Christofer Laurel, Stockholm university, economics

The purpose of the research project has been to analyse how sports and cultural events taking place at stadiums, stages and museums become integrated in social media and how consumers in digital places express engagement concerning their associated experiences. The project has therefore contributed to the understanding of the interplay between events taking place in physical places and their digital integration within the social media landscape through consumers' articulation of engagement and experience. By studying this interplay, the results of this research project have added to the understanding of social media's importance to physical places in terms of stadiums, stages and museums; events' significance for physical and digital places; and how social media can increase physical places' attractiveness and competitiveness.

The three most important results from the project and an account of these results

Within the frame of the research project, four sector studies and a number of case studies have been carried out. The starting point for these studies have been the collection and analysis of 1.2 million publicly published posts in social media within the following sectors:

o All 27 central museums in Sweden during a twelve-month period (172,009 posts)
o All 15 Allsvenskan stadiums during the larger part of the Allsvenskan season in 2015 (117,687 posts)
o All 14 SHL-stadiums during the season 2015/2016 (62,061 posts)
o A sample of 12 music and city festivals in the summer of 2015 (139,309 posts)
o About twenty specific case studies (approximately 680,000 posts)

In view of the conducted studies, the three most important results of the project are the following. First, the project shows the extent to which the studied sectors and cases have been integrated in the context of social media, and the extent to which users express engagement to their associated experiences in their interaction with the sectors. By doing so, this project illustrates that large variations in engagement is present both within, as well as between, sectors. Second, the project illustrates the engagement contribution that digital engagement expressions expressed towards sectors bring to place brands, in terms of how engagement directed towards for example museums also integrates engagement vis-à-vis city brands and nation brands. Thirdly, in view of the digital engagement that the studied sectors enjoy and the often substantial engagement contribution to place brands, the project shows that social media represents a strategic context that is essential to manage in order to enhance engagement levels and consumer experiences.

New research issues that have been generated through the project

The research project has generated several new research questions, mainly related to the consequences that digital engagement represent for professional organisations in terms of how co-creation of experience among visitors can and should be managed. Furthermore, the results also indicate that several of the studied sectors are in an early stage of development in terms of the interplay between the events, physical places and social media, which raises several questions regarding the aggregated level of development among other sectors both within and outside the boundary of the experience industry.

International connections of the project

The project's international connections have been centred on publication in international scientific journals and participation at international conferences. During the project, four scientific papers have been accepted for publication in Event Management, International Journal of Innovation Management and Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management. Furthermore, six research papers have been presented at international conferences.

Research communication measures outside the academic community

Four main communication activities have been carried out during the project. First, two events have been organised: a round table and a full-day seminar. Second, four reports have been published during the project in order to disseminate preliminary results to concerned sectors. Third, six lectures have been given with their point of departure in the research project. Fourth, the research project has attracted an extensive interest from the media, and a total of 40 media appearances that relate directly or indirectly to the research project have been carried out.

How the project has helped to increase collaboration between a higher education institution (HEI) and a non-academic organisation

During the first phase of the research project, a round table discussion at Stockholm Business School Stockholm University was organised with fifteen participants. Both researchers from Stockholm Business School, KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Stockholm School of Economics as well as sports sector experts from Djurgården Football, Spårvägen, Solna city, Stockholm Sports Federation and Sport Campus Sweden participated.

After the round table discussion, and as part of the ambition to increase collaboration between the university and the organisation outside academia, four reports were published during the project. In addition to present preliminary results, the aim of the reports was furthermore to integrate additional non-academic organisations within the framework of the research project, thereby strengthening collaboration.

The last report published, "Digital Museum Engagement: Central museums and museum visitors in social media", was released at a Flexit-seminar. During the full-day seminar at the Nordic Museum, which was jointly organised by the Nordic Museum, the Association of Swedish Museums and the research project, 130 participants from primarily the museum sector participated.

The two most important publications from the project and an account of these publications

In perspective of the four accepted scientific articles of the research project, the two most important publications are the following.

1. Digital Festival Engagement: On the Interplay between festivals, place brands and social media

Due to the emergence of social media, the research field of consumer engagement is currently undergoing a vibrant development. This development is particularly noticeable in event management, where research currently focuses on how visitor experience can be enhanced by utilising social media. As the field is still in an early stage of its development in regard to the impact of social media, the first accepted article presents how the digitisation of festival engagement can be explained and the implications that this development brings to festivals and place brands. The results show that festivals enjoy substantial engagement levels among its visitors and that digital festival engagement also creates an interrelated engagement contribution to the places where the festivals take place. By presenting the concepts of digital festival engagement and digital place brand engagement, this article contributes to extant literature by explaining how the increased dynamics of digital engagement expression can be explained and managed. In perspective to main purpose of the project, this article contributes by illustrating how one of the project's studied sectors can be understood in terms of aggregated engagement levels before, during and after festivals take place and which engagement contribution in social media that place brands can expect from festivals.

