al. 2014). One of the key findings in this article is that the size of a NGO s social network, meaning followers or friends, is more important to online fundraising than its financial efficiency or organization size (in financial assets), who otherwise is two powerful determinants in offline donations. This shows that small NGOs most likely would benefit by investing in their social media presence and webpage. The reason this is a success is due to the social network effect with the organization s fans reaching expanding circles of online friends in their own social networks, which results in increases in charitable contributions (Saxton 2014: 13). As a consequence of this social network effect it

6 is possible for small- and medium sized NGOs to compete with big international NGOs as social media and crowdfunding present a more level playing field compared to traditional advertising. To benefit from the social network effect on Facebook 1, the NGOs need people to engage with their updates i.e. like, comment or share them. Here, message characteristics might be an important factor in how much attention and reactions an update generate. Therefore, this is the focus in this project. The fact that social media and the social network effect are so important together with the message characteristics, has led to the following problem statement and research questions: This study seeks to investigate which updates on UK animal NGO s Facebook pages that generate most engagement (likes, comments and shares) with stakeholders on Facebook, which as a result leads to a broader audience online. Research questions have been made to facilitate the problem statement, and to provide a more in depth analysis of Facebook updates. - How many posts try to engage with followers? - What characteristics do the popular status updates have in common, with focus on language functions To answer the above problem statement and research questions, the project is divided into 8 parts. First, the introduction introduced the subject of the project. Second, background on NGOs and volunteering in the UK is presented. Third, the methodology part explains how the research is conducted and how the problem statement is answered the best possible way. This part also goes into depth with the data gathering and sampling of NGOs. Fourth, the theories used in this project is presented and explained. Stakeholder engagement strategies, organization-stakeholder communication theory and language functions are some of the theories presented. The fifth part of this project is the analysis of the status updates with focus on microblogging functions and language functions, which leads on to the sixth part which presents the results of the analysis. The seventh part of the project is the discussion and future research. Here the decisions that has been made throughout the research will be examined and provides 1 Facebook is chosen as the social media site in this project because in the UK, Facebook is the preferred social media service, and 96% of all who have a social media profile have one on Facebook (Ofcom 2014: 38). It is estimated that in 2015 Facebook will have 32.2 million users in the UK alone (Statista 2015). Furthermore, 86% of adults with a current social networking profile consider Facebook to be their main social networking profile (Ofcom 2014: 38).

7 information on thoughts throughout the research. And finally, the last part is the conclusion. It will sum up the work and conclude on the whole research. The term stakeholder engagement will be explained in the theory part. The Animal NGOs used as research subjects will be presented in the methodology part Limitations This project only deals with animal NGOs in the UK. This means that the findings are only applicable to UK animal NGOs as culture influence how NGOs work in different countries. In some countries it is normal to volunteer as a part of the society s norms but not for all countries. Therefore further research has to be conducted to conclude whether the findings are applicable to other NGOs in other countries. However, it might be safe to conclude that countries that have a similar view on NGOs could benefit from the results from this study. However, an important limitation is the number of NGOs under investigation. For a broader and more complex study more NGOs should have been used, but due to the analysis of language functions it will take too long to find and analyse language functions in more than four chosen NGOs Facebook updates. 2 Background information: NGOs and the UK NGOs have existed in various forms for centuries, however in the 1980s and 1990s they rose to high prominence and increased dramatically in numbers (Lewis 2009: 1). NGOs exist in many sectors, including education, health, social welfare, human rights, animal rights etc. They can be small or large, local or global and focus on single or multiple issues. The aim is to change socio-economic and environmental circumstances for communities of people. There are different definitions of NGOs, one definition is from Crump and Ellwood who states: Also referred to as voluntary agencies. These are private organizations of a charitable, research or educational nature that are concerned with a range of social, economic and environmental issues they act on an international, national or local scale. Some raise money from the public and from government to help fund development projects others attempt to educate the public and campaign on major issues or to lobby governments and international agencies to change public policies (Crump and Ellwood 1998 in Tench and Yeomans 2014: 465). NGOs, however, can have many other names dependent on what sector they work within. For example a CBO (community-based organization) represents, as the name implies, sectoral interests of the community, they are self-administered groups (unions, associations, cooperatives, small-scale enterprises) that generate some income. They are an important part of civil society. Then there is INGO (international non-governmental organizations), they are

