Effects of Motives for Social Media Use on Corporate Image

｢지방정부연구｣ 제16권 제3호(2012 가을) : 51～67

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* first author

** corresponding author

: Twitter Account of Korail

소셜미디어의 이용 동기가 기업이미지에 미치는 영향

: 코레일 트위터를 중심으로

Ju Hyo-Jin*

Cho Joo-Yeon

Kim Tae-Hee

Jeong Jae-Woo**

코레일이라는 공기업을 연구대상으로 선정하여 트위터를 이용하는 동기가 만족도를 넘어서 기업이미지에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지를 실증적으로 분석함으로써 트위터의 활용방안에 대한 전략적 방안들을 제시하는 데 연구의 목적이 있다. 즉 트위터의 이용 동기와 이용자 만족도의 관계를 분석하고, 이러한 이용자 만족도가 코레일의 기업이미지에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지를 구조방정식 모형(SEM)을 통해 실증적으로 분석한 다음 분석결과를 바탕으로 정책적 함의를 제시하였다. 분석결과, 첫째, 평균값 분석에서 코레일의 트위터를 정보탐색과 자기확인을 위해 이용한다는 인식이 높은 것으로 나타났다. 둘째, 구조방정식 모형을 통해 분석한 결과, 정보탐색동기가 이용자 만족도에 가장 큰 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 트위터의 이용자 만족도가 코레일의 기업 이미지에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 분석되었다. 셋째, 코레일의 기업 이미지를 지속적으로 향상시키기 위해서는 단순히 트위터만의 활용방법에 대한 고민이 아니라 기존의 블로그와 홈페이지의 연계방안에 대해서도 고려하는 것이 필요하다.

주제어 : 코레일, 소셜미디어, 소셜네트워크서비스(SNS), 트위터

Introduction

In today’s knowledge-information society, mobile devices such as smart phone, tablet PC, etc. are newly developed and rapidly populated, leading to unlimited internet access through Wi-Fi, 3G data interface. With the use of Smartphone or tablet PC, it becomes easier to access internet without devices such as laptop or desktop. Development of mobile technology established the foundation for rapid growth of social media in which individuals can broadly communicate with anyone in the world. Younger generation is accustomed to internet media enough to establish the culture of two-way communication and to drive for self-expression and affiliation. Social media refers to media which is led by the public and open communication. It includes platform (blog, YouTube) developed to produce and spread individual’s experience, thoughts, information, provide social network service(Facebook, Twitter), and help build relationships between users. Among these social media, Twitter drew attention as one of new media applications in South Korea by providing fast and vivid information about Umyeonsan landslide and flood in Gangnam area in July last year caused by local downpour in real time faster than newspapers, broadcast, and even than internet portal news.

Also, in the election in the U.S. in 2008, the president Obama used Twitter to organize young voter and to raise campaign fund. He also communicated with voters in real time to build friendly relationship with them. All these led him to be elected president. Twitter is considered as a two-way medium which follows existing media through its unique features such as follower, retweet(RT), short-form tweet with 140 letters maximum(post), etc. Besides, various forms of information such as image, audio, video, etc. can be shared through Twitter. Social network service is personal connecting source which establishes social network of off-line on line. It supports relationship-building between users who have common interests. Based on the relationships, it supports various activities such as retaining personal connection, sharing information and contents, etc.

Effects of Motives for Social Media Use on Corporate Image

｢지방정부연구｣ 제16권 제3호(2012 가을)

The number of Twitter users exceeded 2 hundred million over the world, 5 million in Korea(Seoul Economy, Nov. 14, 2011). There were 5,000 tweets a day in 2007, 300,000 in 2008, 35,000,000 in 2009 to be at least 50,000,000 in 2010 which means 600 tweets arise per second. Over 15,000,000 people are using Smartphone and over 1,000,000 people are expected to use tablet PC by 2015. The expectation means growth of Twitter in the future so leading companies are eagerly planning marketing and PR strategies using Twitter. That is to say, enterprises used to provide consumers with information one-sidedly but consumers now provide other consumers, even enterprises with information inversely. Companies use Twitter to provide customers with information and now even to monitor what information about the company and products is shared among consumer group and what information the consumers want. It is a trend that companies are willing to actively communicate with customers through SNS by opening official accounts of the company. Not only private enterprises but public sector like government organizations and public corporations are setting up PR strategies following this trend and tactically using Twitter for PR and marketing of the company’s products and brands. In other words, public corporation expects the strategic participation in Twitter to eventually impact positively on corporate image by improving customer’s satisfaction with Twitter use.

