Social Media Marketing in Practice of Polish Nationwide Catholic Opinion-Forming Weeklies: Case of Instagram and YouTube

Abstract

This article, as the fourth in the cycle, presents the conclusions of the research project analysing marketing activities of Polish Catholic opinion-forming weeklies on the chosen social media platforms. This paper aims at presenting the results of the study on the use of Instagram and YouTube as marketing tools by the aforementioned weeklies. The authors focus on such topics as: (1) social media as a way of creating and distributing media products; (2) social media as a way of commercialising the content; (3) social media as carriers of marketing communication (including self-promotion). The empirical research is based on case studies and the content analysis of the social media profiles of the five selected magazines (Gość Niedzielny (GN), Tygodnik Katolicki Niedziela (TKN), Przewodnik Katolicki (PK), Idziemy (I) and Tygodnik Rodzin Katolickich Źródło (TRKŹ)). It can be concluded that some Catholic weeklies manage their accounts in a moderately professional way, using their visual and distribution potential and some functions of the platforms quite efficiently. On the other hand, they do not apply a regular and purposeful self-promotion strategy, do not use important mechanisms of the platforms such as the Shop and IGTV (on Instagram), and do not consistently build a profile or create playlists on YouTube.

1. Introduction

The vast majority of media originating from traditional press, radio and television run profiles on social media platforms. One of the reasons for this activity is the numerous benefits it provides (Szews 2015). These can include, for example, reporting on important events (e.g., Piwko et al. 2021; Cárdenas et al. 2021), implementing news organisations’ ideological agendas and supporting news prioritisation (e.g., Al-Rawi 2017; Cherubini and Nielsen 2016), as well as communicating with audiences, leading to the implementation of diverse dramaturgical strategies (Bonini 2014). Graca (2020) noticed that “the level of participation increases in number of interlocutors who can take part in the message” and highlights the features of posts of “speed, short duration and presence of sound” (p. 98). In this context, Lee (2015) even refers to the “production of speed-driven content” and “more frequent micro-updates”.

Laor and Steinfeld (2018) think that the content published on social media profiles is “a window into the station’s inner-workings, showcasing their product, programs and hosts, and even serving as a catalyst for discourse and dialogue” between the medium and its recipients. Researchers emphasise that the content of media profiles is mainly self-promotional and provisional. This is confirmed by Spangardt et al. (2016), who discussed the role of presenters in building relationships with audiences outside the studio through social media channels (p. 95). A marketing perspective is also presented by Hermida (2010, 2013) and García-Perdomo (2021), who associate platforms with the dissemination and production of programming and highlight the importance of news sharing practices. As it turns out, the redistribution of posts by audiences means acquiring new channels and building their reach. Kalsnes and Larsson (2018) argue that the greatest sharing potential comes from engaging, emotional and provocative content—which, in turn, encourages media to construct messages of this type more often. Because of this, Lischka (2018) wonders whether “the informational benefits to social media users may be lower because of an increased amount of entertaining news and a reduced amount of foreign politics and economic news” (p. 29). The marketing context is also referred to by Bosch (2014), Jędrzejewski (2014) and Min et al. (2015). The first two researchers see it as a constant connection to the audience and the expansion of the boundaries of media functionality by going beyond their analogue activity. The second group of scholars argues that adopting appropriate practical solutions in running social profiles can lead to an increase in medium ratings. Some doubts regarding this fact are raised by Larsen et al. (2016), who claim that “there is no clear relationship between the viewing figures and FB activity on Skavlan’s [analysed medium] wall”. On the other hand, scientists have admitted that negative social media responses regarding one episode attracted more people to watch that episode after it was broadcast (p. 3857).

Thus, it can be concluded that the disadvantages of using social media are their unpredictability and the fact that they tend to cause crises. Jędrzejewski (2014) further talks about the incomplete use of the potential of platforms in building relationships with audiences, while Bowd (2016) points to the risk of audience fragmentation “across a range of delivery platforms (…) rather than expanding their reach to new publics and cementing their role in public life” (p. 141). Lee (2015) highlights the danger of journalists being overburdened with new responsibilities. Kalsnes and Larsson (2018) noticed that social media bring “valuable traffic for media companies”, while questioning its quality.

Managing social media profiles in the media is therefore an arduous, complex and challenging process, requiring adequate preparation and knowledge. Sellas and Bonini (2014) point out several practical dimensions of this process: strategic (interactive adaptation to the needs of the audiences without simplifying the formulated message, building website traffic, promoting the content of the traditional medium), synchronous (informing about what the traditional medium offers and encouraging discussion), values (strengthening the media brand, self-reflection, coordinating content flow), interaction (promoting the media brand, connecting with the audiences), and skills (listening to and trying to understand the audiences, managing brand reputation).

Additionally, the running of social media by traditional media can lead to the blurring of boundaries between marketing (communication and distribution) and journalistic objectives. Sacco and Bossio (2017) refer to the difficulty of balancing the demands of the newsroom with the promotional requirements of the media enterprise. They argue that the key to success is to accept “the interplay of editorial, business and technology aspects in news organizations” as “an important aspect of understanding the processes and practices that influence the transition of journalistic work in the social media age”.

It concerns practically all editorial offices functioning in the social media space—including the Catholic ones, which are the subject of this paper. This study closes a series of texts examining and characterising the marketing potential of the social media activity of Polish Catholic opinion-forming print magazines, thus enriching the literature on the mediatisation of religion and religious institutions, and expanding research on the social media marketing aspect of the mediatisation of religion and religious institutions.

This series diagnoses the degree of professionalisation of Catholic media editorial offices in social media marketing. By pointing out strengths and weaknesses, it determines whether the analysed media use the marketing potential of their social profiles; in other words, whether editorial offices originating from strictly traditional (print) media demonstrate an inclusive approach to social media, thus adopting the perspective of Sacco and Bossio (2017).

The research plan adopted for the cycle dictates the thematic scope and theoretical–empirical shape of the texts included in it.

The first article (Adamski et al. 2020) is introductory. It provides an in-depth review of the literature on the mediatisation of religion, religious marketing, the marketing use of social media by traditional media and the definition of Catholic media in Poland. The authors identify, justify and describe the media selected for further analysis (Polish Catholic weeklies: Gość Niedzielny, Tygodnik Katolicki Niedziela, Przewodnik Katolicki, Idziemy and Tygodnik Rodzin Katolickich Źródło). Then, they discuss the methodology of the project (literature review, case study, comparative content analysis), formulate general research objectives and questions, and clarify specific questions, which in subsequent texts are adapted to the social media profiles of the analysed weeklies. The presented solution as to the division of content within the cycle means that all the publications follow the same structure:

• the theoretical part discusses the relevant social media platforms and the marketing aspects of their use by traditional media (including Catholic media);
• in the methodological part, specific research questions are adjusted to a particular social networking platform (the remaining research assumptions do not change);
• the empirical part discusses the use of the functionalities available on the particular platforms by the media studied and the results of a comparative content analysis of these media’s profiles, based on unified codification keys taking into account the specificity of particular social media platforms.