8 overseas organizations that work in developing countries, some are funded by governments others are privately run. A QUANGO (quasi-autonomous non-governmental organization) is a semi-public body financed by government, and the management team is often appointed by the government (Tench and Yeomans 2014: ). This project focuses on NGOs, which are independent national bodies, which deal with issues in their country and in a particular sector; in this case animal welfare in the UK. It is difficult to estimate how many NGOs that exist in the UK today as it depends on the definitions, and new ones emerge and old ones close down. However, according to the Commonwealth Foundation it is estimated that there are more than 500,000 NGOs in Britain alone, and that the turnover of the 175,000 registered charities was 17 billion pounds sterling a year (moyak 2015). According to an article in the British newspaper the Guardian, too many cooks, there were 185,000 registered charities in November 2000 in England and Wales (Benjamin 2000). In the article it is stated that 70% of the public, according to a new ICM opinion poll, think there are too many charities doing similar work and competing with each other. However, Gordon McVie, director general of cancer research Campaign, does not see NGOs merging as a solution to this. As the number of charities is rising by 5000 a year, so do competition for funds, and this results in aggressive marketing that undermine public confidence in NGOs. Furthermore, the article states that almost a third of the people questioned by ICM do not feel they have sufficient details to make informed decisions about supporting charities. Due to all these factors in the voluntary sector almost three-quarters of national voluntary organizations predict increased media scrutiny over the next year and 60% believes that the trustworthiness of the sector will be more frequently questioned. However, many people still, today, donate money and work for free. Numbers on volunteering in the UK The national council for voluntary organisations 2 (NVCO) has published a UK Voluntary Sector Statistical Almanac, and in this almanac they describe the voluntary sector that they believe has experienced a significant transition. This almanac also provides the reader with numbers on how many volunteers that exist in the UK, who volunteers in the UK on so forth. As it was stated in the introduction, the NGOs are very dependent on donations from the public, and according to the 2014 almanac, income from individuals continue to be the biggest source of income for NGOs. It is mostly women and people over 45 who choose to donate money to charities (NCVO 2015). However, it is not only money that helps NGOs, also volunteer work is important. It is estimated that 15.2 million people volunteer at least once a month in the UK. From August 2012 to April 2013, 29% of 2 NCVO champions and strengthens volunteering and civil society, with over 11,000 members, from the largest charities to the smallest community organisations (NVCO 2015).

9 adults in England had formally volunteered at least once a month in the previous year, and 44% had volunteered at least once in that year. This equates to an estimate of 12.7 million people volunteering in England once a month, and 19.2 million once a year. If the survey results are applied to the wider UK population as a whole, this would produce an estimate of 15.2 million people volunteering at least once a month in the UK, and 23.1 million volunteering at least once a year (NCVO 2015). The numbers of volunteers were at its highest in 2005 with 29% volunteering at least once a month and 44% volunteering at least once a year. After 2005, the numbers have fallen, and as a consequence in 2010/2011, only 25% volunteered at least once a month and 39% at least once a year (NCVO 2015). NCVO does not know the reason why the numbers have dropped; however, they do suspect the recession to have something to do with it, as the numbers before 2005 were increasing. Micro volunteering Still one quarter of the adult population is volunteering, and this is very important for all NGOs as they depend on their volunteers. Volunteering is also important for the UK economy as it is estimated that volunteering contributed with 23.9bn, equivalent to 1.5 per cent of Gross Domestic Product in (Grant 2015). Due to the Internet and social media, it has become easy to help NGOs in society. People may not have time to volunteer, but now they can micro volunteer. Micro volunteering allows people to give their spare time to good causes via technology. There are many ways to help via micro volunteering, some of them are ranging from writing a letter to a child receiving treatment for cancer to giving online support to charities involved with conservation, or using a skill you might already have like a language to help others (Ledger 2015). The micro volunteering phenomenon has gained momentum around the world. It has opened up communication channels between charities and volunteers, and helps shape the future of how people are able to help causes they care about. Hopefully, this new micro volunteering can help NGOs in the future, and make even more donate and help. Next, the methodology part is presented. Here all information on how the research is conducted is presented and the validity and reliability are also accounted for. 3 Methodology The methodology part contains information on the research approach. This provides the reader with knowledge about how the research is conducted to answer the questions the best possible way and gives the reader an understanding of the background on which the conclusions are made. The worldview, the design and the method contribute to the research approach that tends to be quantitative, qualitative or mixed. First, the worldview are presented and explained. Second, the research method is

