An Apology is More Than Just Saying “Sorry” – Framing Effects in Online Service Recoveries

Description

This research sheds light on how companies should apply attribute and goal framing in their public responses to online complaints in order to elicit favorable reactions by complaint bystanders on social media. In contrast to earlier findings, we show that responses in which companies apply positive or negative attribute framing can have similar effects. Furthermore, we demonstrate that for goal framing, a positively framed recovery message is more effective than a negative one. Here, positively framed messages have the benefit that complaint bystanders regard them as a sincere apology by the involved company, which ultimately triggers benevolence towards the firm. These insights suggest that marketing scholars and practitioners should re-consider seemingly established framing effects and their specific boundary conditions in the context of online complaining.

Period	2 Jun 2021 → 4 Jun 2021
Event title	2021 Academy of Marketing Science (AMS) Annual Conference: Celebrating the Past and Future of Marketing
Event type	Conference
Degree of Recognition	International