In the second article of the series, the authors (Jupowicz-Ginalska et al. 2020) focus on the marketing context of the management of Facebook profiles by Catholic weekly magazines. The obtained results indicate that their editorial boards, despite some correctly conducted activities (such as maintaining visual coherence, linking to the website), do not use the marketing potential of FB, which suggests “that they underestimate this tool as an effective channel of reaching their audience” (p. 20). A moderately professional approach to social media marketing “is reflected in a small number of interactions and low post reach”, and Facebook’s “functions are limited to supplementing the main communication channel, which is the printed weekly and its website” (p. 20).

The third study (Leonowicz-Bukała et al. 2021) examines the marketing activity of the weeklies on Twitter. The authors conclude that the media “manage their accounts in a moderately professional manner”, which means that they use the visual and distribution potential of the platform, but “they miss the chance to build a community of users focused around media brands, they do not apply a systematic and deliberate self-promotion strategy, nor do they use important TT mechanisms, such as hashtags and emoticons” (p. 22). In this case, too, the media “do not take full advantage of the marketing possibilities of Twitter”, so its “functions are limited to supplementing the main communication channel, which is the printed weekly and its website” (p. 22).

This article, implementing the research assumptions of the series, examines the marketing aspects of the use of Instagram and YouTube by Polish Catholic weeklies. In the theoretical part, the authors describe both platforms and present research devoted to the activity (including the marketing one) of traditional media on both platforms. The methodological part is slightly modified: the research period for content analysis is extended. The rest of the methodological assumptions and the empirical part are implemented according to the adopted scenario. As with the previous articles, this one also concludes with limitations and future research threads. It is worth emphasising that Instagram and YouTube are, as it turns out, the least researched social networks from the so-called Big Four—the Scopus database generates only 5218 results for a query about Instagram, while YouTube generates more than twice as many (12,266), but the most results are for Facebook (31,489) and Twitter (37,040). Similar proportions are given by the Web of Science search, whereby a query on the name of the platform gives, respectively, 4358 (IG), 10,762 (YouTube), 29,122 (Twitter) and 51,319 (Facebook) results.

2. Instagram and YouTube as Communication Tools

2.1. Instagram

Instagram is the fourth most popular social media platform in the world (used by 60.6% of Internet users aged 16–64). It ranks right after YouTube (92.8%), Facebook (89.2%) and Facebook Messenger (76.5%) (Kemp 2021). In Poland, it is used by nearly 9.2 million people (Kemp 2021), mainly young people aged 15–34 (Miotk 2018).

The history of the service dates back to 2010, when it emerged as an app for sharing photos. Initially, only iOS users were given this opportunity, but in 2012 Android users joined them. The app’s name comes from a combination of the words “instant camera” and “telegram”. The original idea of Instagram was to create a social medium to serve as a photo album. Later, new features emerged, such as the option to add video (2013), Instagram Stories (2016, posting ephemeral content expiring after 24 h) and IGTV (2018, publishing long-form videos). To this day, the application gives the opportunity to interact by means of comments under posts, private messages, liking the posted material and creating a community gathered around a given profile (Czarnota 2017, p. 136). Instagram is a product designed mainly for mobile devices—there is a browser-based version, but it lacks several solutions available on mobile phones. The platform mainly operates with images and video, which means that it is treated as a medium focused on visual communication, aesthetics and entertainment. This makes it difficult to adapt the information content to its specifics (Buczek 2016, p. 48).

The visual message on Instagram can be intensified by:

• Hashtags—words or phrases preceded by the # sign. They allow posts to be assigned to relevant topic groups and make it easier to search for profiles on the platform. Instagram has also provided a hashtag tracking option, making it easier for profile managers to quickly analyse who is using their #, company name, slogan etc. (Fabijańczyk 2016). The use of hashtags strengthens the organic reach of posted content;
• Tags—increase the marketing activity of company accounts and support sales actions. Proper use of this feature helps redirect potentially interested visitors directly to the shopping site, and can also be used to maintain relationships with other Instagram users;
• Emoticons—a textual or pictorial record of emotions and moods. Although they are most often perceived as forms created in the era of computerisation, they were used as early as in the 19th century (Tomić et al. 2013, p. 35). Nowadays, they are not only a representation of standard ASCII characters, but also a graphic representation (image) of feelings or actions;
• Filters—a type of overlay that adds a special effect to the content being shared. Instagram has many filters built into the application, and it is also possible to create individual ones. This feature is criticised because it leads to the creation of an idealised image of the presented world, life, or people. Every now and then a debate arises over the removal of some filters from Instagram (Youn 2019) in order to compensate for the problem of dysmorphia or to change the way “filtered” messages are tagged.

Wielgosz (2017) mentions the following advantages of Instagram communication: the mobile nature of the application and its functions, its user-friendly interface, its characteristic functionalities and the categorisation of content. The aforementioned functions make profiles more attractive, multimediatise them, strengthen their networking by establishing close relations with other users, and help build a coherent, interactive and visually attractive message. On the other hand, features that reduce Instagram’s marketing effectiveness are pointed out. Serafinelli (2017) remarks that Instagram “is less effective than other means of communication because of its limited messaging features” (p. 22). It should be noted that Instagram, as a social medium operating with a visual message, is different from services such as Facebook or Twitter: hence, the marketing potential of the strategy depends on its proper construction (Chobot 2019, pp. 51–55). In other words, the key to achieving effectiveness is an appropriate strategy for operating in this space (Buczek 2017; Hu et al. 2014), often involving the integration of marketing impact by linking to Facebook and Twitter (Hubinová 2017). It is also worth noting the relatively high marketing potential of Instagram among the so-called generation Y (it comes second, after Facebook, and before Twitter and YouTube) (Kusá and Záziková 2017).

2.2. YouTube

YouTube is used worldwide by 2 billion users per month (Roguski 2021), and in Poland by about 25.9 million (Kemp 2021), who watch more than 4 million videos every minute (Marr 2018), and the average time per session is about 40 min (Rutnik 2019). In order to register for the service, it is necessary to create a Google account.

The beginnings of the platform date back to 2005. The service was founded by three IT specialists, but the following year it was purchased by Google. Thanks to the significant interest from the investors, the portal launched successfully; a year after the first material was uploaded, the platform had 100 million views per day, with the number of videos increasing by 65,000 every day (Wikipedia 2021).

