Abstract
With the booming of Chinese internet corporations, various wrongdoings have been frequently exposed to the public, which damages their corporate image. To face the challenge, these companies usually resort to apologies for image restoration. This study investigates how apology strategies are employed by Chinese internet corporations to restore image in the event of wrongdoings. Based on a self-built corpus and by means of textual analysis, we identified different apology strategies characterized by various linguistic features. The results show that “Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices (IFIDs)” and “damage repair” are two of the most frequently used move types which are normally marked by such key linguistic features as personal pronouns, modal verbs, performative verbs and intensifiers. It is also found that IFIDs, “giving account” and “admitting mistakes”, “offering repair” and “inviting further interaction” are often incorporated together to show the company’s sincere apologetic stance which contributes to the ultimate goal --- rebuilding corporate image and regaining the public’s trust. However, direct expressions of “asking for forgiveness” are seldom found in apologies crafted by Chinese internet corporations. This study on apologies in the domain of internet corporations is believed to shed light on research on corporate apology in particular and corporate image restoration in general.
Highlights
Recent years have witnessed the increasing exposure of high-profile wrongdoings and misconducts from Chinese internet companies, ranging from the vicious competition between Qihoo and Tencent and the shocking Didi killing incident to the layoffs scandal at NetEase
This study is designed to identify the distinctive apologizing patterns and characteristics embedded in apologies posted by Chinese internet corporations and explore how corporate image can be restored via apology strategies
Through examining the occurrence Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices (IFIDs), we found that the performative verb “apologize” is used far more than “sorry”, “forgive” or “regret” as the former is more formal and is a better choice to show their sincerity in extending explicit apology and acknowledging responsibilities
Summary
Recent years have witnessed the increasing exposure of high-profile wrongdoings and misconducts from Chinese internet companies, ranging from the vicious competition between Qihoo and Tencent and the shocking Didi killing incident to the layoffs scandal at NetEase. An organization needs to formulate and deliver a response to its stakeholders and the general public in order to protect its corporate reputation (Coombs, 1999) Under this condition, companies often resort to apology as part of their responses, but not all apologies are successful at repairing public perceptions. There are still topics and phenomenon remained largely unexplored concerning internet corporations, such as the elaborately crafted apologies when they face a crisis situation. To fill this gap, this study is designed to identify the distinctive apologizing patterns and characteristics embedded in apologies posted by Chinese internet corporations and explore how corporate image can be restored via apology strategies.
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