10 presented, including the sample and code-development. Lastly, ethics, reliability and validity will be accounted for. 3.1 Worldview and research approaches In his book, Research Design, John W. Creswell (2014) presents four major philosophical worldviews. These are post-positivism, constructivism, transformative and pragmatic worldviews. Creswell states that his term philosophical worldviews are the same as what other call paradigms, epistemologies, ontologies and research methodologies. A worldview is defined as: a basic set of beliefs that guide action (Creswell 2014: 6). This project builds on the philosophical worldview pragmatism. Pragmatism is not committed to one system of philosophy and reality, but researchers draw from both the quantitative and qualitative assumptions in their research (Creswell 2014:11). Therefore, the pragmatic worldview, according to Creswell, underpins the use of mixed methods studies and as a result of that emphasizes the research problem and uses all approaches available to understand the problem(creswell 2014: 10). However, this project does not use the mixed method, but instead uses the qualitative research method as it is language that is analyzed. It is important to realize that the research approaches should be seen on a continuum. The quantitative and the qualitative approach should be seen as different ends on the continuum and that a research tends to incline more to one side than the other (Creswell 2014: 3), but has elements from both. The pragmatic worldview uses a mix of quantitative and qualitative assumptions in its research, and uses the methods best suited for answering the questions and the best understanding of the problem. The researchers are free to choose the methods, techniques and procedures they believe can give the best answer to the problem statement, as the pragmatic worldview is very problem-centered, and do not see the world as an absolute unity. The pragmatic worldview is not committed to one system of philosophy, and as a consequence can draw from both the post-positivistic and constructivist worldview. This research is qualitative in nature, and the qualitative methods most often falls under the constructivist worldview. The constructivist worldview builds on the assumption that individuals develop subjective meanings of their experiences; these meanings are negotiated socially and historically and are formed in interaction with others. In this worldview the researchers aim is to interpret the meanings other have about the world (Creswell 2014: 8). The reason the pragmatic worldview is chosen, and not the constructivist, is due to the epistemology; the fact that constructivism will try to uncover meaning from data, whereas pragmatists would collect data (quantitative and/or qualitative) in order to find solutions and solve problems, and this is what is done in this project. The pragmatic worldview claims that realization should not be understood as an objective reflection of reality, but as a useful tool, showing its suitability in practice (Gyldendal den store danske 2009). Next, the research method will be presented together with the sample and coding.

11 3.3 Research method Many different methods to inquiring data exist. In this project the corpus of Facebook updates from selected NGOs are analysed to investigate how NGOs use social media to engage with their followers. This project looks like a corpus analysis on some points, and in other points not. Therefore, it cannot be concluded that this is a full corpus analysis, but that it draws on some of the elements from it. A corpus analysis is a method to gather and analyze data, and is a rather new method. It emerged in the 1980s and expanded rapidly in the 1990s due to the technological development i.e. it became easier to gather and analyze data i.e. text with help from technology. A corpus is a collection of electronic texts that is stored and prepared to analysis. It has to be representative to a specific area (a language, a subject area or a company), and its goal is to meet a specific purpose (Vesterager, 2013). Furthermore, a corpus is built on authentic data, in this case from status updates on Facebook made by the NGOs. The data is a collection of status updates from Facebook, and is representative for British animal NGOs on Facebook. Normally, corpus analyses are quantitative as it counts the frequency of items or displaying their occurrences in the texts. Therefore, it is stated that it takes its starting point in the post-positivistic worldview. But simply counting items does not tell anything in itself, it is the associated analysis, which may be both quantitative and qualitative, that gives the insights (Evison 2010, 122). This project is very qualitative in the analysis of the updates, and therefore does not comply with the normal standards for a corpus analysis in this case as no words are counted. To use elements from the corpus analysis has some advantages. It is easy to gather and find the Facebook updates as they are online and available to all. If certain words or phrases needs to be analyzed it can be done via simple tools online, however, this is not the case in this project. If counting items was the main element in the analysis it would secure a fast, focused and consistent analysis whereas ad hoc searches on the Internet and manual analysis take more time. However, in this type of research all of the analysis is done manual as the qualitative research question cannot be answered by only counting items, this is also the reason why no more than 65 updates are used in the analysis. The language functions are not certain words to be identified, but the text as a whole that needs to be analyzed. Here the method differentiates itself from the traditional corpus analysis. The disadvantage by using this method is that it can take much time to complete a corpus; however it depends on the purpose. In this case I need to take time into account as I have a deadline. This corpus will consist of status updates from Facebook as mentioned before. It takes some time to gather it all, however it is accessible and the updates are all in chronological order with the newest on top. This makes the gathering of the data easy, and it is possible to do within the time frame.