The classification of YouTube has been problematic for over a decade. Some scholars categorise it as a social medium (Aufar et al. 2020), citing the opinion of the site’s creators, who were more concerned with positioning their product as a social network than a video storage website (Cyrek 2020b, p. 123). On the other hand, “its social nature may not be so obvious in the common understanding that the site (…) did not originate as a social network, but as a video sharing platform to which social features have been added” (Cyrek 2020b, p. 124; Uryupina et al. 2014). This approach allows some researchers to describe YouTube as a social medium (Wattenhofer et al. 2012). Burgess and Green (2011), on the other hand, point out that users of the platform do not make use of its social features, but mainly watch videos uploaded to it without regularly logging in and uploading videos. There is also its visual side, which is different from other social media. As Cyrek (2020b) points out, it presents content through thumbnails of posted videos rather than profiles of creators and users (p. 124). A. Kavoori (2015) refers to YouTube’s cultural aggregation because the site is “a totality where variously sized videos, commentaries, tools, tracking devices and logics of hierarchisation all combine into a dynamic seamless whole” (p. 24).

YouTube is a medium with a high degree of convergence, becoming a domain of media activity previously known for its press or radio forms. The platform offers not only the opportunity to create a channel and upload videos, but also to comment on them, share them or rate them. YT’s marketing communication planning is also worth mentioning. Practical advice in this regard is offered by Google (2015), which emphasises the need to design activities according to a strategic approach to building video content. This refers to the “Hero, Help and Hub” rule:

• Hero—creation of typical image-building, emotion-evoking and engaging content at key moments for marketing activities;
• Help—advisory content that can be used in practice, for example, answers to the service users’ questions and searches;
• Hub—keeping the audience’s attention, aimed at current subscribers, where the regularity of publication, and a unique character and style encouraging interaction with the channel owner’s brand, are the most important factors.

Another noteworthy aspect is social TV, which results from the blending of traditional TV and social networks (Szews 2014, p. 67). There are two advantages of such a converging medium. For the viewer, it means the chance to reach and interact with journalists and media stars. For the medium, it provides increased analytical opportunities for ongoing activities and the implementation of marketing activities (Szews 2014, p. 68). Within the latter, YT can be used in various ways, for example, for presenting products and services, ways of assembling or applying them, and creating expert content (comments from company employees, answers to frequently asked questions, customer recommendations) (Kaczmarek-Śliwińska 2013, pp. 107–39). Moreover, YT channels can be accepted into the YouTube Partner Programme (YPP), which means a chance for effective monetisation. Being accepted into the partner programme means meeting the platform’s requirements regarding public watch hours and subscribers. One of the necessary conditions is respecting copyrights and posting content that does not violate legal regulations. Positively verified channels receive access to functions for earning advert revenue.

3. Instagram and YouTube in Academic Research—From a General Perspective to Catholic Media. Literature Review

3.1. Instagram

Taking into account the fact that the analysis of the marketing potential of a medium touches upon various areas (organisational economics, marketing, psychology, sociology, media, including the Catholic profile media), the literature review was treated in an interdisciplinary manner.

In the field of psychology, research topics relating to Instagram focus on the following themes: the selfie/groupie culture (Venus and Ryu 2018), human psychological well-being (Barry et al. 2019), the frequency of application use (Sherlock and Wagstaff 2019), and depressive symptoms generated through the mechanism of negative social comparisons (Lup et al. 2015) or the objectification of individuals (Fardouly et al. 2017). Researchers also address the issue of motivations for using applications (Lee et al. 2015; Huang and Su 2018).

Sociological analyses have focused on topics such as the relationship between image representation and the formation of social imaginaries (Reade 2016; Olive and Varea 2017), digital activism (Fernández-Prados et al. 2021), and young people’s perception of the world (Loukianov et al. 2020). The roles of emotions in understanding and shaping online actions (Au and Chew 2017) and new visual practices (Olifirenko 2019; Serafinelli 2017) have also been explored.

Within the economic approach, Instagram has been analysed through the angle of its impact on the economy (Hardey 2015), its labour activation (Alkhowaiter 2016), and its use for promotional, informational and relational purposes (Al-Kandari et al. 2019; Czarnota 2017; Garifova 2016) or purchase decisions (Subhankar and Anand 2019). There has also been a focus on the area of corporate responsibility (Shrivastava et al. 2021), fostering digital entrepreneurship (Adekunle and Kajumba 2021), using the platform during the pandemic (Soekiman et al. 2021), and activity management, both within specific market segments (Anagnostopoulos et al. 2018; Gumpo et al. 2020) and the arena of political marketing (Jung et al. 2017).

The field of media studies is of considerable interest to researchers. Here, Instagram is analysed in contexts such as disinformation (Massey et al. 2020), mediatisation (Ekman and Widholm 2017; Bossetta 2018; Dobkiewicz 2019), and its use in pro-social action (Retallack et al. 2016; Jaramillo-Dent and Pérez-Rodríguez 2019) and crisis situations (Murthy et al. 2016). The themes of the dysfunctional use of new media, including destructive effects on individual development, are also addressed (Skowronski et al. 2021). Instagram has also been the subject of studies in aesthetic and visual culture (Rogers 2021) and review of methods and factors for studying messages emerging from social networks (Czarkowska and Gumkowska 2017).

As it turns out, the Instagram activity of religious media has not attracted significant scholarly interest. The research to date mainly focuses on analysing the social media activity of religious communities (Cabak 2020; Wrzos 2018) and Church leaders and agendas (Cardoso and Barraco 2019; Campbell and Vitullo 2019). There are also some studies on the use of social networks by Catholic media locally. However, it must be stressed that these are based on a comparison of quantitative indicators, without reference to qualitative and in-depth analyses (Graca 2020). There have also been attempts to present the Instagram activity of representatives of particular denominations, such as Jews and Jewishness (Ichau et al. 2019), or to describe the place of religion in the lives of young users of the medium (Micó-Sanz et al. 2020). However, no studies have been found that address the marketing use of Instagram by Catholic media, much less Catholic weeklies. This means that there is a gap in the literature, which this text aims to fill.

3.2. YouTube

As in the case of Instagram, the literature review referring to YouTube was approached in an interdisciplinary manner. Thus, analyses and research from a psychological perspective refer to the sphere of communication, touching upon topics such as YouTube as a space for the implementation of cyberpsychology, behaviour and social networking research (Konijn et al. 2013; Allgaier 2020), or as an area for use in educational processes (Jackman 2019). Reference is also made to the threat of problematic attachment (addiction) to the use of the platform (Balakrishan and Griffiths 2017) and the electronic aggression that occurs there (Moor et al. 2010). On the other hand, it is analysed in terms of opportunities for groups defined as minorities (Green et al. 2015).

From the sociological perspective, themes related to socialisation processes in adolescent peer culture (Balleys et al. 2020) and the framing of socially meaningful content (Keskin 2018; Thelwall 2018) dominate. Issues of business relationship formation (Vonderau 2016) and the specificity of users’ online behaviour are also raised (Misoch 2014). Some analysts see YouTube as a space that has democratic value (Dylko et al. 2012) and as a tool for lifelong learning (Cho 2013).

In the economic approach, researchers tend to analyse YouTube in terms of globalisation (Kim 2015), digital economics (Leonard and Bell 2018), attention economy (Cyrek 2020a), marketing management, and the increasing share of promotion targeting young users (Schwemmer and Ziewiecki 2018). Reflections on communication emerged in analyses of YouTube as a platform for competing with user-generated content and professional content (Arthurs et al. 2018).