Therefore, this research focuses on Twitter’s influence based on media aspect of Twitter. The research is to suggest strategic methods of Twitter use by analyzing the influence of the motives to use Twitter on corporate image aside from personal satisfaction selecting a public corporation, Korail as the subject. That is, the research analyzes the relations between motives of Korail Twitter use and customer satisfaction, empirically analyzes impact of customer satisfaction on Korail’s corporate image by structural equation model(SEM), and then proposes the policy based on analysis results. However, this research is priori one because there have not been enough research on influence of Twitter verifying application and effect of Twitter on the view of public corporation.

Literature Review

1) Social Media and Change in Policy Environment

Changes in policy environment triggered by diffusion of social media applications have been included increases in citizen participation, increases in direct communication between government and the civil society, and shifts of power to the public (Samsung Economics Research Institute, 2011, 7-13). This diffusion of social media applications has changed policy environment in these ways; first, citizens will engage more actively in the policy making process, not staying as a spectator. Since social media doesn't guarantee anonymity, more direct actions will be made from citizens who used to be free-riders. Second, there will be change in the mode of communication between government and citizens, which is from indirect communication to direct communication with fast and widely distributed contents online. Last, there will be changes in the way of forming public opinions, from oligopoly structure where a minority of opinion leaders and government rule to a decentralized structure where majority of the public can participate in public opinion formation. In other words, there will be more individual-driven agenda setting than by majority needs. Also, changes will be made from the current policy making system which used to allow citizens’ ideas to be reflected after government makes decision to ‘open source’ system which engages citizens into the whole process of policy making. The role of citizens is expected to change from consumers of government services and benefits to ‘prosumers’ by directly engaging in the process of policy execution and evaluation.

2) Social Media

Social media refers to web-based technologies and services that are designed for enabling users to communicate, participate, and share information in a social environment(Porter, 2008) and depends on user-created content. Examples of social media includes test messaging, blogs, internet forum, podcast, wikis, message board, video blogs, micro blogs(i.e., Twitter), social sharing, services(e.g., YouTube), and social networking services(e.g. Facebook, MySpace). The use of social media is being increased and continues to change the way of individual interaction (Lee, 2007).

The term, social media was first used by Chris Shipley who is co-founder and CEO of Guidewire Group, and first reported in the press by Todd Defren, principal at SHIFT Communications.

Podcast is a compound word of iPod and broadcasting. It is a type of digital media distributed by RSS. Also, when narrowly defined, it means the way of posting audio or video files such as News, Music, Talkshow, conference onto the website by individual contents producer or radio or TV station(Rho, 2008).

Wikis is websites on which users easily edit Web page content using any Web browser. A typical example is Wikipedia which is an Internet encyclopedia launched in January 2001. There are editions in 284 languages, with more than 16 million references.

Behind the advent of social media, a new paradigm in the societal and cultural field originated with the development of up-to-date Informational technology(IT), advancement of multi-media and their harmonized results. Digital consumer technology has changed people’s lifestyle very quickly; in particular, it allows people to create their personal contents easily by utilizing both audio and video(e.g., Internet, smart phone, digital camera, and MP3) (Lee, 2007). Compared to earlier public culture led by specific expert groups, such new trend of social media has been more intensified and widespread as diverse digital media has been popularized over time. Especially, a supply of contents has been generated from mass-media to personal media; and such movement began to settle down in our society as a new culture(Shim, 2007).

Participation in social media motivates people interested to build more involvement and provide feedback. While it leads to make it difficult to differentiate media from its audience, it also helps mitigate challenges in accessing and using contents by making all the participation and feedback procedure open to the users and encouraging voting, feedback and information sharing.

Generally speaking, traditional media is considered a one-way broadcast for audience, while social media is regarded as a two-way communication. Social media also organizes one community quickly, which is capable of chatting common interests freely. As a result, most social media can be burgeoned by partnership of various media or connection via link(FKII, 2007).

