Barclays Capital Investment - Media Techniques - Case Study Example

Media Communication xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Name xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Course xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Instructor xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Date submitted Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Introduction According to the Barclays Bank Chief Executive, Bob Diamond, the bank has reported a tremendous increase in the company profits during the second quarter of the year. In a press conference held to announce these results, the president stated that the company was able to maintain its funding, capital and liquidity. This achievement has come amidst the eurozone crisis that has adversely affected many companies in United Kingdom. Barclay’s financial analysts insist that the company does not require any more capital as it has been able to attain a steady £5bn mark. The banks performance has attracted more investments as shareholding capacity increases. Barclays Capital Investment is better placed as compared to its competitors. In the past years, the company kept aside 43% of the BarCap kitty, for employee’s bonuses and other costs. However, it has been able to increase this percentage to 46% during the last quarter of the year. Although there are predictions of worsening economic conditions, the management of Barclays is optimistic that the company will still be able to meet its 2013 vision of attaining 13% equity returns (Cottle 2003). This great achievement comes at a time when many investment banks are crumbling down due to the US debt crisis and the eurozone which has occurred in the past few months. This news has attracted attention of the media and is actually making headlines in newspapers, magazines, blogs and TV shows. The paper will critically evaluate the spectrum of the issue as demonstrated by two media articles that have been selected. It will analyze different media techniques that are portrayed in the articles. Patrick, M, 2011, Barclays CEO affirms RoE target for 2013, Market Watch, November 1st 2011. Available at http://www.marketwatch.com/story/barclays-ceo-affirms-roe-target-for-2013-2011-10-31 The Market Watch is a popular web page used by many companies and businessmen in New York, London and Tokyo. It allows the users to create a profile page where they can post new progress in the company, make communication with parties to the company and get updates in the stock market. Barclays has a profile page with Market Watch where it posts major news concerning the bank. The bank made a recent post on the website concerning the company’s profit increment. The main aim of posting this information is to attract the attention of potential investors (Marris and Thornham 2000). The article provides important information that is required by investors such as the total amount of profits that were accrued before and after tax. It also shows how the bank’s net profit has increased since the last financial year. This information will enable investors to make informed decisions on whether to make minor or major investments with the bank. Another major purpose of this article is to disseminate financial information to the shareholders o f the bank such as customers, suppliers, the government and investors. The article is a typical of an example of a business page whose main target group are the businessmen. This is first demonstrated by the article title which reads “Barclays CEO affirms RoE target for 2013”. The initials CEO and RoE can only be interpreted by a business mind or someone with interest in financial matters. The initial CEO which stands for Chief Executive Officer and RoE Return on Equity can only make sense to someone who understands them properly. A lay man would be discouraged to read the article by merely reading the heading. Therefore, it is quite evident that the article was targeting individual conversant with financial matters. The writer also makes use of other abbreviations such as BCS which stand for Banking Communication Standards and GBP to mean Great Britain Pound. In addition, the article is quite brief and precise. Ideas brought out in the article are direct to the point and the author illustrates them in a shallow manner without giving much details. Although very financial, the author demonstrates simplicity which is characteristic of many business articles as the target readers have limited time to go through lengthy articles. The paragraphs are very short, ranging between 1-5 sentences in length, and each of them bring out different idea. For instance, he states the position of the bank in London’s stock market in just one sentence. In addition, the flow of ideas in the article is descending in nature. This means that he has portrayed the most important ideas at the beginning of the article and ends with the less important. It provides a probability that the reader might be in a hurry to finish the entire article but due to this systematic arrangement will ensure that the reader will capture the main point without necessarily reading the whole of it. The article has a response section that enables communication between the author and the readers. The author is able to make direct contact with the readers who make comments regarding the article and gives him a chance to make immediate response. To the Barclays bank staff, they will obtain adequate information on the extent to which their target audience accessed the news and their numbers as well (Johnson-cartee 2005). The article is attracting and will easily draw the attention of any person. The title raises suspense which makes the reader want to read the content. The reader will be eager o know how the Barclays CEO is so confident in saying that he will be able to achieve the 2013 return on equity goal. In addition, the article is captivating and rather enjoyable to read. It is not too comprehensive to read as it gives shallow details of the matter being discussed. The article is brief so the reader does not have to spend much time reading it. It gives all the important information in very few words which is