Negative recommendation in social media – theoretical approach and case studies

In: Przegląd politologiczny: kwartalnik = Political science review, Heft 3, S. 45-60

Abstract

The Internet, including the social media services, has considerably changed the manner in which consumers voice favourable or unfavourable recommendations about products and services. Development of social media allowed reaching a significantly greater number of persons in a quicker way. One may also notice that the range of thematic comments has been expanded – customers speak not only about the quality of the products, their prices, service levels, but also about other aspects of how marketing companies function. Finally, it is worth paying attention to the language of these opinions, which – in the case of a negative experience with a product or retailer advertising – is often aggressive. With the development and dissemination of social networking, PR and marketing communications managers must learn how to communicate and satisfy customers and those who express their discontent at different stages of the purchase funnel. This is especially important in the case of negative word of mouth (NWOM) because every negative opinion can become the nucleus of major problems within brand image and the brand crisis. The aim of the article is to show the specificity of word of mouth in social media (sWOM) as one of the forms of electronic word of mouth (eWOM) and to depict phenomenon of NWOM in social media basing on selected case studies from the Polish market.