Exploring airline Companies' engagement with their passengers through social network: An investigation from their Facebook pages

Abstract Social media is an effective way to engage with an airline, and many carriers include Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and Instagram as vital parts of their customer engagement strategies. The Facebook pages of four top airline companies that won the 2017 World Airline Awards have been used as the source of this study. The Stimulus–Organism–Response (S–O–R) model has been adopted. 281 posts were collected and analyzed by employing the thematic analysis method. The findings reveal that three out of four airline companies, especially those with more company-oriented, tend to stir complaining customers' cognitive and emotions regarding their flight experiences. The findings and recommendations offer airline companies a clearer picture about the airline passengers' concerns and behavior in responding to the Facebook contents posted. Furthermore, this study fills the gap in the existing studies, which lack a framework to investigate how airline companies engage with airline passengers via Facebook posts.