This paper theorizes online social disapproval (OSD) as a distinct, multilevel phenomenon that can rapidly escalate into bursts of public responses with significant reputational and financial consequences. This study aims to conceptualize OSD bursts, distinguish them from traditional crises and develop an analytics-based toolkit to guide organizations in detecting and managing them.
Drawing on literature in organizational crisis management and social media analytics, this study uses a multilevel lens to theorize micro–macro linkages in OSD. It develops a four-phase framework – preburst, initial burst, spreading and contagion and recalibration – and proposes a managerial toolkit that specifies analytics objectives, guiding questions and indicators for each phase.
This study identifies OSD bursts as sudden, cross-platform escalations triggered by microlevel criticism that diffuses through digital networks. Unlike stage-based crisis models, OSD bursts are diverse in origin, erratic in development and resistant to full resolution. This framework highlights how analytics could mediate managerial sensemaking by expanding attention, shaping interpretation and constraining response options. The toolkit provides managers with methods to detect early warning signals, quantify burst severity and assess long-term reputational impacts.
This paper advances scholarship by conceptualizing OSD as a multilevel process that challenges conventional crisis management paradigms. It introduces an analytics-driven managerial toolkit that positions analytics as sociotechnical mediators of organizational sensemaking. For practitioners, it provides actionable guidance on detecting, interpreting and managing OSD bursts, enabling organizations to adapt to the “new normal” of digital disapproval.
