Comunicación corporativa durante la pandemia Un análisis de las portadas de la prensa económica española durante el 2020 / Corporate communication during the pandemic An analysis of the front pages of the Spanish business press in 2020

Abstract

La pandemia por la COVID-19 llegada en 2020 ha afectado a todo el panorama mediático y, por tanto, también a la comunicación corporativa. El propósito de esta investigación ha sido analizar los temas principales de portada de los tres diarios económicos españoles durante el 2020 para evaluar si la pandemia ha condicionado la comunicación corporativa de las organizaciones y si procede, en qué medida ha sido. El análisis se ha llevado a cabo aplicando análisis de contenido de las portadas en medios económicos españoles de referencia: quality papers (Alvarado, 2008). Los resultados obtenidos señalan que la crisis sanitaria ha absorbido los temas principales de las portadas de los diarios económicos hasta dejar sólo la mitad de cobertura disponible para otros temas. Dentro de este fenómeno de apropiación los efectos en el empleo tuvieron el mayor protagonismo con un 10% de presencia en todos los titulares analizados. Por otro lado, en el espacio no ocupado por la pandemia se observó que la cobertura sobre la fusión Caixabank – Bankia fue la más relevante en comparación con la cobertura del resto de organizaciones. La conclusión más importante que puede extraerse de esta investigación es que la comunicación corporativa de las organizaciones no desapareció durante el 2020 pese a los estragos de la pandemia aunque sí se redujo en un 50%. Este hallazgo indica que se intensificó la presión para que las organizaciones pudieran trasladar sus mensajes. De la misma forma la cobertura lograda en las portadas mantuvo un enfoque empresarial y no fue un camino para la difusión de los esfuerzos en RSC.

Palabras clave: pandemia, COVID-19, comunicación corporativa, portadas, medios económicos, titulares

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic that arrived in 2020 has affected the entire media landscape and corporate communication. This research has analysed the main topics on the front pages of the three Spanish economic newspapers during 2020: Expansión, Cinco Días and El Economista. The evaluation of the main front page topics has made it possible to quantify the extent to which the pandemic has displaced the coverage devoted to corporate communications in organizations. In addition, it has been possible to observe which organizations have successfully spreading their messages and which specific issues have been most related to the pandemic.

The results obtained show that the health crisis has absorbed the main topics of the front pages of the economic newspapers, leaving only half of the coverage available for other topics. Within this phenomenon of absorption, the effects on employment had the greatest prominence with a 10% presence in all the headlines analysed. The coverage on unemployment is especially important if it is related to the tourism sector, which was the industry with the highest presence on the front pages (36.6% of all topics categorized as COVID-19). The significant presence of both topics indirectly points to the important weight of tourism in the Spanish economy. However, it is not possible to state that all related topics were negative because there was also coverage focused on economic recovery (4.4%).

On the other hand, in the space not occupied by the pandemic, it was observed that the coverage of the Caixabank - Bankia merger was the most important in comparison with the coverage of the rest of the organizations. This business initiative achieved 2.65% of front-page topics since the pandemic began, in a scenario that was very limited. In general, mergers and acquisitions were the most important topic in 2020, as the second most covered specific topic was the failed merger between Banc Sabadell and BBVA. Telefonica was also among the companies with the most front-page coverage, although with a greater diversity of topics. The rest of the companies analysed also showed a wide variety of corporate topics as dividend management, cash flow movements and business diversification.

It was also noted that the coverage achieved on the front pages maintained a business focus and wasn’t a vehicle for disseminating CSR efforts related to the pandemic. This is a very significant result because much recent literature has argued that during the pandemic, CSR has played an important role in the communication strategies of organizations. However, it seems that these actions have not been enough important to get a prominent position on the front page of Spanish business newspapers.

The most important conclusion that can be drawn from this research is that corporate communication by organizations did not disappear during 2020 despite the ravages of the pandemic but was reduced by 50%. This reduction also shows a very important effect to take into consideration. During the year 2020 organizations had to work much harder to be in the spotlight even though the economic coverage of the analysed media did not completely disappear because of the pandemic.

Keywords: pandemic, COVID-19, corporate communication, front page, business press, headlines