Abstract
This study explored the organisation-stakeholder relationship of Woolworths and applied the Relational Proximity Framework (RPF®) in a digital communicative context. The three RPF® drivers (directness, continuity, and multiplexity) were used to determine Woolworths' relationship with stakeholders. These drivers also served as themes, as in the Atlas.ti dataset. Organisations must use various digital communication platforms to manage their stakeholder relationships. Woolworths relies heavily on social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and X (Twitter) to manage stakeholder relationships. It is worth noting and significant for organisations to take advantage of various digital communication platforms to manage relationships with stakeholders. Woolworths has more followers on all the social media platforms mentioned above, and these followers share their views in every post the organisation uploads.
The study used an explanatory sequential mixed methods design to better understand the relationship between organisations and stakeholders. Qualitative interviews were conducted and Atlas.ti was used to generate themes and codes. The relational diagram investigated how Woolworths engaged stakeholders using Facebook, Instagram, and X (Twitter) and which codes showed frequently, including the highest and lowest in terms of numbers. The data included six themes: the background of participants' engagement with Woolworths on social media, organisation-stakeholder relationships manifestation, social media platforms, directness, continuity, and multiplexity. There were codes which were also linked with each theme, and this was in line with the respective social media pages of Woolworths because each theme was examined through Facebook, Instagram, and X (Twitter). These codes were thematically analysed and therefore an appropriate understanding was created.
NodeXL software was used to analyse Woolworths's social media engagement on Facebook, Instagram, and X. Conversational archetypes were also included to provide the data with a proper conclusion about the relationship between the organisation and its stakeholders, demonstrating that the right conversational archetype for the engagement was the broadcast network. This revealed that Woolworths posted more content on its social media accounts but received less stakeholder participation.