2010 - Public Relations Society of America

2009). In BMCC context, in addition to the blogger’s information credibility and authority, the
blog’s influence on blog followers also lies in the issue fit between the content provided by the
influential blogs and the blog followers’ interest and attitude (_____ & _____, in press).
Blog users rate blogs to be their most credible source of information (Johnson & Kaye,
2004), but Americans as a whole rate blog credibility much lower (Banning & Trammell, 2006;
Bernoff, 2008). However, during a crisis publics equally rate the credibility of third-person blogs
and blogs sponsored by organizations experiencing crises (Bates & Callison, 2008).
Additionally, increased blog reading and use enhances perceptions of blog credibility (Johnson
& Kaye, 2010; Sweetser, Porter, Chung, & Kim, 2008; Sweester & Metzgar, 2007).
Blog Mediated Crisis Communication Model
The BMCC model (___ & ___, in press—see Figure1) helps crisis managers decide if
and when to respond to influential bloggers through monitoring the blogosphere. The first part of
the model explains how information is transmitted on and offline among key players: influential
bloggers and their followers, mass media, and organizations’ online and offline communication.
The first seven propositions predict how these various publics interact (propositions 1.1 to 3.2,
see Table 1), while the second part of the model provides suggestions on how a given
organization should proactively manage blog-mediated crises from crisis monitoring to strategic
responses (propositions 4.1 and 4.2, see Table 1).
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Insert Figure 1 about here
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Through interviews with 40 American Red Cross chapters, researchers tested how an
organization in a given blog-mediated crisis should monitor and respond (propositions 4.1 and
4.2) and expanded the BMCC model to include micro-blogs such as Twitter and content-sharing
sites such as YouTube and Facebook (____ et al., 2009). This previous research also expanded
the model to include organizations’ internal social media platforms, as opposed to solely external
influential bloggers, due to emerging evidence suggesting that other platforms are increasingly
being used by public relations professionals (___ et al., 2009).
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Insert Table 1 about here
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In this study, we provide the first empirical evaluation of three key components the
BMCC model posited: (a) Influential blogs affect blog followers by providing issue-fit opinion
leadership to address the followers’ motivation for informational and emotional needs of the
crisis issue (proposition 2.1, see Table 1); (b) Influential blogs exert influence indirectly on key
publics’ issue awareness by providing the media with newsworthy content that is later edited and
disseminated to general news audiences (proposition 3.1, see Table 1); and (c) Influential blogs
exert influence indirectly on key publics’ issue awareness though offline word-of-mouth
communication of issues among bloggers, blog followers, and other publics (proposition 3.2, see
Table 1). Research questions one and two follow up on propositions 2.1 and 3.1 by asking:
RQ1: Why, if at all, do publics seek out social or older media for crisis information?
RQ2: What factors affect whether publics seek social or older media for crisis information?
Research questions three and four follow up on proposition 3.2 by asking:
RQ3: How, if at all, do publics communicate about crises on and offline?
RQ4: What factors affect whether publics communicate about crises?
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