3) Twitter and Korail Twitter

Recently, online users write messages and share them with others online; thus, establishing their own networks. In this regard, as so-called, social networking websites has been fully flourished and among them, twitter has been paid much attention as an other online communication. Twitter is literally a short message service which is limited to 140 words per message. This online application not only allows people to share opinion and feelings with their friends but also to postnews and to update it continuously(Lee, 2009).

Twitter was originated in RTS(Real Time Short) message service which created by Biz Stone, Jack Dorsey, and Evam Williams in March, 2006 in the United States.

Twitter is created by combining advantages of prior blogs, SMS, messenger, and other communities in the online system. Indeed, it can be regarded as an accepter-oriented media because people can communicate with each other based on selections of stories which are likely to be told among different stories and information in the world (Choi, 2010).

According to Hwang (2009), twitter has several unique characteristics that are different from previous well-known SNS(e.g., Facebook and MySpace). First, twitter has convenience of utilization due to simplicity. For example, when asked, “what are you doing?” short answers less than 140 characters will be posted at once; in turn, it enables real time communication. Through such simple and short communications, people who post their words and ones who read the posting can join the online conversation at no cost easily and frequently. Second, twitter provides contiguity since many people can reach twitter via their personal computer and mobile(smart phone). Also, it can allow people to use instant messaging anytime. Unlike prior SNS, it has no limitations in sending messages to someone on twitter anytime, anywhere. Third, twitter has a broad network. Previous SNS such as Cyworld exactly mirrors offline relationships and converts them into the online. In other words, people who already knew each other in the offline create just another online relationship by accepting friend requests.

Thus, it has changed only a depth of the relationships without an increase in width of the relationships. On the other hand, such relationships made online are different from ones made offline in that they are more open and free to build new relationships. Once person is interested in one’s site(or blog) on twitter and then clicks one button named “following,” he or she can make a new relationship. Although people don’t know each other, such very unique system creates a network. Considering all aspects of twitter, we can expect that it leads to millions of communications and further builds so-called, a more networked community.

Korail Twitter account was open on July 3rd 2009 to communicate with its clients. Its public relations office is in charge of its operation and management. Korail Twitter is being used for its advertisement purpose as other companies by providing railroad service related information such as the upcoming event, or Korail news in a real time basis. Also, Korail has handled civil complaints received through this Korail Twitter. The number of twitter followers rapidly increased by more than 2 million during the heavy rain(Electronic Newspaper, August 1st, 2011). Initially, it struggled with lack of staffs that are in charge of each territory and systematic work cooperation, albeit a high expectation of the use of Korail Twitter. Yet, in June 2011, Korail created a social-media assigned team and made them forward complaints and petitions of citizens rapidly to appropriate departments in Korail via twitter. As a result, such efforts led to an enormous change of organizational communications within Korail. In addition, Korail is currently exploring new schemes to connect Korail homepage with related other blogs efficiently; Korail is seeking for strategies for a successful management of twitter. In particular, it is expected that Korail can offer services not only for a local commerce but also for a nationwide business in a broad manner.

4) Motives, User Satisfaction and Corporate Image

In a knowledge-information society, effective communication with stakeholders and gaining their favorable attitude are critical for any corporations to survive in an intense competition and continuously changing environment. For this purpose, private sector organizations should be responsible for social causes, and public enterprises should be required to contribute to society by pursuing the public interest. Considering that sharing information on social causes and discussion on those issues are occurring online through Twitter, the greatest of interest is how to use Twitter for this purpose. In this perspective, previous studies on the relationship between motivation to use SNS or Twitter, user satisfaction, and corporate image are examined. First, in terms of the relations between motive to use Internet and user satisfaction, Pacharissi and Rubin(2000) suggests interpersonal relations utility, pass time, information seeking, convenience and entertainment as major motive to use Internet, and among them, information seeking and entertainment are one of the highest motives. Kaye(2005) also tries to identify weblog use motivations and finds six motivations such as information seeking and media checking, convenience, personal fulfillment, political surveillance, social surveillance, and expression and affiliation. According to the research of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, the major reasons why people use weblogs include 1) to express themselves creatively, 2) to document their personal experiences or share them with others, 3) to stay in touch with friends and family, 4) to share practical knowledge or skills with others, 5) to motivate other people to action, 6) to entertain people, 7) to store resources or information that is important to them, 8) to influence the way other people think, and 9) to network or to meet new people.