appropriate for any business journal or article. In my opinion, the journal article was an adequate media outlet to be used by Barclays for publicity of its quarterly profit and other financial results. Treanor, J, 2011, Barclays profits rise despite eurozone crisis, the Guardian, 31 October, 2011 available as at http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/oct/31/barclays-profits-rise Bob Diamond publically announced the rise of the banks profit as clearly written in the Guardian. Being not only a renowned newspaper and channel of communication, it is also a widely read paper. The newspaper is not controlled by an individual and therefore, the bank interests are advocated. The main objective of the article was to raise awareness in the business world on the increment of the Barclays profits despite the crises that are experienced in the eurozone (Treanor 2011). One may argue that it was a well set strategy to publicize itself as a growing bank over its competitors especially at the time when economic crises are being experienced in the Europe. The article has mainly targeted the shareholders, therefore, maintaining their trust in the management, potential customers who are the Guardian readers, potential and existing business partners, the bank’s client in the United Kingdom and the government. Therefore, the channel used was effective as the expected audience was targeted (Austin & Pinkleton 2001). The article consists of a gripping introduction, that is, it is striking to the reader. Basically, one is intrigued to know the how the rock solid funding, capital, liquidity has been maintained. Paragraph two has definitely put the story in context, that is, past, present, future. It has clearly indicated that Barclays had earlier avoided taxpayer bailout in 2008 crisis, the target range which has increased by 5% and the future plans it has set to set a side 46% of the total revenue generated and the bank target of a 13% return, for example (Treanor 2011). The rest of the paragraphs elaborate well the points which were raised in the introduction individually and the words in each paragraph are less than 30 words. Most of the words used in the article have ‘pulled some weight’ to keep the article tight. Actually, it has led to brevity, prose and ‘punchy’ words, resulting to simplicity in a way that will not take much of the readers time, simply put; designed for people who are in a hurry. The articles have maintained an inverted pyramid structure, as the story progresses, the details are becoming fewer, have given more answers and has more active verbs and less of passive verbs. The use of words and not figures can draw people into this article. The layout of the article is impressive as the writer has doubled spaced, used readable font, point size large that are easy to read (Austin & Pinkleton 2001). Using communication theories-news value, encompasses of unexpectedness, in this case, the news given of the rise in the profit despite the economic crisis were unexpected and it is also unusual for a bank that had slightly avoided a taxpayer bailout to rise drastically within a span of three years. The composition of the article is satisfactory as the main elements needed in a business report are present, for example, finance. The gate keeping theory which mainly consists of news selection, filtering processes, though not clearly seen has been adopted in this article. Only the necessary information needed to show the increment of the profit from the previous financial years has been given, basically, the information has been filtered to give precise and exact news needed. As a result of statistics given distortion and inbuilt biases has been eliminated in this article (Baron 2002). In any article, the role of images cannot be ignored. One advantage of using the images, is that, is appealing, striking and give a visual description of the news. In this article, the image placed is that of Bob Diamond, the Chief Executive officer of the Barclays who’s reacted to the announcement of the bank’s increase in profits. Comments to this article are both positive and negative. Some comments from the readers have also shown some misbelieve to the news. For instances, some said that it is an advantage to the government as it will increase the taxes while others have seen as a big joke, that is, a bank increasing its profit in the midst of grief and desperation in the business world (Austin & Pinkleton 2001). Barclays is not the only beneficial of the article, the potential investors may take advantage of the positive flow for their business, and the shareholders’ shares will be contented with management work, the government due to taxes increment and the clients will be also feeling secure as they continue to engage in the banking services. This result to the Guardian increases its sales in the newspapers due to the demand of information (Baron 2002). Comparison of the articles: Media House presentations The above discussed articles about Barclays strike very interesting concerns between the media houses that published them. The Guardian and the Market Watch approaches on the same media content is one that displays choice in creating and sharing information in the minds of the learners. The Agenda setting theory implies that news media are not always successful at directing the audience on what to think much as they are in telling the audience what to think about (Carroll 2010). The representation or misrepresentation of the information in the two media has different influences on the different audiences. It is vital to indicate the possible targeted readers of the articles since this would assist one define the direction of the above telling. The introductions of the articles set the platform for this. The Market Watch highlights the Bank’s ‘commitment’ to make a 13% return-on-equity by 2013, in spite of reduced investment-banking revenue. The Guardian strikes the reader with the bank’s capital position in reference to the new profit mark. The Agenda setting is a political, competitive and conflictive and builds on interest groups and influence. Relative to the Market Watch which is basically business and