Within media studies, YouTube is examined in the context of challenges for journalism (Peer and Ksiazek 2011) and spaces for the development of participatory culture (Chau 2010). The service is also described as, for example, a young people’s medium (Lange 2016) or a “post-television” genre, offering forms of communication but also limiting traditional forms of broadcasting (Tolson 2010).

There is little interest in the use of YT by religious media (including Catholic ones). Their presence on the platform is assessed as part of general analyses of new media, of which YT is one of many examples (Wasiński and Szyszka 2013). The platform appears sporadically in studies focusing on particular social events, such as political elections or migration problems (Lesniczak 2016; Krzyżanowski 2020). If the platform appears in research related to the Catholic Church, it is within the perspective of communication strategies (Baraybar-Fernández et al. 2020) rather than in terms of marketing use.

Given the above observations, it can be confirmed that there are significant research gaps in the marketing use of YouTube by religious media (including Catholic weeklies), which this text has the potential to address.

4. Methodology

The overall aim of this text is to examine the marketing aspects of the implementation of Instagram (IG) and YouTube (YT) by selected Catholic magazines. As a result of the literature review, another objective can be added: to fill the existing academic gaps in the analysis of Catholic media activity on both platforms.

The following detailed research questions were asked in this text:

• RQ1: Are the IG and YT profiles of Catholic weeklies emanations of their media brands and the carriers (additional channels of distribution) of their content, or, apart from marketing, do they have additional functions of evangelising, apology or community-forming?
• RQ2: Is the content of IG and YT profiles original or copied from the content published in other distribution channels of these magazines (such as websites)?
• RQ3: Are the IG and YT profiles managed regularly, according to a certain specified schedule? How large is the post reach and is there a noticeable connection between their topics and the reactions of the audience? Do people who post comments accept the convention of the profile as a place of marketing the weekly’s content, or do they treat the profiles as a place of expressing religious feelings, evangelisation, apologetic-polemic activities?
• RQ4: Do the IG and YT profile administrators interact with those who comment? How do they react to the possible polemic, apologetic, evangelistic behaviours of their users?
• RQ5: Do the administrators use IG and YT features? What is the scale of using the profiles for self-promotional purposes?
• RQ6: Which types of posts (video, graphic, text, mixed) are the most common?
• RQ7: What are the topics of posts? How do the issues related to self-promotion compare against this background?
• RQ8: Are there any differences and similarities between the marketing methods of IG and YT used by the Catholic weeklies?
• RQ9: Is there a deliberate concept behind IG and YT management, or is it a chore that needs to be treated as a burden due to the lack of a clear concept and management strategy?

As with previous articles on Facebook and Twitter, again, no hypothesis is formulated due to the explorative character of the study.

The authors of the present study consistently rely on the following research methods, used in previous publications within the scope of the project: literature review regarding the marketing use of IG and YT by traditional media (including the Catholic ones; this has already been done, leading to the identification of academic gaps); case studies of the IG and YT profiles of the chosen Catholic weeklies; and a comparative, quantitative–qualitative content analysis of these profiles. The research sample included only those media that run profiles on the platforms in question; for IG, these are Gość Niedzielny (GN), Tygodnik Katolicki Niedziela (TKN) and Przewodnik Katolicki (PK), and for YT these are all the five magazines.

The case studies refer to the following components.

For IG: names of the profiles, bios (short descriptions of the profiles), numbers of posts, contact data, numbers of followers (users who follow the profiles), numbers of followings (profiles that are followed by the magazine’s profile), links, hashtags, connections to other social media profiles, IG Stories, the IG shop, the IGTV app, the visual presentations of the profiles (avatars, colours, emoticons).

For YT: dates of page creation, the names of the profiles, contact data, numbers of subscribers, numbers of the profile’s views, the profile’s descriptions, number of recommended channels, playlists, links, hashtags, connections to the magazine’s other social media profiles, visual presentation of the profiles.

The content analysis of IG and YT posts was implemented for two periods: 1–30 November 2019 and 1–30 November 2020 (for the research on FB and TT it was 18–24 November 2019). It was decided to extend the original research period for two reasons: firstly, an initial review of the IG and YT profiles of the selected media showed that between 18 and 24 November 2019 these media had low social media activity, resulting in a poor research sample for analysis. It was therefore extended to cover the whole of November 2019. Secondly, it was recognised that the data obtained may have been unreliable due to being outdated. Hence, it was decided to examine the content of the profiles from November 2020 and compare it with the same period of the previous year in order to answer the question of whether the media studied had changed their social media policies.

Both for IG and YT, the three most interesting elements for the authors were the content of the posts, the form of the posts (textual, visual, mixed, etc.) and the reactions of the users. The material was coded with the use of an extended categorisation key. This research tool was unified for all the social media studied within this project (each time only certain elements were added, depending on the nature of each portal). The first stage of coding involved the aggregation of data on the following variables: dates of posts, types of posts (text, video, mixed, etc.), the number and types of reactions (heart-shaped likes for IG, thumbs up/thumbs down for YT) and comments, the media’s reactions to these comments, using IG and YT functionalities (hashtags, emoticons, tagging/mentioning other accounts), the authorship and origin of the posts, the geographical origin of the posts and their belonging to thematic macrocategories.

Detailed data are presented in

Table 1. Assumptions for content analysis of IG and YT profiles—stage I.

Variables	Research Question	Description
Date of post	RQ3	Specifies the systematicity of profile management
Format of post (text, graphic, video, link, mixed, etc.)	RQ1, RQ5, RQ6	Specifies the relation (visual, textual) between social media profiles and media brands; specifies the proficiency in creating different types of posts
Number of “hearts”/thumbs up/thumbs down reactions to a post	RQ3	As above
Number of shares of a post	RQ3	As above
Number of comments on a post	RQ3	As above
Does the profile respond to comments?	RQ4	Specifies the quality of the interaction between administrators and those who comment
Use of hashtags (#)	RQ5	Specifies the proficiency in creating different types of social media posts
Use of emoticons	RQ5	As above
Use of other graphics (background, filters)	RQ5	As above
Use of tagging/mentioning otheraccounts	RQ1, RQ5	As above + specifies whether the medium tries to engage other accounts and, if yes, which ones
Post authorship (original/externalsource)	RQ1, RQ2	Specifies the range of posts prepared exclusively for IG/YT + posts linking to other components of the analysed media brands
Geographical references in posts	RQ1	Specifies the topics of the posts on the profiles (also the extent to which published posts are related to self-achievements when comparing to other topics)
Assignment to thematic macrocategories: religion, society, politics, economy, culture, sport, law, self-image, other (each post could belong to several thematic categories)	RQ7	As above
Date of post	RQ3	Specifies the systematicity of profile management
Format of post (text, graphic, video, link, mixed, etc.)	RQ1, RQ5, RQ6	Specifies the relation (visual, textual) between social media profiles and media brands; specifies the proficiency in creating different types of posts
Number of “hearts”/thumbs up/thumbs down reactions to a post	RQ3	As above

Source: personal collection.

