Dialogic Communication and Thought Leadership: Twitter Use by Public Relations Agencies in the United States

Abstract

This study examined how the 117 Twitter profiles maintained by U.S. headquartered agencies appearing in the 2017 Global Top 250 PR Agencies list from the Holmes Report are using this platform to communicate with their publics. Guided by the dialogic communication theory, a content analysis of 1,120 tweets (from the 112 agencies identified as having public active accounts) published between January and October 2017 were analyzed to better understand the content strategies implemented by these agencies as well as the relationship between levels of public engagement and the implementation of dialogic principles. Additionally, this study placed a special emphasis on thought leadership and the means being employed by agencies to introduce and promote their ideas. The study’s results suggest that while media vividness increases the public’s levels of engagement, interactivity has an inverse effect. At the same time, the findings indicate that agencies are not fully employing the dialogic capacity of Twitter. From a strategic point of view, this study provides significant implications for social media communication practices by public relations agencies.

Keywords:

• Dialogic communication
• thought leadership
• social media
• engagement
• public relations agencies