Digital transformation is part of the profound post-industrial society changes that are having a crucial impact on all media firms and institutions (Evens et al., 2018; Oliver, 2018; Picard, 2014; Naim, 2013) and particularly in terms of a crisis of trust. Indeed, we live in an era of distrust, where legacy media incumbents are rapidly replaced, consumption is ever more fragmented and loyalty disappears quickly. Equally, the focus on ratings, page views, clicks or consumer engagement is not likely to increase trust in the media.
Trust is achieved when media companies and institutions can be ‘relied’ on. Today, there are fewer media outlets that audiences can trust. According to the Digital News Report (2022), “Trust in the news has fallen in almost half the countries in our survey, and risen in just seven, partly reversing the gains made at the height of the Coronavirus pandemic. On average, around four in ten of our total sample (42%) say they trust most news most of the time. Finland remains the country with the highest levels of overall trust (69%), while news trust in the USA has fallen by a further three percentage points and remains the lowest (26%) in our survey.”
Given the dynamics of competitive media markets, it is time to take stock of the role of trust in the media and look forward, particularly as trust in the media is so fragile (Chan-Olmsted & Kim, 2022; Kalsnes & Krumsvik, 2019). For example, we know that trust is important in differentiating one media firm from another in the marketplace and that the business of media firms is to increase revenues through subscriptions and memberships (e.g. Netflix, Spotify, Amazon, Disney, The New York Times, The Economist, Apple). However, looking forward, subscriptions, memberships and other forms of sustained customer commitment require trust. Trust in media organizations may develop by building organizational capabilities such as better understanding of audience needs and wants, evaluating consumer journeys to create high-quality user experiences and co-creating media products and services with consumers.
emma 2023 Conference Theme
The conference will examine the key question of How media firms and institutions can become more trustworthy? It aims to contribute to the academic conversation about trust and we hope that scholars will examine a range of topics including:
- Reputation of media companies
● Trust in executive level leadership
● Trust and sustainability of media companies
● Human Resource Management in media companies
● Internal communication and trust building: how generate, attract and retain talent
● KPIs for measuring and managing trust
● Trust in native digital media and legacy media brands
● The role of trust in branding, marketing and co-creation
● Creativity, innovation and trust
● Influencers and trust
● Social media, fake news, misinformation
● Trust, big data and artificial intelligence in the new world of media and entertainment
● Audience listening as way to increase trust
● Subscription-based television sources and trust
● Quality in audience research and trust measurement
● Trust and quality in content production
● Trust in advertising supported media vs subscription media
We also welcome paper proposals beyond the conference theme that addresses theoretical reflections or empirical findings relevant to contemporary media management scholarship.
Call for papers
Submissions for the emma conference are invited as paper proposals in the form of abstracts (500-750 words excluding references) followed by a full paper (6000 words maximum) if the abstract is accepted.
The full call for papers can be found here.
emma Conference Grant
Early-career researchers, including PhD candidates, who wish to apply for an emma Conference Grant (up to €1000) are referred to the Call for Applications.