Is there more to it than posting a status update?

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social media at all. Utilizing social media in an organization requires investments in knowledgeable and skilled employees (Bourdeaux, b 2011, 17) that are able to choose and utilize the most appropriate applications. It is easy to set up a Facebook page for an organization, but what happens after the first post requires consideration and devotion to a new way of communication. Although there really is a lack in resources for many of the museums in Finland, it seems rather odd that all of the interviewed museums, regardless of their size, amount of employees, or geographical location referred to this. Perhaps it is not really a question of resources, but the way things are prioritized; the willingness to include social media actions into the daily routines. Almost all of the informants pointed out that it would be best if someone in the museum had social media as their job description. Naturally, having a person creating a social media presence for the organization, all day everyday, would solve many of their problems, but it is somewhat an interesting way of seeing the issue. First of all, does this mean that the employees cannot overstep their job descriptions, can they not do things that are not set for them specifically, due to some bureaucratic patterns, or perhaps even a spirit of their own? Or could it mean that they do not prioritize social media usage as high up in their list of “to-dos” as they insinuated in the interview situations? It is not likely that the employees would not be able to step out of their job descriptions, as those can be really extensive and vague, and some of the museums do have employees specifically for PR and communications purposes. Also, it is not likely that the informants would have stressed the importance of social media in vain in the discussions. Thus, perhaps this dilemma has to do with the execution of the social media presence. The museums only allow using Facebook, for example, for the one to three people in charge of communications in that museum. Social media, by its nature, is uncontrollable, user generated, open, collective, connecting people and organizations, and totally unpredictable (e.g. Balm & Dogerlioglu, 2011; Constantinides & Fountain, 2008; Murugesan, 2007; Mitussis et al., 2006, 575). Organizations today, not only museums, try to do everything on the contrary; they try to control the uncontrollable. As the idea of social media requires enthusiastic people who want to write, film, record, or take photos of their surrounding and then share these with others, it would be interesting if the organizations could let loose as well. What the “letting loose” could mean for museums in practice, is that they would need to have a strategy of social media utilization so that, for example goals and missions of social media 93
utilization, would be clear to themselves. Also, they would need guidelines for all of the employees. One set of guidelines could be created for the people, who mostly post to social media, and perhaps another one for the employees whose job descriptions do not even come close to PR, communications, or marketing. The versatility of voices in a social media presence would not destroy the image of the museum, on the contrary. We feel the museums should embrace social media as it is, not try to mold it into a communications channel, just as the old web 1.0, advertisements, or posters. As noted earlier, having employees communicating first of all with each other and second of all with customers in social media can indeed be a solution to the problems with answering a vast amount of customer feedback (Wagner, 2011, 171). The freedom of communicating in real-time in social media spreads not only the positive, but also the negative, experiences (Leppäniemi, 2011), which is why it is crucial to have many active users of the social media applications within an organization, as one or a few people might not be able to tackle it all at once. Also, it would suit the nature of social media of having more and versatile users of it, also making the social media presence of that particular organization, without question, more active. If social media seem too scary or unsuited to a certain museum’s brand, for example, then the museum needs to consider other ways to form relationships with their customers. Yet, as mentioned earlier, there are risks in not having a social media presence as well. Organizations should think about why they have a page in Facebook, for example; is it because the organization wants to create relationships, or is it because others do it as well? If the goal truly is two-way communication leading to a relationship, as it is according to the informants, then the organizations need to pay attention to the way and content of communication, and think of it as a long-term strategic measure. In an organization, social media should not be utilized as another medium for repeating the same messages all over again, but a new kind of environment for creating new kinds of relationships with the stakeholders. If an organization fails to act in social media, they will miss out on the new way of building customer relationships, and on the other hand, if they do engage in social media without proper consideration of the strategy, they will most likely fail to deliver their customer promises of excellent quality in all of their actions (see Smith & Wollan, 2011, 3). Collecting information on the customers, and actually utilizing that information in improving the service with the help of that information is vital for a service organization. As noted, none of the museums interviewed collect data on how their customers act in social media, and only 94
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Is there more to it than posting a
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Tiivistelmä Tämä tutkimus osalli
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5 FINDINGS OF THE RESEARCH ........
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1 INTRODUCTION “Winning and keepi
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museums, are expected to outperform
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1.1 Research questions and structur
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& Levy (1969) defined it, it is jus
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profit, and governmental. Each of t
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and the consumer of a service are t
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3 THEORY: RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CUS
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3.2.1 A mindset for customer relati
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depends on the customer and industr
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to understand in service organizati
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fact that a service is created at t
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RM, however, is not a new phenomeno
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step to creating a relationship. Wi
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25). When the clientele of an organ
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all problems, for example, also in
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Traditionally customers have seen t
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entire process of co-creation of va
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messages received by the customers
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Page 45 and 46: engage with the organization in soc
Page 47 and 48: media in an organization, and thus
Page 49 and 50: 3.5.1 Social media applications Soc
Page 51 and 52: & Leighton 2011). Kozinets et al. (
Page 53 and 54: approximately 30 percent of the use
Page 55 and 56: developed for the function of filte
Page 57 and 58: important, what will it give to the
Page 59 and 60: 4 METHODOLOGY In order to find out
Page 61 and 62: interviews, instead of unstructured
Page 63 and 64: The methods used for data collectio
Page 65 and 66: with regard to the number of organi
Page 67 and 68: collections, the museums spent 2,8
Page 69 and 70: using the internet, but also they a
Page 71 and 72: Registered as a user in a social ne
Page 73 and 74: does what, at least almost on case
Page 75 and 76: wise to consider the style of writi
Page 77 and 78: there is or how to behave, or what
Page 79 and 80: Even though a few museums seemed to
Page 81 and 82: …There, in the online world a mus
Page 83 and 84: sized museum had, not only customer
Page 85 and 86: We don’t know whether people from
Page 87 and 88: Yes, you could day the experience i
Page 89 and 90: inquired on whether different conte
Page 91 and 92: 6 DISCUSSION In this chapter the fi
Page 93: Another concern the museums pointed
Page 97 and 98: 7 CONCLUSIONS In this chapter a dis
Page 99 and 100: that even when people do arrive int
Page 101 and 102: large-scale interactions with exter
Page 103 and 104: 8 REFERENCES Alasuutari, P. Laadull
Page 105 and 106: Conway Tony & Debra Leighton. ”Co
Page 107 and 108: Grönroos Christian. ”Service Qua
Page 109 and 110: McDaniel Clay. ”3 Key Metrics To
Page 111 and 112: Passebois Juliette & Philippe Aurie
Page 113 and 114: Sorav Jain. ”40 Most Popular Soci
Page 115 and 116: APPENDIX 1: List of Finnish art mus
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