12 This project starts off by looking like a corpus analysis as the gathering of data is much like gathering a corpus i.e. electronic text is gathered to be analyzed. However, the analysis does not underpin the normal counting items, and the quantitative viewpoint, but tends to be more qualitative. The collection of Facebook updates in the appendixes is, however, referred to as a corpus. This is also arguments for the research is being viewed as qualitative in nature Sample One of the main challenges is to make sure the corpus is representative for the population, in this case all animal NGOs. If the corpus is representative it is generalizable which will be elaborated in the part about reliability and validity. To make sure the research is generalizable a sample of the population is used. A sample is a representative cross section of the population. This makes sure that all parts of the population are represented in the study. In this project the population is animal NGOs in the UK. It is vital for the research that the size of the corpus is the optimal one. The ideal size depends on the purpose with the research. In this research the corpus is an excerpt of NGOs Facebook wall. As mentioned earlier it will be all updates in May Furthermore, it is important to decide whether the corpus should be monitor corpus or synchronic corpus. In this case it is a synchronic corpus, which means that no new texts will be added to the corpus when it is gathered. The purpose is to analysis how the engagement is at the moment. Therefore, it is logical to use the synchronic corpus. Four NGOs have been chosen as the research subjects, and they are: Battersea Cats and Dogs Home, Dogs Trust, Wood Green the Animals charity and Blue Cross for Pets. The reason for choosing these four research subjects as well as a presentation of the NGOs will be presented now. Sample characteristics After some searching online, four research subjects have been selected for this research, and some criteria had to be met in order to be selected. First, the organisation has to be an animal NGO in the UK. It is easier to compare and generalise NGOs who have the same agenda and similar missions for the organisations. It could have been any type of NGO, but the reason fell on animal NGOs due to their big need of the publics generosity. Second, the NGOs have to be on Facebook as it is the communication channel which is investigated. All NGOs use their Facebook page several times a week and they also refer to Facebook on their website, so it can be concluded that it is an important communication tool for them. In connection to Facebook, the amount of likes on Facebook is also a criterion for being selected. There has to be awareness about the NGO in the society, so in this research the smallest NGO (on Facebook) chosen is Wood Green Animals Charity with 50,008 likes on Facebook. The final criterion is that the NGOs have to depend on public donations and volunteers, and that they do not receive any government funding as it