2. User Engagement in Social Media: An explorative study of Swedish fashion brands

In the literature that explains how consumer engagement and involvement is manifested, both concepts have been understood as relatively stable in their character. More specifically, a consumer who is involved in a specific product category and engages in it tends to do so regularly over long periods according to extant literature. Against this background, the second accepted and published article presents how engagement is manifested in digital contexts and in social media. The results show that social media users tend to be much more varied in their engagement levels than previous literature suggests. Therefore, this article contributes to the engagement literature by showing how engagement levels in particular, but potentially also the underlying involvement concept, is considerably varying in social media. In perspective to the main purpose of the project, this article contributes with an important component in terms of illustrating how user engagement in different social media platforms vary greatly and the consequences this entail for the understanding of consumer engagement.

The publication strategy of the project, with comments on the same. Researchers funded by RJ from 2011 must have their peer-reviewed writings published in journals and in conference publications so that they are freely accessible online. State therefore how open access has been ensured.

The publication strategy of the project has been to write up two series of scientific articles. The first series of scientific articles was produced as a result of a literature review and smaller pilot projects conducted during the project's first phase. The second series of scientific articles were written up continuously as the collection of the project's datasets were completed.

Overall, this strategy resulted in a total of 20 manuscripts, four of which are published or accepted for publication in scientific journals, six have been presented at international conferences and 14 are under review in scientific journals. Open access to research results has been ensured by selecting scientific journals and conferences that offer open access. Furthermore, preliminary results have been made available through four reports in accordance with the underlying idea on which open access is based.

Publications

Articles published / accepted for publication

1. Laurell, C. & Björner, E. (2016). Digital Festival Engagement – On the interplay between festivals, place brands and social media. Accepted for publication in Event Management.

2. Geissinger, A. & Laurell. C. (2016). User engagement in social media: An explorative study of Swedish fashion brands. Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management. 20(2), 177-190.

3. Laurell, C. & Sandström, C. (2016). Analysing Uber in Social Media – Disruptive technology or institutional disruption? International Journal of Innovation Management, 20(7).

4. Laurell, C.  (2016). Fashion Spheres – From a Systemic to a Sphereological Perspective of Fashion. Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management, 20(4), 520–530.

Conference articles

1. Laurell, C. & Sandström C.  (2016). Spotting Industry Change through Social Media - The Case of Tesla. To be presented at the ISPIM Innovation Summit, Kuala Lumpur, 4-7 December.

2. Geissinger, A. & Laurell. C. (2016). Fashion weeks and social media – Engagement concentration or spill over? Presented at the Global Fashion Conference, Stockholm, 20-21 October.

3. Laurell, C. & Sandström, C. (2016). Where's the sharing in the sharing economy? From collaborative consumption to platform capitalism through institutional entrepreneurship, presented at the 10th Ratio Colloquium for Young Social Scientists (RCYSS), Stockholm, 26-27 August.

4. Laurell, C. & Söderman, S. (2016). Storytelling and social media: On the changing communication landscape, presented at the Global Marketing Conference 2016, Hong Kong, 21-24 July.

5. Laurell, C. & Söderman, S. (2016). Sports, storytelling and social media: A review and conceptualization, presented at EURAM 2016, Paris, 1-4 June.

6. Laurell, C. & Sandström, C. (2015). Analysing Uber in Social Media – Disruptive technology or institutional disruption? presented at the 2015 ISPIM Innovation Summit, Brisbane, 6-9 December.

Reports

Laurell, C. (2016). Digitalt museiengagemang: Centrala museer och museibesökare i sociala medier. Stockholm: Volante Research.

Laurell, C. & Nielsén, T. (2016). Digitalt arenaengagemang: SHL-arenor och arenabesökare i sociala medier. Stockholm: Volante Research.

Laurell, C. & Nielsén, T. (2016). Digitalt arenaengagemang: Allsvenska arenor och arenabesökare i sociala medier. Stockholm: Volante Research.

Laurell, C. & Nielsén, T. (2016). Digitalt festivalengagemang: Festivalbesökare och platsvarumärken i sociala medier. Stockholm: Volante Research.