Social media

In the following section, H₂ will be tested. To test H₂ I will, based on my data collection, analyze if Facebook was a good media choice and an effective communication channel during the Marius crisis.

When living in a society where social media is a more and more frequently used medium by both the public and organizations, it seems relatively logic to communicate through Facebook, even in a crisis situation like the Marius crisis. Facebook is an easy medium to communicate through, and the organization can talk directly to the public, but at the same time, communicating through social media can act both as a facilitator and a trigger to crises. After having analyzed how Copenhagen Zoo managed the crisis communication on Facebook⁴⁸, I will now examine if the public believed Copenhagen Zoo managed the crisis communication well. In the following I will present my questionnaire results regarding the use of social media.

First and foremost, the respondents were asked if they follow or like Copenhagen Zoo on Face-book. 15.1% of my respondents said yes, whereas the remaining 84.9% said no. In relation to this, the respondents had to answer to what degree they had read about the situation on Facebook. 15.9%

selected ‘very much’, 50% selected ‘some’, 9.1% selected ‘neutral’, 18.8% selected ‘not a lot’ and 6.3% selected ‘not at all’. Moreover, only 3.5% of the respondents participated in the debate on Facebook. Out of the participating respondents, 50% participated by ‘liking’, 33.3% participated by sharing, 66.7% participated by commenting and 16.7% selected other. Even though only 15.1%

follow or ‘like’ Copenhagen Zoo on Facebook and only 3.5% participated in the online debate, more than half of my respondents (65.9%) either read very much or some about the situation on Facebook. This indicates, that even though a lot of people might not follow or ‘like’ Copenhagen Zoo on Facebook, the crisis was rarely present on social media, and in the eye of the public - which also shows how powerful social media can be.

In order to examine what the public thought about Copenhagen Zoo’s presence on Facebook, I showed my respondents the first Facebook status update about the Marius situation. Based on my

48 Please see section 6.1

findings, the respondents found the content of the status update good, necessary and trustworthy. In fact, 58.5% found the content of the message good, 55.6% found it necessary and 45% found it trustworthy. Only 1.8% found the content of the message untrustworthy, 4.1% found it bad, 1.8%

found it mean, 4.7% found it insensitive and 5.3% selected ‘other’. This clearly indicates, the majority of the respondents believe Copenhagen Zoo are handling the crisis well on Facebook.

Furthermore, the respondents were asked if they believe Facebook is an appropriate medium to use in a situation like the Marius crisis. 80.7% said yes, and 19.3% said no. When it comes to credibil-ity as a news source, 3.5% of my respondents find Facebook highly credible, 29.8% find it credible, 26.9% are neutral, 29.8% find it somewhat credible and 9.9% do not find it credible at all.

From my questionnaire results it can be discussed that the majority of the respondents (65.9%) were aware of the situation happening on Facebook during the Marius crisis, even though only 15.1%

follow or ‘like’ the Facebook page of Copenhagen Zoo. Moreover, the respondents believe the voice of Copenhagen Zoo on Facebook was good, necessary and trustworthy. Finally, the majority of the respondents (80.7%) believed Facebook was an appropriate medium to use as a communica-tion platform in the given situacommunica-tion, and a third of the respondents (33.3%) find it either highly credible or credible.

6.2.1 SMCC-model

In the following section I will identify the social media user groups present on Copenhagen Zoo’s Facebook page. Based on gathering a lot of main comments from Copenhagen Zoo’s Facebook page, many posts indicate that they have a lot of influential social media creators. This is shown by several main comments showing either aggression/negativity or support towards Copenhagen Zoo and their decision. An example of a post from an influential social media creator can be seen in the following: “Euthanizing? Please consider your cognitive capacities. We had a zoo director here on Dutch television who claimed the giraffe was welcome in his zoo.It seems you're too stupid to use the right word: killing.And I heared it was in front of public? Even children? This is not about an animal dying (look at all the meat in the shops here), this is about your brains!” (Stienstra, 2014)⁴⁹. Furthermore, the social media users present on the Facebook page interact with each other, by either agreeing or contradicting with one another: “sometimes I love people!Look to your own country! befor you point your finger off other countries!! In the U.S. they hunted the wolf so must, so it cam on the list of endangered species! In 24 U.S. states you can still hunt the black bear!

Many of disse states the allow hunting practices deemed cruel and "unsporting," including spring

49 Please see appendix 24

hunts, baiting, hounding, and the selling and trade of bear parts. And you can still hunt mountain lion and bison, But thats OK, it's just for fun! ... In Australia you can still hunt wild buffalo and wild boar! And we are the killers! and the monsters!?! right;--!)” (Tøt, 2014)⁵⁰. From my second-ary data, it can therefore be analyzed that the majority of the Facebook users are influential social media creators. They create a lot of crisis communication, and consume the information from one another.

When looking at Copenhagen Zoo’s crisis communication on Facebook, they did target the influential social media creators. Based on the crisis communication produced by the influential social media creators, Copenhagen Zoo responded to all of the social media creators at once. They did this through their five different status updates. From the second status update, Copenhagen Zoo expressed they have read all of the different comments on their Facebook page, by saying: “We know that many are angry about the euthanization of a giraffe in Copenhagen Zoo today […]”

(Zoo, 2014)⁵¹. At the same time, Copenhagen Zoo decided not to reply to any Facebook comments, but only communicate through their own status updates. Companies can act very different in a crisis situation on social media, in fact some companies choose to either be completely quiet, with the fear of making it worse, where others answer every single one of the comments. Copenhagen Zoo decided to act in between these two options by only posting status updates.

This can be seen as the appropriate solution given the majority of the Facebook users are influential social media creators. By not replying to any comments, Copenhagen Zoo might have avoided even more Facebook activity to be produced. If they had replied to the user comments, it could have given the influential social media creators reason to produce more information, which could have intensified the situation even more. Moreover, as analyzed in section 6.1 a lot of the Facebook users attacking Copenhagen Zoo, did not relate to the Marius crisis objectively, as they seemed to be influenced by their emotions. From this it can be discussed, it would have been hard for Copenha-gen Zoo to make them listen more than they already did, had they responded to every comment.

Finally, it would have been massive work for Copenhagen Zoo to respond to all of the comments, given the volume of Facebook activity during the crisis.

Even though, a lot of influential social media creators have been expressing their dissatisfaction about the Marius situation, it can be analyzed from my questionnaire results, that communicating

50 Please see appendix 23

51 Please see appendix 22

through Facebook during the crisis was the right choice of medium and an effective communication channel. The majority of the respondents (80.7%) find Facebook to be an appropriate medium in a crisis situation and 33.3% stated they find Facebook either highly credible or credible as a news source. Moreover, Copenhagen Zoo managed to target their Facebook crisis communication to the influential social media creators.

Based on my social media analysis of Copenhagen Zoo, H2 saying social media leads to crises being intensified, can be disconfirmed.