13 makes the engagement that more important. The four animal NGOs are all from the UK and fulfil all the criteria. They will be presented in this order: Batter Dogs and Cats Home, Dogs Trust, Wood Green the Animal Charity and Blue Cross for Pets. The reason for a small homogeneous sample is to give a clear picture of how these kinds of NGOs communicate and engage on Facebook. This allows for an in-depth detailed investigation. It is normal for qualitative studies to use a non-probability sample (Ritchie and Lewis 2010: 78), and this is also the case in this study as the four animal NGOs are selected deliberately to reflect the above particular features. Battersea Dogs and Cats Home Battersea Dogs and Cats Home (Battersea) was established in 1860, and is one of UK s longest-serving charities and the leading animal rehoming centre. It has three rescue centres in south East England. Battersea receives no central government funding to care for the animals, but relies fully on the support of the public. It is one of the only animal rescue centres that take in any animal no matter its condition, age and behaviour, and this is also the reason why Battersea is one of the only animal NGOs who puts animals to sleep (Battersea Dogs and Cats Home 2015). Battersea s vision is to believe that every dog and cat should live in a home where they are treated with love, care and respect and their mission is to: aim to never turn away a dog or cat in need of our help, caring for them until their owners or loving new homes can be found, no matter how long it takes. We are champions for, and supporters of, vulnerable dogs and cats, determined to create lasting changes for animals in our society (Battersea Dogs and Cate Home 2015). In 2012 Battersea had 833 volunteers and 313 members of staff, and they cared for 8,640 animals in their three centres. Battersea is active on the social media and has profiles on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and You-tube (Battersea Dogs and Cats Home 2015). On Facebook the organisation has 459,277 likes (Facebook Battersea Dogs and Cats Home 2015) Dogs Trust Dogs Trust was founded in 1891, and is the largest dog welfare charity in the UK. In the 20 rehoming centres nationwide Dog Trust cares for 16,000 dogs each year, and last year Dogs Trust rehomed 14,895 dogs. Dogs Trust relies solely on the public to run and receives no government funding (Dogs Trust 2015). In 2013 volunteers worked for over 12,000 days in the rehoming centres (Dogs Trust 2013: 3). On the social media Dogs Trust is active on Twitter and Facebook, on Facebook Dogs Trust has 811,792 likes (Facebook Dogs Trust 2015). Dogs Trust is involved in a range of projects about, among others, educating pet owners and veterinary care to dogs belonging to homeless people (Dogs Trust 2015). Their mission is to bring about the day when all dogs can enjoy a happy life, free from the threat of unnecessary destruction (Dogs Trust 2015).

14 Wood Green the Animals Charity Wood Green the Animals Charity is one of the leading animal welfare organisations in the UK. It began its work in 1924 and has progressed steadily since with four centres in the UK. Wood Green takes in all kinds of animals and help thousands of animals find a new home each year (Wood Green 2015). Wood Green also depends on the publics generosity and the more than 300 volunteers to survive and care for the animals (Wood Green 2015). Wood Green has many social media profiles, they can be found on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, You-tube and Google+. On Facebook they have 50,008 likes (Facebook Wood Green Animal Shelters 2015). Wood Green the Animals Charity s vision is of a world where all pets are well cared for in loving homes for life and their mission is to take in unwanted and lost animals, provide shelter and care, find secure and loving homes, provide advice, support and guidance for pet owners and increase the public's awareness of its responsibility towards animals in society (Wood Green 2015). Blue Cross for Pets Blue Cross for Pets has existed since 1897 and takes care of injured, abandoned, ill pets in the UK, it is registered as a charity in England, Wales and Scotland. Blue Cross vision is every pet will enjoy a healthy life in a happy home and their mission is we find happy homes for abandoned or unwanted pets, and we keep pets healthy by promoting welfare and providing treatment (Blue Cross 2015). To accomplice their vision and mission Blue Cross, among other, give talks at schools and youth groups and provide veterinary help for people who cannot afford it. Blue Cross for Pets has 23 rehoming centres and 8 hospitals spread in England and Wales (Blue Cross 2015). Blue Cross for Pets also runs on donations and their volunteers to be able to take care of the animals in their centres. Blue Cross for Pets has 185,754 likes on Facebook (Facebook Blue Cross for Pets 2015), and they can also be found on Twitter and You-tube Code-development This research gathers status updates from four different NGOs. The 65 status updates will provide a good overview of the updates and consequently give an accurate result to the problem statement. When the data is gathered, it needs to be coded. In this project there are two main elements in focus when looking at the status updates, and therefore the updates are coded twice. First part is 1) engagement where the three key functions of microblogging updates plays a crucial role. And 2) Looking at language functions in the updates to determine which language functions that help generate most attention as likes, comments and shares which are important to reach many on the social media. The three key functions of microblogging updates and language functions will be presented and explained in the theory part. The data is coded using the three key functions of microblogging by Lovejoy et al (2012).