(it shows close links between the research questions 1–7 and content analysis; research questions No. 8–9, due to their summarising nature, are answered in the conclusions).

At the second stage of coding, each of the thematic macrocategories was split into more specific categories, which meant that each selected social networking site was examined according to 61 thematic threads: religion (faith, homosexuality in the Catholic Church, Church events and celebrations, the Ten Commandments, history and important figures of the Catholic Church, moral scandals in the Catholic Church, other); society (upbringing/education, health, migration, LGBT/gender, euthanasia/abortion/contraception, patriotism, non-corporate media, moral scandals, history, other, and an additional category for 2020 was COVID-19); politics (elections, activities of the government/the ruling party, activities of the president, activities of the opposition, EU activities/relations with the EU, US activities/relations with the US, activities of other countries/relations with other countries); economy (state budget, financial condition of Poland, financial condition of the EU, condition of the global economy, the euro currency, social benefits, new taxes, other); culture (events, books, films, theatre, painting and sculpture, music, people of culture, cultural laws, other); sport (events, sports promotion, athletes, sports laws, other); law (legislation, CJEU, judges, Polish Constitution, criminal and civil cases, other) and the magazine’s own achievements (event—including patronage, market success, success/information about employees, next issue of the magazine, insert to the magazine, patronage granted, social campaign, link from the magazine’s own medium, other).

The codification process was implemented between 1 and 30 May 2021. To ensure the integrity of the research, the coded information was cross-checked by all the researchers and—in case of any doubts—unclear data were discussed, and the final code was agreed upon together (1–15 June 2021).

5. Results and Discussion

Detailed information on the selected weeklies was presented in the first text of the cycle. Here, the authors focus exclusively on the IG and YT profiles of the magazines.

5.1. Instagram Profiles of the Selected Catholic Weeklies—Case Studies

GN’s profile on IG is currently followed by 8740 users. Since its creation (first entry on 6 June 2019), the editorial team has posted 510 posts and followed 168 other profiles, mainly representing the Catholic religion (priests, nuns, archdioceses, religious orders, Church institutions and Catholic media—including their own regional editions), culture, art, and individuals openly declaring their faith.

The profile was given the title “goscniedzielny”, with the bio stating: “The most popular weekly opinion magazine in Poland. We have been at the centre of Church events since 1923.” The message is reinforced with the hashtag #goscniedzielny and a link to the magazine’s website. The profile picture of GN is a red logomark with white letters (the initials of the magazine’s title). The editorial team also runs IG Stories, using the feature of Highlight Stories, which have a red-and-white graphic design and are grouped in collections such as “Your reactions” (tagging of GN by readers), “Good Words” (quotations from the Bible, saints and clergymen, structured in a visually coherent way, with a reference to the website, frequent exposure of the magazine’s logo and using the #wordfortoday or #goscniedzielny hashtags), “Our Covers” (exposition of the magazine’s covers), “Going On” (announcements of cultural events), #saintstudents (a series of quotes from saints/the beatified in their student days) and “100/100 JPII” (a series of 100 thoughts for the centenary of the birth of John Paul II). It is worth noting, however, that the assignment of posts to certain sets of stories (for example, in “Going On” or “Our Covers”) is non-systematic and not updated. The analysed profile also uses IGTV, but it currently consists of only four materials, including two vlogs by a GN journalist (one is dedicated to the pandemic reality and the other to the magazine’s holiday series). GN does not use the shop option on IG or link to the magazine’s other social profiles.

The administrators of the TKN profile (name: “tygodnik.niedziela”) have published 187 posts (the first post from 6 February 2020), and so far have gained 1345 followers and 723 followings, including various institutions and people directly connected with the Church in Poland (such as clergy and representatives of Church authorities, foundations, dioceses), secular and Catholic media (including profiles of regional editions of the magazine), individuals and Polish pop culture stars declaring Catholicism. Again, no information is provided on the date the profile was created. Instead, the bio includes the following description: “FAITHful media since 1926: we are for you. We want to support you on your journey towards Truth and Love”, accompanied with emoticons representing a heart, a halo and praying hands. The editors included a link to the magazine’s website, and the magazine’s logomark features a white letter N on a blue background (a reference to the magazine’s logo). On this profile, too, the highlighted stories have been grouped into sets (with their icons not referring to the magazine, but to religiosity in the broadest sense). These are: “This Is Us” (a light, visually varied presentation of the magazine’s and the portal’s content, encouragement to buy the magazine and visit the website, celebration of anniversaries related to the publication of the magazine, promotion of inserts, references to the magazine’s profile on FB, intensive use of emoticons, # and tagging—both by TKN and internet users), “#Liturgy” (graphically enhanced quotes from the Bible, systematically enriched with #, graphics and a reference to FB) and “Videos” (four emoticon-enriched materials containing statements by a Polish clergyman). It is worth mentioning that only the last set is not systematically updated. The analysed profile does not contain references to other TKN social media (apart from short mentions in stories); it does not use options such as the Shop or IGTV, and there is no hashtag in the bio.

The profile of the third magazine, PK, is followed by 1673 users. In total, 547 posts have been published on it (the first one on 23 April 2016). The editors decided to follow 495 users: this group is not very different from the groups identified on the profiles of TN and TKN. It includes religious individuals, clergy, institutions of the Church, cultural, educational and social institutions, Catholic and secular media (commercial and public), and book publishers. The profile named “przewodnik.katolicki” links to the magazine’s website (not the main site, but the archive). The logomark refers to the magazine’s logo (white letters on a red background), and the highlighted posts have been organised into three sets so far: “PK25”, “PK23” and “PK22” (consisting of scans of the covers and articles from issues 25, 23 and 22 of the weekly). There is no description in the bio, nor are there references to other profiles on social media, IG Shop or IGTV.

A comparison of basic data derived from the conducted case study is presented in

Table 2. Comparison of the IG profiles—analysis results (as of 27 July 2021).

Basic Information	GN	TKN	PK
Date of page creation	Unavailable	Unavailable	Unavailable
Name of the profile	goscniedzielny	tygodnik.niedziela	przewodnik.katolicki
Description in bio	The most popular weekly opinion magazine in Poland. We have been at the centre of Church events since 1923	FAITHful media since 1926: we are for you. We want to support you on your journey towards Truth and Love	No description
Contact data	No	No	No
Number of posts	511	187	547
Number of followers	8743	1345	1672
Number of followings	168	723	495
Links in bio	Magazine’s website	Magazine’s website	Magazine’s website (archives)
Hashtags in bio	#goscniedzielny	No	No
Connection to other social media profiles	No	No	No
IG Stories	Yes (the sets of distinguished stories are rich, differentiated, dynamic, but some of them are updated unevenly)	Yes (the sets of distinguished stories are rich, differentiated, dynamic and most of them are updated evenly)	Yes (the sets of distinguished stories are modest, monotonous, and updated unevenly)
IGTV app	Yes (on a low level)	No	No
IG Shop	No	No	No
The visual presentation	Coherent with the magazine’s brand	Coherent with the magazine’s brand	Coherent with the magazine’s brand

Source: personal collection.

