Emergent methods

Please cite this article in press as: Toledano, M. Emergent methods: Using netnography in public relations research. Public

Relations Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pubrev.2017.03.007

ARTICLE IN PRESS G Model

PUBREL-1594; No. of Pages8

Public Relations Review xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Public Relations Review

Full Length Article

Emergent methods: Using netnography in public relations

research

Margalit Toledano∗

The University of Waikato, Private bag 3105, Hamilton 3240, New Zealand

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:

Received 9 September 2016

Received in revised form 14 March 2017

Accepted 15 March 2017

Available online xxx

Keywords:

Netnography public relations research

Emergent methods

Ethnography

Ethics

a b s t r a c t

This article suggests the use of netnography in public relations studies of online commu￾nities. It shares lessons from an unplanned and unexpected experience with members

of an online community. It demonstrates how, in an environment of trust, respondents

to online surveys can become engaged with the research, discuss it on their own online

forum, and provide rich data that goes beyond their answers to quantitative online ques￾tionnaires. It draws from the author’s experience while conducting an empirical study on

the role of public relations in facilitating community networks. More specifically,the online

survey examined the work of community network organizers who used the online plat￾form Meetup.com to organize offline face-to-face community group activities (Toledano &

Maplesden, 2016). That research aimed at tracing the involvement of public relations in

online networks. The unexpected post-survey engagement with the participants involved

netnography that provided significant additional evidence and insight. The article calls for

the use of netnography in PR research to expand PR scholars’ understanding of relevant

communities through analysis of their internal genuine online conversations and the way

they process organizational messages. The call takes evidence from the actual research on

Meetup organizers (Toledano & Maplesden, 2016)to provide an example that demonstrates

the potential benefit of using the emergent method of netnography.

© 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction and background

The standard books on research for public relations tend to cluster around a familiar set of methods (Stacks, 2002; Stacks,

2011; Stacks, 2017; Daymon & Holloway, 2002, 2011). During periods of immense and rapid change in the communication

industry, methods with a tried and tested history can helpfully provide continuity and adapt to meet what is actually new.

Nevertheless, this article identifies benefits in adapting to newer online environments with what Hesse-Biber and Leavy

(2008) call “emergent methods” and Kozinets (2015) calls “digital methods. . native to the digital environment” (p. 3).

Emergent methods are identified as “new conceptions of knowledge and the knowledge building process” (Hesse-Bibber

& Leavy, 2006, p. xi). New opportunities for accessing data via new technologies open ways for building knowledge as

explained by Hesse-Biber and Leavy (2008): “Sometimes the field of emergent method is fuelled not by new paradigmatic

perspectives but through technological innovation that pushes on the boundaries of methodology” (p. 7). They use the

example of the discovery of recombinant DNA, which allowed researchers to investigate carrying genes for a range of

∗ Corresponding author.

E-mail address: [email protected]

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pubrev.2017.03.007

0363-8111/© 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.