ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: CULTIVATING #CUPFUSION: AN EXPLORATION OF THE UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES OF COMMUNICATION IN A PUBLIC RELATIONS CAMPAIGN Timothy Shaw Penn, Doctor of Philosophy, 2018 Dissertation directed by: Professor Elizabeth L. Toth Department of Communication This dissertation is an exploration into the application of Merton’s (1936) typology of the unanticipated consequences of purposeful social actions, to a public relations campaign. Merton gave consideration to using scientific analysis to understand factors leading to the unanticipated consequences of purposive actions, rather than attributing them to chance or fate. Four of his five factors, including lack of foreknowledge, habit, myopia, and values, have proved applicable to the public relations campaign examined in this case study. The case involves the 2016 Reese’s #Cupfusion campaign. When news of a new Reese’s product, Peanut Butter Cups stuffed with Reese’s Pieces, was leaked on Facebook, the brand manager at Reese’s and a small public relations team at Ketchum decided to “tease” the truth about the release of the product, rather than reveal the existence of the candy. Using qualitative methods, including in-depth interviews, organization-provided document analysis, and content analysis of the Reese’s brand Facebook page, this researcher found that by using innovative public relations strategies, combined with a proactive relationship management technique which used social media to cultivate an existing relationship with Reese’s fans on Facebook, the #Cupfusion team was able to cultivate an unintended “viral” outcome for their product roll-out. Merton’s typology of unintended consequences has application for public relations theory and practice. The concept of lack of foreknowledge has implications for both chaos and complexity theory, and how they can be applied to the digital environment and social media, including how organizations can respond to unintended consequences and crisis. This research also supports and adds to social media and strategic campaign planning practice, by providing a lens for the analysis and execution of both pre-implementation and evaluation of public relations campaigns. CULTIVATING #CUPFUSION: AN EXPLORATION OF THE UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES OF COMMUNICATION IN A PUBLIC RELATIONS CAMPAIGN by Timothy Shaw. Penn Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Parkin partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2018 Advisory Committee: Professor Elizabeth L. Toth, Chair Professor Linda Aldoory Professor Meyer Kestnbaum Professor Sahar Mohamed Khamis Professor Erich Sommerfeldt © Copyright by Timothy Shaw Penn 2018 Dedication I would like to dedicate this work to the members of my family who never let me give up on my dream. I am especially grateful to my mother Patricia, who always knew I wanted to be a college professor in my heart, even if I had to start in middle age. And most of all I dedicate this to my wife Cathy, who has supported me through everything, helped me during my low periods, and kicked me in the butt when I needed it most. ii Acknowledgements I want to acknowledge the generous effort, time, and guidance I received from the members of my dissertation committee. You stuck with me through my extended quest for research subjects and offered sage advice on how to make this dissertation as insightful and relevant as possible. Thank you to Dr. Elizabeth Toth, Dr. Linda Aldoory, Dr. Sahar Khamis, and Dr. Erich Sommerfeldt for your guidance through both my course work and for serving on my committee. A special thanks to Dr. Meyer Kestnbaum for coming down from the Sociology Department and providing your excellent perspectives on my research. I want to give extra-special thanks to my advisor, mentor and friend Dr Elizabeth Toth. She took me on as one of her last (she said) advisees, and probably never anticipated that I would take so long to complete this project. She has been a constant source of advice and guidance, and this dissertation would probably never have happened without her support. I owe her a lot. Finally, I would like to thank those that helped me find this case and who generously gave me their time for interviews and supplied me with supporting materials. Susan Whyte Simon, Devon Horowitz and the team at Ketchum, and especially to Ryan Riess and Anna Lingeris, who gave me a peek behind the curtain at Hershey, I owe you all big time! iii Table of Contents Table of Contents ................................................................................................... iv List of Tables ......................................................................................................... vi List of Figures ....................................................................................................... vii Chapter 1 – Introduction ......................................................................................... 1 Definitions and Delimitations ..............................................................................3 Public Relations ................................................................................................5 Public relations campaigns ...............................................................................5 Social media ......................................................................................................6 Summary of Literature Review ............................................................................7 Purpose of this Study ...........................................................................................8 Summary of Proposed Method .........................................................................8 Implications of this Study ....................................................................................9 Organization of the Dissertation ........................................................................11 Chapter 2--Literature Review ............................................................................... 13 The unanticipated consequences of social action ..............................................13 Chaos – Link to Lack of Foreknowledge .......................................................16 Complexity – Link to Lack of Foreknowledge ...............................................21 Complexity theory and responding to unanticipated events ...........................22 Additional factors in Merton ..........................................................................23 Research on the unanticipated consequences of social action ...........................26 Unanticipated consequences in public relations research ...............................31 Strategic planning for public relations campaigns .............................................35 Social media and public relations ......................................................................38 Social media and public relations research .....................................................42 Public relations and strategic social media campaign planning .....................44 Summary ............................................................................................................47 Research Questions ............................................................................................51 Chapter 3 -- Method .............................................................................................. 53 Assumptions .......................................................................................................54 Research Design.................................................................................................54 Interviewing .......................................................................................................57 Procedures ..........................................................................................................60 Case recruitment and participant selection. ....................................................60 iv Interview Procedures ......................................................................................62 Additional Approaches to Data Collection .....................................................64 Data Analysis .....................................................................................................66 Validity, reliability, and generalizability ........................................................70 Reflexivity ......................................................................................................73 Chapter 4 -- Results .............................................................................................. 76 The Reese’s #Cupfusion Campaign ...................................................................76 Initial concept and leak. ..................................................................................76 Initial response. ...............................................................................................77 First Stage Strategy and Tactics. ....................................................................79 Media recruitment. ..........................................................................................83 Facebook News Conference. ..........................................................................84 Twitter. ............................................................................................................85 Media reaction. ...............................................................................................86