Effects of message interactivity upon relational maintenance strategy in digital communications between organizations and the public

Digital communication between organizations and the public is strategically important in shaping mutual understanding and long term relationship. The primary focus of this project was to investigate the relationship between message interactivity and relational maintenance strategy in the email communication process on organization websites. At issue is to what extent message interactivity and relational maintenance strategy is purposefully incorporated in email responses to public inquiries and consequently, to what extent such interactivity is potentially related to the quality of communication in terms of relationship maintenance. An experimental approach was used to exchange emails with randomly selected 2011 Fortune 500 companies to generate messages which were coded, and analyzed with correlation and variance statistical procedures. The study revealed that there was a statistically significant difference between types of relationship (exchange relationship vs. communal relationship) in terms of levels of interactivity and relational maintenance strategy. The study also found that there was a significant association between message interactivity and relational maintenance strategy. The approach in this study overcame a significant hurdle of lack of data to investigate communication content. By looking into the effects of interactivity upon relationship maintenance, this study contributed to bridging the research gap between message interactivity and relational maintenance strategy, two otherwise distinctly separate research streams. Future studies are needed to investigate the direction and degree of influence between message interactivity and relational maintenance strategy.