.

It can be concluded that none of the magazines fully exploit the platform’s potential regarding its systemic and functional features. Leaving aside the obvious fact that not all the magazines selected have a profile on IG, it should be stressed that a common mistake made by GN, TKN and PK is that they do not use the Shop option (and therefore do not commercialise their profiles). The media also fail to provide information on the date when the profiles were created, which in turn makes it difficult to assess whether their activity is effective. Contact details, such as the address or email, do not appear either (IG offers the possibility to include them outside the bio). The magazines do not use IGTV (only GN uses this option, but it is sporadic and at a basic level).

The strong points of the profiles are their visual coherence: the signets and graphic designations of the highlighted stories refer to the visual identification of the printed versions of the magazines. It also seems that the groups of users followed are not random and correspond to the ideological assumptions of the magazines. Finally, the magazines include links to their websites, trying to control the flow of recipients between the different platforms (on the other hand, they do not, apart from the stories, refer to other social media, even though each of them has, for example, a Facebook profile).

It can be said that GN’s profile is run the most efficiently. It has the highest number of followers, the hashtag is a direct reflection of the magazine’s title, and the description in the bio has strong promotional content, emphasising the magazine’s editorial policy (the Church), its publishing tradition (almost 100 years on the market) and its commercial success. The disadvantages of the profile are the modest use of IGTV, the underdeveloped network of followed profiles (which limits the chance to build an integrated community) and the lack of visual reinforcement of the bio (for example with emoticons).

The strength of the TKN profile is the description in the bio, which not only focuses on the publishing tradition (since 1926) and the religious theme (FAITHFUL media, emoticons of a halo and praying hands), but also emphasises the role and importance of the audience, trying to establish a closer relationship with them (“We are for you”, “We want to support you”). This aspiration can also be seen in the extensive community of users followed. On the other hand, the bio does not include a hashtag, and the title is not an accurate reflection of the weekly’s title. The profile would also gain greater visual coherence with the magazine if the menu of highlighted stories was also embedded in the visual identity of the magazine.

The IG run by PK is the most modest. Although the network of users followed by the profile is larger than that of GN, other features of the platform are practically unexploited. The bio contains only a link to the website (not the main one, but the archive one). An interesting idea is to group the stories according to the order of issues of the printed magazine; however, their content is hardly impressive in comparison to the stories of GN and TKN, which are abundant and visually attractive.

5.2. YouTube Profiles of the Selected Catholic Weeklies—Case Studies

The GN channel on YT is subscribed to by 2620 internet users and has been viewed 518,324 times since 25 September 2015. The profile links to the GN website, the Wiara.pl portal and Radio eM (religious media, belonging—like GN—to the Instytut Gość Media publishing house). The editorial office is available by e-mail. In the Home tab, next to the description of the video promoting the latest issue of the magazine, there is the #gośćniedzielny hashtag and references to the magazine’s profiles on FB, TT and IG (however, these are not plug-ins but links). In the same place, the editorial team asks for financial help, appealing: “If you want to support us, make a donation to the Gość Niedzielny Foundation”.

The channel offers 23 playlists, some of which refer directly to the magazine, its website or journalists (“Gospel with Commentary”, “In the Latest Gość Niedzielny”, “Going on in Gość Niedzielny”, “Gość Talks”, “GOSC.pl Talks”, etc.). Most of the playlists are not updated: the exception is “In the Latest Gość Niedzielny” (linking to the magazine’s publishing cycle) and “Gospel with Commentary” (embodying the magazine’s Catholic editorial policy plus exposure of brand ambassadors, as the Bible is discussed by the weekly’s journalists). Other playlists, which are not a complete series and which have a significant marketing potential, have not been updated since March–May 2021 (for example, “GOSC.pl Talks”, “Creative Gość”, “Gość in Dioceses”).

GN subscribes to six different channels, three of which are related to its own publisher (the other three are about sport, the life of a private person and the apostolate to the sick). The YT Community tab is used inefficiently, as it was last updated in April 2021.

On the visual side, GN is consistent with the overall concept of the brand: the graphics on the banner as well as in the profile picture are based on the magazine’s logo.

The TKN channel, established on 22 June 2007, has about 11,800 subscribers (and 5,286,004 views). Its official name is slightly different—on YT, TKN functions as “Studio TV Niedziela”, but in fact, it is an extension of the weekly. The description of the channel proves this—“Studio TV Niedziela operates (…) under Tygodnik Katolicki Niedziela. It promotes the weekly and reports on the most important social and religious events in Częstochowa, Jasna Góra and the Częstochowa archdiocese”. The profile transfers to the magazine’s website and provides the editorial e-mail address (there are no references to the magazine’s other social media, either as links or plug-ins). The profile does not use the opportunities offered by the “Community” tab (it is empty), but it subscribes to 19 other channels, 18 of which are related to religious topics and the Catholic faith.

The channel offers 59 playlists; all of them contain religious themes, which are either primary (“St Joseph”, “Sacraments”, “Rosary”, “Our Lady of Czestochowa”, “Bishops”, “Shrines”, “Pilgrimages”) or episodic (such as “Military”, “Health”, “Coronavirus”, “Competition”, “Monuments”, “Politicians”). Three of them are directly related to the magazine (“Talk”, “Niedziela Editorial Office”, “Niedziela Review”), but only one of them is systematically updated (“Niedziela Review”). Moreover, in 32 playlists, the last post was published between January and June 2021, and in 13 playlists, in July 2021. The last videos in the remaining playlists appear between 2017 and 2020.

The visual side of the profile refers to the magazine’s logo, although it does not duplicate it (the magazine’s logo is white text on a blue background, while the channel’s logo is reversed; the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary—known from the weekly’s logo—is in the channel’s profile picture).

The PK channel was created on 11 June 2012, and since then it has gathered 269 subscribers and 67,634 views. The profile is not connected to the weekly’s website or other social media, and has no email contact or description. The editorial team subscribes to 10 different channels, including 6 related to widely understood religion (media, publishing). Interestingly, PK—as the only one of the analysed magazines—subscribes to liberal media, presenting a critical attitude towards the Catholic Church in Poland. The content of the channel is grouped into three playlists, but none of them is updated (even “Issue Previews”). Visually, PK’s YT channel is relatively consistent with the brand’s visual identity: the profile picture shows a red-and-white logomark with the letters PK, but the banner exposes the image of Jesus, not referring to the weekly magazine.