15 Their research was the first to classify social media messages by organizations. This will provide an insight to which updates, and how many of the updates, that falls under the category of stakeholder engagement, as two of the three microblogging functions generate stakeholder engagement. However, some changes to the model needs to be taken into account as Lovejoy et al. (2012) analysed Twitter updates, and these are different from Facebook updates. A problem regarding the coding is the fact that there are no maximum to how long Facebook updates might be, and this makes the analysis difficult as the updates can have more than one communication function. However, if the updates have two or more functions then the most obvious function will be the one that counts. Most often it is the microblogging function in the first paragraph that is the main one; however, few of the updates do not follow that order, and then it is the main function of the overall update that decides which microblogging function is the main one. This will be explained in depth with examples when the analysis begins. Next, the updates are encoded from which language function is used by the writer; these are presented in tables with examples of each language function. When looking at these elements it can be concluded how the organizations need to write, and which updates that generates most attention and thereby help the organization to more donations, engagement and/ or volunteers in the future. Earlier research, as mentioned in the introduction, has already concluded that social media are an important communication channel, however that message characteristics should be studied to show further results, and this is what this project aims to do in terms of which language functions that are used in the status updates. 3.4 Ethics At all stages of a research there are ethical issues to anticipate, however when the data is public as it can be found on Facebook and their website, it is easy to document and refer to statements from the NGO. Credibility is more important when you deal with personal or harmful information that can turn up during an interview. However, to end off with a credible and trustworthy project it is important to not make conclusions that suppress, falsifies or invents results just to make the conclusion more exciting and interesting. To make sure the results are credible the terms reliability and validity is used. 3.5 Reliability and validity The concepts reliability and validity is normally used in natural science. However, they can be used in qualitative research as well. In their broadest sense reliability meaning sustainable and validity meaning well-grounded will have relevance for this research as they help define the strength of the data. This is particularly important in the context of generalization (Ritchie and Lewis 2010:270).

16 3.5.1 Reliability According to Ritchie and Lewis (2010:270) reliability is generally understood to concern the replicability of research findings and whether or not they would be repeated if another study, using the same or similar methods, was undertaken. There are many opinions about whether replication can occur in qualitative research or not. According to the constructivist school there is no single reality to be captured so replication is not obtainable. Another opinion is that studies can never be, nor should be, repeated (Ritchie and Lewis 2010). Due to these and more concerns reliability in qualitative research is often avoided. In quantitative research, however, there are three types of reliability, and these relates to producing the same results under the same measurement conditions, the stability of a measurement in regard to time and the similarity of measurements in a given period of time (Creswell 2014: 160). This study analyses 65 updates from four different, however similar, NGOs. It is difficult to argue whether the results can be replicated due to the fast changes online. How NGOs communicate on the social media can change due to laws, profiles, the people in charge and the communication purpose. However, I believe if the same study was undertaken at the same time with four other animal NGOs the results will be quite similar because the four animal NGOs in this research are very similar in what they post on Facebook. Therefore, this study is reliable Validity Validity of findings or data is often understood to refer to the correctness or precision of a research reading. Even though validity is seen as an important element in quantitative research, it is widely recognised that validity is equally important in qualitative research. However, in qualitative research the questions posed are different and relate more to validity of representation, understanding and interpretation (Ritchie and Lewis 2010). Often validity is explained as a concept with two dimensions: internal validity and external validity. Internal validity is concerned with whether the researcher is investigating what he/she claims to be investigating. External validity is concerned with the extent to which the abstract constructs or postulates generated, refined or tested are applicable to other groups within the population (Ritchie and Lewi 2010: 273); in others words whether the results can be generalized beyond the immediate study sample. In quantitative research there are four measures to assess validity, and these are: content validity, predictive or concurrent validity and construct validity. Content validity assess whether the items measure the content they were intended to measure. Predictive or concurrent validity are both measures of criterion validity, and whether the results correlate with other results. Construct validity test the link between a measure and an underlying theory. The correlation with other tests measuring similar items has to be high if the tool has to be considered valid (Creswell 2014: 160).