Park and Cho(2004) conducted a similar study of university students and identify thirteen motivations such as self-esteem/identity expression, convenience, voyeurism, sharing memories, posting/enjoying media or video files, interactions, fashion, economic benefit, learning tool, documentation, habit, relations/interest, and escapism. They also found those motivation positively affect user satisfaction. Woo(2004) conducts a survey of six hundred four-years university students, and asked about their motivation to use weblogs, their satisfaction, and cognitive style. The study finds that major motives are interaction, self-fulfillment, information, and relaxation. Park and Nam(2008) also find motives such as change to be exposed to new ideas, political surveillance, relationship management, self-fulfillment, information sharing and storing, media and checking issue. Especially focusing on Twitter use, Nae(2010) examines the relationship between mobile SNS use motivation and user satisfaction by dividing into nine factors such as communication with others, relationship utilities, relations to off-line, convenience, entertainment, using short-sentences, information utilities, accessibility to foreign countries, and accessibility to celebrities. She finds that most of motives identified have a positive effect on user satisfaction. To date, there have been few empirical researches regarding the relationship among SNS or Twitter use motivations, user satisfaction, and corporate image while there is general agreement that strategic use of SNS can contribute to forming a new relationship, and this relationship in public sector can bring positive results(Rybalko & Seltzer, 2010; Kent et al., 2003; Taylor et al., 2001).

Additionally, Kim et al.(2011) examined thirteen Twitter accounts of the City of Seoul, and find that users of the City of Seoul Twitt appear to post a new twit rather than retwitt or reply. Most of the information twitted is for information sharing or advertisement. Choi and Byun(2011) suggest that strategic use of SNS can positively affect policy making and its implantation of Seoul government, and in turn, it will have a positive effect on citizens’ attitude.

A review of previous studies reveals that there has been little research on the relationship between motivations to use, user satisfaction, and corporate image. This implies that more research should be conducted on this issue, especially social media or social network services. This study suggests that by facilitating the use of SNS, organizational performance can be improved with better advertisement, and in turn contributes to its continuous development.

Research design and methodology

1) Analytical Framework and Variables Selection

In order to create survey items for the independent variable, which is motivation to use, we conducted focus groups of practitioners and professionals who are doing work related to twitter as a pilot test using the survey questions in the study of Kang(2006) and Nae(2010).

Twenty questions was designed and grouped into four factors such as interpersonal relations, information-seeking, entertainment, and self-confirmation. Also, as a Intervening variable, five survey items are selected to measure user satisfaction. For the dependent variable, which is corporate image, another individual interviews of Korail senior leadership were conducted to figure out the most important corporate image for them, and the image ‘trustworthy’ is found to be most important. Based on the survey items used in the study of Kim and Jang(2004), and Cha(2005), five questions are selected to measure trustworthy corporate image.

<Figure 1> Analytical Framework

2) Sample Selection and Descriptive Statistics

For this study, the survey questions are posted as a link on Korail blogs and this link is again twitted on Korail Twitter. The survey was conducted from December 9th, 2010 at 4:00pm to 10:00pm for six hours .In total, 406 surveys were received. Except for two surveys which were inappropriate, 404 surveys were used for the analysis. Demographic questions include gender, age, level of education, occupation and residential area. Among the respondents, majority of the respondent are male by 58.9% and female respondents are 41.1%. In terms of respondents’ age, majority of the respondents are aged from 20 to 40 years by 87.1%. Respondents under age of 15 years are two (0.5%), aged from 15 to 20 years are 25(6.2%), 20 to 30 years are 223(55.2%), 30 to 40 are 129(31.9%), 40 to 50 are 18(4.5%), and over 50 are 7(1.7%). Also, 56.2 percent of respondents are university graduates, 27% are high-school graduates, 11.1% are postgraduates (master’s), 3.7% are middle/high-school students and postgraduates(Ph.D) are 2 %. According to the distribution of residential area, majority of respondents are from Seoul by 34.7%, the second most from Kyungsang-do by 27%, Kyunggi-do by 20.3%, ChungChong-Do by 13.4%, Jeolla-do by 4%, Kangwon-do by 0.5% and Jeju-do by 0.2%.