The Tygodnik Rodzin Katolickich Źródło (TRKŹ) channel has been active since 5 September 2018, but so far it has accumulated only eight subscribers and 3079 views. This profile is not linked to other social media or the magazine’s website. It has no description or email address, either. TRKŹ does not subscribe to other channels, does not offer any playlists, and the last video posted on YT is from 2020. However, the full identity of the magazine has been retained: the upper part of the magazine cover (with the logo) appears on the banner and in the profile picture.

Idziemy (I) joined YT on 7 March 2012. Currently, it has 730 subscribers and 322,788 views. The channel links only to the weekly’s website and does not contain any profile description. It subscribes to two other religious profiles, with between 465 and 40,600 users. It offers only one playlist with previews of the magazine’s content—this was run systematically until March 2021, and after this time any YT activity of the magazine disappeared. The channel is fully based on the visual identity of the magazine. The banner features the magazine’s cover, while the profile photo displays the magazine’s logo.

A comparison of basic data derived from the conducted case study is presented in

Table 3. Comparison of the YT profiles—analysis results (as of 27 July 2021).

Basic Information	GN	TKN	PK	TRKŹ	I
Date of page creation	25 September 2015	22 June 2007	11 June 2012	5 September 2018	7 March 2012
Name of the profile	Gość Niedzielny	Studio TV NIEDZIELA	Przewodnik Katolicki	Tygodnik Rodzin Katolickich Źródło	Idziemy
Contact data	Yes (e-mail)	Yes (e-mail)	No	No	No
Number of subscribers	2620	11,800	269	8	730
Number of profile’s views	518,324	5,286,004	67,634	3079	322,788
Profile’s description	No	Yes	No	No	No
Number of subscribed channels	6	18	10	0	2
Playlists	23	59	3	0	1
Links	Yes (in the About and Home tabs, to the magazine’s website and other media of the publisher)	Yes (in the About tab, link to the magazine’s website)	No	No	Yes (link to the magazine’s website in the About tab)
Hashtags	Yes (in the Home tab)	No	No	No	No
Connection to other social media profiles	Yes (in the Home tab)	No	No	No	No
The visual presentation	Coherent with the magazine’s brand	Partly coherent with the magazine’s brand	Partly coherent with the magazine’s brand	Coherent with the magazine’s brand	Coherent with the magazine’s brand

Source: personal collection.

.

Despite the fact that all the analysed magazines have established their own YT channels, there is no professional social media marketing involved. As can be seen, the profiles of PK, TRKŹ and I, despite maintaining the visual coherence of the brand, practically do not work—not only are they not updated, but they almost completely fail to use the basic functions of the platform. They do not expose the e-mail addresses of the editorial teams, do not include any descriptions, do not arrange videos into playlists, and do not use links (apart from I, which does it to a very limited extent). The practical lack of editorial activity has resulted in a low number of subscribers (PK and I had the potential to develop their channels due to the number of views they had, but clearly could not convince their audiences to convert interest in their profiles into loyal consumption of YT content).

Compared to the competition, the GN and TKN channels stand out, although the subscription levels are not impressive compared to the number of views. In the case of GN, it is worth noting that it is the only one to expose its hashtag and to link to the magazine’s other social media (and the publisher’s other media), thus attempting to steer the flow of the audience between the various components of the media brand. GN uses its profile for promotional and distribution purposes, for example, through the regular management of playlists (exposure of the journalists, previews of upcoming issues, new Gospel content). Nevertheless, this area also contains aspects that would need improvement (such as developing playlists, the updating of which has been abandoned).

In the case of TKN, the channel is not fully coherent with the weekly (different name, changes in graphic design). Studio TV Niedziela is an example of the marketing inconsistency of the publisher. It seems to be a separate medium clearly based on the weekly. Unfortunately, due to its graphical and conceptual separation, it does not exploit the full potential of a synergic approach to its presence on social media platforms. The channel also lacks links to the magazine’s other social media or its own hashtag. On the other hand, its strength might be the playlists—their content is coherent with the concept of the weekly and significantly deepens some thematic threads related to religion. Unfortunately, there are some mistakes here as well: an oversupply of playlists, and a failure to update those that are typically promotional, that is, dedicated to the weekly (out of three, as indicated, only one is updated).

5.3. Instagram Profiles of the Selected Catholic Weeklies—Content Analysis

The content analysis of the Catholic media on Instagram covered two quarters (periods 10–12/2019 and 10–12/2020). The results for the analysis are presented in

Table 4. The number of posts on the Instagram profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies by day of the week (2019–2020).

2019	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Total
GN	7	5	7	9	9	5	4	46
PK	0	1	1	0	0	0	1	3
TKN	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
2020	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Total
GN	10	5	12	12	13	7	8	67
PK	0	0	1	1	0	1	4	7
TKN	4	5	8	3	6	1	0	27

Source: personal collection.

. Over the period studied, the number of posts seems to have increased (for GN and PK; TKN cannot be compared due to the absence of an account in 2019).

GN was the most active, especially on Thursdays and Fridays. In the case of GN, there was a significant increase in activity, as in 2019 the number of posts was 46 and in 2020 it was as high as 67. There is a similar trend in PK (in 2019—three posts, in 2020—seven posts), but given the small number of messages, it can be supposed that this is not a strategic activity.

PK did not post on Mondays and Fridays. Most posts in the analysed period appeared on Saturdays. Compared to GN, the publishing activity is much lower. In 2020 (October–December), TKN published 27 posts, most of which appeared on Wednesdays. No posts were published on Saturdays.

Each medium includes additional details in their posts, such as hashtags, emoticons, and tagging other accounts (

Table 5. Components of the post content on the Instagram profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies (2019–2020).

2019	Hashtags	Emoticons	Tagging	Total Number of Elements	Total Number of Posts
GN	46	40	17	103	46
PK	2	1	1	4	3
TKN	-	-	-	-	-
2020	Hashtags	Emoticons	Tagging	Total Number of Elements	Total Number of Posts
GN	67	67	18	152	67
PK	7	2	5	14	7
TKN	27	26	16	69	27

Source: personal collection.

). The use of these elements, compared to 2019, increased in the following year (for GN, a total increase from 103 to 152; PK from 3 to 7; TKN from 0 to 27). In most publications, all the accounts use several forms in a single post, combining hashtags with emoticons and tags. PK and TKN use tags more often (compared to the number of posts published) than GN. The fact that there is so little use of hashtags, emoticons and tags on Instagram may be surprising, since such tools are characteristic of this social medium and provide an opportunity for significant audience engagement.

Considering the form of the post, the most frequently used model consists of an image supplemented with text. This form dominated in both quarters studied. All the analysed media recorded a clear upward trend—in the case of GN, the image with text form was applied in 82.61% of the posts in 2019, and this increased to 92.54% in 2020. As for PK, there was an increase from 66.67% in 2019 to 85.71% in 2020. TKN, which started its activity on Instagram in 2020, used the image with text format in 100% of its posts. Examples of post content are given beow.

