Public Relations Review 38 (2012) 723–730 Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect Public Relations Review How companies cultivate relationships with publics on social network sites: Evidence from China and the United States Linjuan Rita Men ∗ , Wan-Hsiu Sunny Tsai School of Communication, University of Miami, United States a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received 6 July 2011 Accepted 1 October 2011 Keywords: Relationship cultivation Social media SNSs Cross-culture a b s t r a c t This study advances our understanding of relationship cultivation on social media from a cross-cultural perspective. We examined how companies use popular social network sites (SNSs) to facilitate dialogues with publics in two culturally distinct countries: China and the United States. We employed a content analysis of 50 corporate pages with 500 corporate posts and 500 user posts from each country. Overall, companies in both countries have recognized the importance of SNSs in relationship development and employed the appropriate online strategies (disclosure, information dissemination, and interactivity and involvement), but the specific tactics vary across the two markets. Furthermore, cultural differences among the types of corporate posts and public posts on SNSs indicate that culture plays a significant role in shaping the dialogue between organizations and publics in different countries. Implications for corporate relationship management practice in the global market in the digital era are discussed. © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction In today’s rapidly evolving media landscape, organizations use an extensive array of interactive media channels to engage with their stakeholders (Avery et al., 2010). Social network sites (SNSs) have become an integral part of many individuals’ daily life, making SNSs an indispensable venue through which companies, nonprofit organizations, and even politicians stay connected with net-savvy citizens (Utz, 2009). Boyd and Ellison (2008) defined a social network site as a Web-based service that allows individuals to construct a public or semipublic profile, build and maintain connections, and display their social connections to other members. SNSs integrate Web-based services and technologies such as blogs, bulletin billboard systems (BBSs), and social games. Thus, they constitute powerful multimedia platforms that provide such utilities as information sharing, entertainment, and social networking. Because of their unique “viral” power in sharing information and building online communities, SNSs are an important public relations tool with which companies create dialogues with their publics. Social media are characterized by user- generated content, which has been found to be more effective than traditional marketing communications in influencing the attitudes and behaviors of other users (Thackeray, Neiger, Hanson, & McKenzie, 2008). As a consequence, organizations are now building and maintaining SNS public pages to improve their social network salience, enhance interest in their organizations, and build relationships with online publics. In response to hypes and speculations regarding the effectiveness of SNSs as a public relations tool, recent studies have investigated how companies cultivate relationships with their publics using SNSs (e.g., Bortree & Seltzer, 2009; Smith, 2010; Waters, Burnett, Lamm, & Lucas, 2009). However, most of these ∗ Corresponding author. Public Relations Program, School of Communication, University of Miami, 5100 Brunson Drive, Coral Gables, FL 33146, United States. Tel.: +1 305 284 2138. E-mail addresses: l.men@umiami.edu, cicirita@gmail.com (L.R. Men). 0363-8111/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2011.10.006