Revenue Sources Matter to Nonprofit Communication? An Examination of Museum Communication and Social Media Engagement

ABSTRACT Nonprofit organizations increasingly communicate with their stakeholders using a diverse range of communication channels, some of which involve social media. Although previous studies have found benefits to using social media for nonprofits, little is known empirically about nonprofits’ entire usage of communication channels. It is particularly unclear when nonprofit organizations become capable of investing in their communication channels and what revenue sources affect organizational communication use. To investigate these questions this study examines the impacts of revenue source indicators on museum communication, including usage of traditional channels and social media. By collecting museum data from multiple sources, including official websites and their social media profiles, this study finds that Revenue Diversification (RD) has a positive impact on the number of communication channels utilized as well as on the number of Facebook posts and engagements. The government grants ratio and donations ratio do not have such relationships. The results suggest that financially stable nonprofit organizations may be more capable of adopting new communication media and proactively utilizing them.