Also, most of the respondents are students(undergraduate/graduate) by 34.9%, office workers are 104 composing of 25.7%, professional are 32 composing of 7.9%, and researchers are 41 composing of 10.1%.

Findings and Discussion

1) Reliability and validity analysis

To assess the instrumental reliability, construct validity and internal consistency, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha test were conducted. Among the exploratory factor analysis techniques, principal components analysis with varimax rotation was employed. Factors whose Eigen-value was greater than 1 with the factor loading of greater than 0.5 were selected. In factor analysis of independent variables, survey items were integrated into four different factors including interpersonal relations motive, information seeking motive, entertainment motive, and self-confirmation motive. The Cronbach's α coefficient of those four factors are each interpersonal relations(0.607), information seeking(0.745), entertainment(0.642) and self-confirmation(0.814), meaning the scale developed in this study is valid and reliable.

<Table 1> The results of independent variables factor analysis and reliability analysis

Factor	Factor 1	Factor 2	Factor 3	Factor 4
Interpersonal Relations 1	-0.066	0.124	0.694	0.331
Interpersonal Relations 2	0.177	0.087	0.806	-0.167
Interpersonal Relations 4	-0.151	0.280	0.621	0.280
Information Seeking 1	0.021	0.754	0.220	0.237
Information Seeking 2	0.511	0.635	-0.083	-0.162
Information Seeking 3	-0.042	0.733	0.151	0.332
Information Seeking 4	0.002	0.733	0.151	0.190
Entertainment 4	0.107	0.219	0.041	0.801
Entertainment 5	-0.070	0.361	0.248	0.690
Self-Confirmation 1	0.773	0.074	-0.068	-0.073
Self-Confirmation 2	0.803	0.039	0.036	-0.057
Self-Confirmation 3	0.746	-0.018	0.072	0.141
Self-Confirmation 4	0.853	-0.016	-0.032	0.043
Eigen value	2.870	2.330	1.690	1.590
Cronbach's α	0.814	0.745	0.607	0.642

Also, for dependent variable, survey items were loaded into one factor, which is trustworthy corporate image, and its Cronbach's α coefficient is 0.885. Intervening variable also is loaded into one factor and its coefficient is 0.862. Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin test was also employed to assess the appropriateness of using factor analysis on data, and the values for independent variables, dependent variable, and intervening variable are each 0.826, 0.826, 0.856, 0.855. Since all the values are greater than 0.5, we can say it is a satisfactory factor analysis to proceed. Additionally, the results of coefficient of Bartlett's test of sphericity confirmed this.

<Table 2> The results of intervening variables and dependent variables factor analysis and reliability analysis

Intervening variables		Dependent variables
Variables	Factor 1	Variables	Factor 1
User Satisfaction 1	0.812	Corporate Image 1	0.844
User Satisfaction 2	0.868	Corporate Image 2	0.882
User Satisfaction 3	0.762	Corporate Image 3	0.846
User Satisfaction 4	0.827	Corporate Image 4	0.869
User Satisfaction 5	0.742	Corporate Image 5	0.690
Eigen value	3.320	Eigen value	3.440
Cronbach's α	0.862	Cronbach's α	0.885

Five indices were used to assess the fit of the confirmatory factor analysis models. The values of the goodness of fit index(GFI) and AGFI are each 0.863 and 0.824 which are closer to 0.90, representing a good fit to the data. Also, the values of NFI and TLI are each 0.847 and 0.868 which are close to 0.9, indicating a good fit. Except that the value of Root Mean Square Residual(RMR) is 0.071 which is bigger than 0.05, most of the indices in this study provides an evidence of acceptable fit of the models.

To access internal consistency construct reliability and average variance extracted test were conducted. All values of construct reliability and average variance extracted are each bigger than 0.5, 0.7, meaning the scale developed in this study is internal consistency.