17 To ensure internal validity, I will return to my problem statement, and keep in mind what it is I want to investigate. By controlling this during the entire project, internal validity will be accounted for. Regarding external validity, I ensure that the sample I use in the research is representative. This gives reason to assume that the results can be generalized. However, the sample in this project is carefully selected to cover all medium and large animal NGOs so it can be argued that a selection bias can occur because the research only use four NGOs when there are many hundreds NGOs in the UK. However, too big a sample can be unwieldy to manage, and a waste of time if accurate answers can be drawn from a smaller sample. It is a balance how big a sample you need to find the most accurate results. Moreover, if the design of the analysis is explicit, and this includes population and sample then it is possible for others to assess the quality of the research and hereby also the results, as well as it makes it possible to reproduce the research. The fourth part of the project will cover the theoretical background. Here all the relevant theory is presented and accounted for. 4 Theoretical background To support the foundation of this project three main fields will be examined. These are stakeholders and engagement, language functions and social media. The first section is the most central one, as it presents stakeholder theory as well as depicts stakeholder engagement strategies including how NGOs can deal with their stakeholders. Furthermore, the stakeholder section presents organizational stakeholder communication strategies i.e. both Morsing s et al. three communication strategies and Lovejoy s et. al. three functions of microblogging. The second section covers language functions. It is explained how these functions can create awareness to the update which is an essential part of the analysis. The third and final section presents the social media phenomenon as well as explains the social network site Facebook, so the reader will know why it is important to be on a social media network site. 4.1 Theoretical framework To answer the previously raised problem statement and research questions, publications from key academic figures within the relevant fields (stakeholder, language functions and social media) are used Stakeholder theory literature One of this project s main focuses is on stakeholder engagement. As a result stakeholder theory is very important to this project. Therefore, many different scholars are used to address how stakeholders should be seen, including Freeman 1984 and Friedman et al Furthermore, Cornelissen s (2011) view on stakeholder engagement is important to consider as he presents stakeholder theory in

18 corporate communication. Regarding how to engage with stakeholders, the primary theory is from Morsing s et al. work in the book Strategic CSR communication and Lovejoy s et al. work on NGOs communication on Twitter. Other scholars (Clarkson 1995, Charkham 1994) are mentioned as to how stakeholders can be categorized by organizations. Furthermore, a report on stakeholder engagement from a leading global organization is used to spread light on how organizations gain successful stakeholder engagement Literature on language functions Language functions are a very important part for the analysis of the status updates. One of the main linguist researchers, Jakobson R. (1990), has been chosen as he presents a model that introduces six different constituents for texts. Other well-known linguists, as Shannon and Weaver, have presented similar terms and functions, therefore it is valid to only present one model Social media literature Social media is a relatively new field of study; however articles about this subject have begun to emerge tackling different aspect of social media, examples are Boyd (2008) and Mangold (2009). Boyd (2008) investigated the interplay between American teenagers and the new technology form, whereas Mangold (2008) sees the new social media as a hybrid element of the promotion mix. In this project Lomborg s (2011) definition of social media as communicative genres will be used to define Facebook as a social network site. 4.2 Stakeholder theory The view that companies have stakeholders is widely perceived in the scientific world (Freeman 1984, Friedman et al. 2002, Cornelissen 2011). Many scholars agree that the good relationship with primary stakeholders is vital for an organization s survival (Pajunen 2006, Jawahar et al. 2001). According to Cornelissen (2011) the concept of stakeholders is very important within corporate communication. Corporate communication is used and managed strategically by organizations to guide their communication with their stakeholders. In his book, Corporate Communication, Cornelissen defines stakeholder as any group or individual who can affect or is affected by the achievements of the organization s purpose and objectives (Cornelissen 2011: 42). Central to this idea is a stake, which he also defines in his book as an interest or a share in an undertaking, [that] can range from simply an interest in an undertaking at one extreme to a legal claim of ownership at the other extreme (Cornelissen 2011: 42). Often stakeholders have different interests and stakes in a company, and it is difficult to balance the different stakeholder interests. As a consequence organizations often categorise their stakeholders into groups. Clarkson (1995: 106) proposes a division of stakeholders into primary and secondary stakeholder

