Social Media, A business Influencer. What about astroturfing?

Dear all, 

This blog talks about my personal analysis at Odigos Guiding Services.  With Facebook as the sole social networking site, the company does rely on it for spreading good public relations, where face-to-face conversations cannot match the media coverage, the Web 2.0. allows online.

Web 2.0 is now such a blessing for corporations and businesses. Unlike traditional public relations practices’ that were often related to the concept of press agentry, propaganda and publicity stunt (Kim, Ni and Sha, 2008, 751), where public relations was often seen as a means of spin doctoring, social media now gives practitioners more transparency towards their stakeholders. This can be sustained through the use of corporate blogging, where firms are using the features of the Web 2.0. to engage more into conversations to shape their corporate profile rather than undertaking counteractive mediums to reach their audiences. In contradiction to traditional practices in the industry such as corporate blogging on the company website, often falling into the category of sales pitches, online newsletters, and repositories for repurposed news releases, a one-way communication, where firms would spread their messages at audiences as a way of attempting to control perception, social media has altered the way public relations used to occur by offering asymmetrical communication or two-way communication.

However, what do you think about the idea of social media allowing business practitioners the capacity to monitor the messages that are published on their blogs/posts? What do you think of the concept of “astro-turfing”, that is where practitioners step in as the public and pretend to be fans, they create a good image and shape a good reputation of the company by reviewing and rating through commentaries and rates, in this way, shaping their own corporate reputation. Hence, they are their own raters and kind of create a false fandom, giving a false alert to individuals who are newly unaware of the service/ product from such practitioners.

Thank you.

Cheers,

Karishma