finance oriented, and targeting the business persons and investors, the Guardian has a wider general readership who may be concerned with business but in a relatively less magnitude. There are differences in facts presented; not misrepresentation, but that they present varying pieces of facts. While the Guardian indicated that revenues fell faster than the costs leading to 82% cost-income ratio, the Market Watch gives more articulate figure showing a 22% fall from the second quarter, and 15% from the third quarter of the previous year to £2.65b from £2.25b. It goes on to detail how the fall was offset. The Guardian takes a difference by indicating of the returns percentage set aside for the payment of bonuses and other staff pays. The agenda setting theory use in business news politically has been used by public relations professionals to build corporate reputation. Corporate reputation entails a media approach from three dimensions: public esteem, prominence, and the series of qualities for which a firm is known (Carroll 2010). The reputation is spelt differently to different publics since the organization needs to attract investors, retain talent, and raise market share and other concerns vital for business success. By use of these captions discretionally to varied publics, the bank aims to cause the audience to think about it. This is tandem with the theory’s hypotheses on top-of-mind awareness, brand name recognition, esteem, and coverage. This has the impact of cognitive attributes which get thought about, having different effects on the public. Agenda-setting has more interest with the circulating ideas than those who pass them in driving the image. The general-public reading the Guardian present a clientele base. Customers, especially in the financial services industry would want to with a bank that demonstrates stability of the capital base and that posts profits even in a crisis. It is also vital to appear profitable and realistic to market opinion makers and analysts. As such, the bank portrays two images. It uses the Guardian to create ‘the bank’ that is doing well despite the Euro-zone crisis in the eyes of the probable customers and major share holders who may not know much about financial matters. To address possible critiques and analysts, who may be competitors, the bank creates the ‘realistic bank’ image through the Market Watch. Selective media use and discretional release of information depending on who the audience is both founded on the agenda-setting and the gate-keeping theories. The organization is able to frame how it desires that the audience think of it. Not only does it entail priming the choice of thoughts ideas, but it also frames the thinking, driving towards the desired outcome. This necessitates the use of gate-keepers. Gate-keeping is defined as a process of controlling information as it moves through a gate (Nahon 2007). The media outlets are the gates. According to Chomsky and Herman (1988), Gate keeping is associated with power struggles and has been linked with propaganda. It may include activities such as selection, withholding, addition, display, shaping, channeling, manipulation, timing, and deleting. This is to ensure that what reaches the intended message is filtered. This may explain why the Guardian and Market Watch treat the similar articles differently, one appearing to be a complement of another. A keen reader would have to read the article from both outlets to make out exactly what the bank profits is all about. It is not that facts were ignored or left out: there was discretional filtering depending on the target audience and the intended image. While gate-keeping may offer little predictive power it has value in summarizing forces that affect people’s decisions about what messages will be selected to present to their audiences (Roberts 2005) Conclusion The above discussed articles present the same information discretionally and selectively published by the source: Barclays Bank. Being business oriented and interested in making impressions or creating images the bank’s gatekeepers make choice of media and message. The Guardian is used to reach the would-be clients in the wider public. This has been displayed by the type and amount of information let out through the paper. In a similar take, the Market Watch presents the organization as one concerned with reality. This is to a smaller closely-knit audience with presumed deeper knowledge about finance and markets. This displays an extensive application of mass communication theories on the part of the organization. References Austin, W, Pinkleton, E, 2001, Strategic public relations management. Planning and managing effective communication programs, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, Inc. Baron, G, 2002, Now is too late. Survival in an era of instant news, Uppeer Saddle river, NJ: Pearson Prentice-Hall. Carroll, E. (ed.), 2010. Corporate Reputation and the News Media: Agenda-setting within business news coverage in developed, emerging and frontier markets. New York: Routlegde Chomsky, N. and Herman, E, 1988, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, New York: Pantheon Books. Cottle, S, 2003, News, Public Relations and Power. London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi: Sage Publications. Johnson-cartee, S, 2005, News Narratives and News Framing: Constructing Political Reality. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. Marris, P. & Thornham, S, 2000, Media Studies. New York: New York University Press. Nahon, K, 2007, Toward a Theory of Network Gate-keeping: A Framework for Exploring Informational Control. Journal of the American Society for Information Control. p. 1-68 Patrick, M, 2011, Barclays CEO affirms RoE target for 2013, Markewatch, November 1st 2011. Available at http://www.marketwatch.com/story/barclays-ceo-affirms-roe-target-for-2013-2011-10-31 Roberts, C. 2005. Gatekeeping Theory: An Evolution . Texas: University of South Carolina Treanor, J, 2011, Barclays profits rise despite eurozone crisis, the Guardian, 31st October, 2011 available as at http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/oct/31/barclays-profits-rise Read More