19 groups. The primary stakeholders are the ones who are important for financial interactions and necessary for the organization to survive. The primary group is often comprised of shareholders, investors, employees, customers and suppliers as well as the public. The secondary stakeholder group is stakeholders who affect or influence the organization or are influenced or affected by the organization. However, the secondary group is not essential for the survival of the organization. Another who has introduced a stakeholder grouping is Charkham (1994). He talks about two broad classes of stakeholders: contractual and community stakeholders. Contractual stakeholders are a group who has some form of legal relationship with the organization. They are formally tied with the organization as they have entered some kind of contract. Often the interest is some form of economic benefit. Community stakeholders are groups whose relationship is non-contractual; however the relationship is still real as they influence each other. One example of a community stakeholder who has no contractual relationship but still influences the organization is the government (Cornelissen 2011: 43). Other stakeholder classifications exist, but will not be mentioned as they are not relevant for the study. However, it can be concluded that many scholars agree that classifying stakeholders is important. This helps the organization in their communication. When an organization knows its stakeholders, then it can focus on developing communication strategies to deal with each stakeholder group the best possible way. In recent years, it has become more important for organizations to consider the relation with stakeholders because the Internet has made it easier for stakeholder alliances to grow, change or collapse. Therefore, the focus has changed from simple communication and exchange of goods to the fact that it is now important to engage with stakeholders in long-term trust-based relationships (Cornelissen 2011: 53). As a result of this, the next section will be about stakeholder engagement. When the organization wishes to have a long-term relationship with its stakeholders, it is important to engage with them Stakeholder engagement Stakeholder engagement has become of increasing importance in the 21 st century for successful business (Adams et al. 2006, Stakeholder research associates 2005, Gable et al. 2005). However, stakeholder engagement is not a new phenomenon. Organizations have long been engaged with their primary stakeholders such as investors, employees, customers etc. The engagement with these primary stakeholders was through traditional media such as shareholder meetings, satisfaction surveys and other traditional communication channels. However, with the uprising of the Internet and more political consumers, organizations saw the need for increasing stakeholder engagement (Adams 2006) as political consumers want additional information about products and services and the Internet is a place to gain information. Therefore stakeholder engagement has increased rapidly since the 1990s.

20 Engagement is an umbrella term that covers the full range of an organization s efforts to understand and involve stakeholders in its activities and decisions (Stakeholder research associates 2005: 13). It takes much work to develop a stakeholder engagement strategy. Some scholars and organizations have some suggestions as how to obtain the best stakeholder engagement. According to the leading global organization Accountability successful stakeholder engagement depends on understanding the purpose of engaging, the scope of engaging and who the stakeholders are (Accountability 2011: 16). It is essential to define a purpose i.e. why to engage and this should be connected to the overall strategy i.e. mission, vision and values. The purpose might be associated with on-going activities such as ensuring a good understanding of stakeholder views or to foster positive relationships with stakeholders. The stakeholders should be involved in defining the purpose of engagement, and the inputs from the stakeholders might adjust the purpose. The scope of the engagement should be associated with the purpose. An issue should be considered relevant material if it influences or has a potential to influence the decisions, actions and behaviour of one or more stakeholders and/or the organisation itself. It should also be considered whether the engagement address the whole organization or only parts of the organisation. It is equally important to consider whether the engagement should include everything the organization does or only specific activities, products or services. Finally, the time frame is to be considered as well; is the engagement a longterm strategic issues or a current concern. The people in charge of the engagement have to identify stakeholders relevant to the purpose and scope of engagement. The relevant stakeholders are those who affect or can be affected by the organizations activities, products or services. Sometimes stakeholders have different or even conflicting interests. Stakeholders have to be identified and put into different categories (Accountability 2011: 16-20) i.e. primary or secondary Stakeholders and NGOs As stated briefly in the introduction, stakeholder engagement is important for NGOs. In an interview with the Stakeholder Research Associates, Jean-Paul Jeanrenaud of the NGO World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) summarized stakeholder engagement as an opportunity to bring many diverse perspectives together on issues that are central to our vision and mission and leverage these engagements towards effective and successful actions (Stakeholder research associates 2005: 34). NGOs often want to create awareness on an issue or cause like climate, animal abuse, poverty etc. along with a suggestion of giving an amount of money. This has become easier and cheaper for NGOs due to the Internet and the social media, which is seen as an essential vehicle for policy influence (Tench and Yeomans 2014: 467). Furthermore, new technology has encouraged a new level of transparency and engagement as NGOs can share information and account for their actions in a very public way.