<Figure 2> Analytical Framework

INTER = Interpersonal Relations, INFOR = Information Seeking, ENTER = Entertainment,

SELF = Self-Confirmation, USE = User Satisfaction, COR = Corporate Image

2) Analysis of Factor Mean Values

The results of mean value analysis of each factor show that information seeking motive(3.074) and self-confirmation motive(3.981) are higher than average of 3.00. It implies that most of the respondent use Twitter for information searching and self-confirmation purposes. However, the other two factors, interpersonal relations motive and entertainment motive are each 2.969 and 2.601, suggesting less people are motivated to use twitter by those two. This result also suggests that most users are using Korail Twitter for seeking for information on train schedule, or convenient facilities while fewer users are interest in participating in Korail event, or entertainment purpose such as getting vicarious satisfaction by complaining about Korail.

The mean value of the dependent variable, ‘corporate image’, is 3.465 and the mean value of Intervening value, ‘user satisfaction’, is 2.829. It also implies that Korail public enterprise is perceived as trustworthy to majority of respondents, but most of them are not satisfied with the use of Twitter. It may suggest that all the efforts Korail made through its Twitter such as providing a prompt response to customers’ questions, sharing information and effective advertisement about how Korail is handling the frequently detected malfunctions of KTX on its Twitter, contribute to enhanced corporate image.

In terms of user satisfaction, lessons can be learned from the case of Dell company who opens more than twenty Twitter accounts and use them for selling their products, providing consulting services, education, and A/S. Dell company was successful in enhancing user satisfaction by effectively and strategically using its Twitter accounts for their marketing purpose such as providing company news, discount-related information, and issuing coupons.

Therefore, it should take precedence to examine the current Korail Twitter accounts in terms of its main purpose of using Twitter, and based on that analysis, strategic decisions can be made to enhance user satisfaction.

<Table 3> The results of analysis of factor mean values

Variables	Factors	Means	Standard Deviation
Independent Variables	Interpersonal Motive	2.969	1.038
	Information Seeking Motive	3.074	1.045
	Entertainment Motive	2.601	1.157
	Self-Confirmation Motive	3.981	0.937
Dependent Variables	Corporate Image	3.465	0.953
Intervening Variables	User Satisfaction	2.829	1.154

Analysis and Discussion: Application of Structural

Equation Modeling

Structural equation modeling(SEM) was deployed to examine the relationships between use motives, user satisfaction, and corporate image. Five indices were used to assess the fit of the models. The values of the goodness of fit index(GFI) and AGFI are each 0.892 and 0.845 which are closer to 0.90, representing a good fit to the data. Also, the values of NFI and TLI are each 0.869 and 0.892 which are close to 1, indicating a good fit. Except that the value of Root Mean Square Residual (RMR) is 0.131 which is bigger than 0.05, most of the indices in this study provides an evidence of acceptable fit of the models. First, among the independent variables, interpersonal relations motive, information seeking motive and entertainment motive are found to be statistically significant at the 0.05 confidence level.

The standardized relative strengths of the relations between the variables are calculated. Among the independent variables, information seeking motive appears to influence the most on user satisfaction by 0.857 while interpersonal relations motive is 0.185, and entertainment is 0.128. This result implies that the higher the motive to use Twitter for seeking information on railroad use, convenient facilities, and providing suggestions, the higher user satisfaction will be. It is also found that the increase in the motive to use Twitter for building a new interpersonal relationship online, and sharing information on railroad services results in the increase of user satisfaction. In other words, it implies that strategic use of Twitter can contribute to enhancing user satisfaction. The examples of strategic use of Twitter includes aggressively advertising the social causes Korail is providing, and providing quick response to any questions or complaints raised by Korail users. In turn, it contributes to the corporate image.

Moreover, it is suggested that more strategies should be made to use Twitter for enhancing corporate image such as linking its Twitter with other blogs and homepages. Advancement and diversification of contents on Korail homepage or blogs should be made as well as creating a venue where customers’ ideas are collected such as ‘customer supporters’.

Second, only self-confirmation motive is found to positively affect corporate image by 0.185 at the 0.05 confidence level. This result means that when users can express their ideas or when they can share their information or knowledge through Twitter, they will have a positive image of Korail. Third, it is found that user satisfaction is positively related to corporate image by 0.273. It also implies that if user satisfaction with Korail Twitter increases, they will have more positive image of Korail.

In other words, it is empirically proved that if Korail can enhance its Twitter user satisfaction, then the image of Korail can be enhanced. Also, it means that using social media such as Twitter and aggressively advertising its social causes and services on Twitter can be a good strategy for enhancing its corporate image.

<Figure 3> Analysis of Structural Equation Model Results

INTER = Interpersonal Relations, INFOR = Information Seeking, ENTER = Entertainment,

SELF = Self-Confirmation, USE = User Satisfaction, COR = Corporate Image

*p<0.05, **p<0.01

Conclusion

With the advancement of the new information technologies such as Smartphone, tablet PC, the user of SNS(social network service), such as twitter has increased. Following this trend, private corporations, public organizations and public enterprises have been active in using Twitter for marketing and managing customer relations. However, few studies have been conducted to empirically examine the actual effect of using Twitter. Therefore, this study empirically examines the effect of the motives of Twitter utilization on user’s satisfaction and corporate image of Korail using structural equation model(SEM). What follows is a summary of the findings. First, mean value analysis shows that information seeking motive and self-confirmation motive are the highest motive to use Korail Twitter, while Korail Twitter users are less motivated by building interpersonal relations or entertainment purposes. In other words, it is necessary for Korail to focus explicitly on investment strategies that can strengthen its network, and create supporting groups of customers. This study also found that users have a positive image of Korail but are less satisfied with using Korail Twitter.

Second, the results of structural equation modeling show that information seeking motive is positively related to user satisfaction, and also user satisfaction is positively related to corporate image. That is, the higher the information seeking motive of users have on Korail twitter such as asking for information on convenient facilities or railroad services, or positing suggestion, the higher their satisfaction will be. Also, the higher user’s motive to build a new relationship online and also the higher their information seeking motive will be, the higher their satisfaction will be. This result also indicates that using Twitter for their marketing purpose has a positive effect on Korail’s corporate image as more trustworthy corporation. Third, it is also found that self-confirmation motive is positively associated with corporate image. In order to enhance corporate image of Korail, more efforts should be made to identify strategies which not only effectively utilize Twitter, but also share contents with other affiliates by linking its Twitter with its blogs or homepage.

Furthermore, coordination and cooperation between public relation office and other departments, and also between Korail and its affiliates are necessary to come up with better ways to use and develop Twitter. Corporate image which users have is created not only when they are using its railroad services, but also when they are using other services or products of Korail’s affiliates. Fourth, the top leaders and senior leaders of Korail should be very careful when they use their personal Twitter accounts. Their use of their own Twitter accounts is sometimes interpreted as a representative of the Korail itself by other users. Providing a guide to making the most use of Twitter, or providing its operation manual is necessary as well. Last, when using Twitter, possible risks of social media should be considered (Samsung Economics Research Institute, 2011: 18-20).

In other words, there is no doubt that social media is an important platform for public policy debate and enhance citizen participation. In effect, social media has replaced traditional town hall forum of the past. While social media enhances participation, it also exposes and increases the potentials of social conflict online and offline. In this regard, in today’s work, social media could be considered as proverbial ‘double edged sword’. It is also suggested that public enterprises should actively participate in forming public opinion.

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Hyo-Jin Ju is an associate professor of welfare administration at Kkottongnae University. He has a Ph.D in public administration from Yeungnam University. His major research interests include organization management, cultural policy and methodology.

<E-mail: jhj@kkot.ac.kr / 논문접수일: 2012. 07. 15 / 심사개시일: 2012. 07. 24 / 심사완료일: 2012. 10. 08>

Joo-Yeon Cho is a part-time instructor of department of Public Administration and Public Policy at Kookmin University. He has a Ph.D. in Public administration from Kookmin University. His Major research fields are performance management, organizational culture, and methodology.

<E-mail: chojy@gmail.com>

Tae-Hee Kim is a doctoral candidate at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey.

<E-mail: dpgh80@gmail.com>

Jae-Woo Jeong is engaged in department of public relation & cultural affairs at Korea Railroad.

<E-mail: jeffjj@korail.com>