• GN:
  Join the October YOU ARE SURROUNDED campaign 1. Go to gosc.pl 2. Click on the banner of our campaign 3. Find the JOIN button and pick a priest 4. Keep the chosen priest in mind during the Rosary. Photo: Jakub Szymczuk #goscniedzielny #you are surrounded #prayer #prayerforpriests #church #faith #rosary #october #jesusitrustinyou.
  What do St. John Paul II and Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati have in common? Of course: Photo: Roman Koszowski #goscniedzielny #piergiorgiofrassati #frassatirace #mountainvibes #lovemountains #tatra #church #faith #hope #love.
  It is not true that the devil is in the details. It is God who is in the details. The biggest secrets of the self-portrait of Our Lady of Guadalupe are presented by Marcin Jakimowicz in the latest Gość. Photo: Roman Koszowski #goscniedzielny #weekly #ireadgość #faith #mary #motherofgod #church #catholic #faith #guadalupe #mexico.
  My hands do not disgust God strong texts on gosc.pl by Aleksander Bańka and Fr. Paweł Koniarek OP. Photo: Henryk Przondziono #goscniedzielny #god #faith #church #catholic #godisgood #jesuslives.
• PK:
  Have you seen our latest issue yet? You will find a supplement on what integral ecology is, whether a Catholic should be an ecologist and what will be discussed at the synod. #amazonsynod #ecology #ecopaper #kapron #stanisławjaromi.
  Do you know Dr Wanda Błeńska? If not, hurry up and get our latest issue! Her beatification process is about to begin (on 18 October). She was really an ordinary but extraordinary woman! #wandabłeńska #beatification #newissue #doctor #Dokta #motheroflepers #missionary.
  Jesus is the light of the world, he is the light of the soul that dispels the darkness of hostility and opens the space for forgiveness—Pope Francis. May Christmas be a time of good meetings and peace, may it lead us to reconciliation. With best wishes from the whole editorial team of Przewodnik Katolicki Thank you for being with us!
  Thank you very much for the nomination; congratulations to the winners and others nominated! Photo: FDNT #totustuusaward #workofthenewmillenium #honourablementionforus.
• TKN:
  Today we are remembering Blessed Fr. Jerzy Popiełuszko. Fr. Jerzy, pray for us! #popiełuszko #remembrance #jerzypopiełuszko #faith #church.
  “Christianity is not just about avoiding sin. There is a second step, which is the question of what we have done with our grace, how much heaven we have brought into our lives.” Roman Bielecki OP—Dwa grosze. O Bogu bliskim/we already have it and RECOMMEND it! #patronage #niedziela @wydawnictwowdrodze @wdrodze_monthly @dominicans #book #faith #spirituality #God #Catholic #book #instabook #bookstagram #recommend.
  #Church #loveChurch More in the latest Niedziela Available at newsagents and in parishes #niedziela #faith #God #Catholic #weekly #spirituality.
  Christmas issue of Niedziela available at newsagents and in parishes!

GN and PK also used an image gallery and text (respectively, 12 and 2 posts in this form combined in both quarters studied, which, in relation to all posts, is 10.62% for GN and 20% for PK). In one instance, GN also published a video and text (0.88%). At the same time, in none of the analysed posts were other forms used, such as image or image gallery only, video only, video and images, or video and images supplemented with text.

Posts by GN and TKN refer mainly to Poland, followed by posts that do not indicate the place. These are the most frequent in PK (in second place is posts about Poland). GN and TK also refer to topics related to Europe (such as Italy, Romania, Croatia, the United Kingdom, the Vatican); the only weekly to mention non-European countries (such as Mexico, Israel, Vietnam, Panama, Uruguay) and international relations is GN. When analysing the individual quarters year-on-year, one can see an increase in the number of GN posts with a Polish theme (from 27 in 2019 to 42 in 2020), but at the same time, there was an increase in the number of posts with no indication (from 8 in 2019 to 19 in 2020).

The thematic scope of the posts is mainly religion and self-promotion (

Table 6. Topics of posts on the Instagram profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies (2019–2020).

2019	Religion	Society	Politics	Economy	Culture	Sport	Law	Self-Promotion	Other
GN	31	7	2	0	6	0	0	33	3
PK	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	3	1
TKN	-	-	-	-	-	-			-
2020	Religion	Society	Politics	Economy	Culture	Sport	Law	Self-Promotion	Other
GN	67	22	0	1	9	0	0	60	1
PK	4	0	0	0	0	0	0	7	1
TKN	15	3	0	0	2	0	0	23	3

Source: personal collection.

). GN also addresses social and culture-related issues, as well as politics and the economy. In TKN, two posts related to culture appeared. None of the analysed media featured posts thematically referring to sports or law.

When dealing in detail with the self-promotion aspect, it can be observed that most posts are related to the promotion of the current or next issue, and there are links to the in-house media, most often to articles that are announced and published on the website. GN and TKN also published posts about patronage granted or the promotion of their own social campaigns. If an insert appeared in the issue, all the channels mentioned it in their posts. In the analysed period, no posts about the achievements of their own employees were noted.

The published materials mainly depicted people (among those known as Catholic Church people: Pope Francis, Pope John Paul II, Cardinal Macharski, Father Popiełuszko) and other components (such as gadgets, artefacts, places). A particularly high percentage of graphic material depicting only a person/people or a person/people together with other components was found in GN. There were also posts showing covers and excerpts from articles. TKN was the only one to publish more posts showing other components than posts showing people (12 and 10, respectively).

In PK and TKN, all the analysed posts have been visibly edited (for example, filters or texts overlaid on the image, specially prepared graphics). In the case of GN, unedited images predominate.

There was a noticeable increase in audience response to the published posts in 2020 (for TKN only, there is no comparison). A particularly significant increase occurred in GN, with a total of 4242 heart reactions (likes for post content) in 2019, and as many as 15,848 in 2020. A slightly smaller, but also significant, increase occurred in PK: from 140 in 2019 to 274 in 2020.

The activity of individual profiles in the area of commenting on or liking posts also increased. The highest number of reactions (responses or hearts) to users’ comments was posted by GN (under a total of 55 posts). Much lower activity was observed in the cases of PK (a total of three in the two quarters) and TKN (nine).

5.4. YouTube Profiles of the Selected Catholic Weeklies—Content Analysis

The analysis of the content of the Catholic media on YouTube covered two quarters (periods 10–12/2019 and 10–12/2020). Of the five weeklies, only three are present on YT: GN, TRKŹ and TKN (

Table 7. The number of posts on the YouTube profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies by day of the week (2019–2020).

2019	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Total
GN	12	16	19	19	16	11	4	97
TRKŹ	0	0	11	1	0	0	0	12
TKN	23	12	20	19	19	6	4	103
2020	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat	Sun	Total
GN	15	17	26	19	14	10	0	101
TRKŹ	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	1
TKN	10	5	11	14	14	3	0	57

Source: personal collection.

).

GN did not exhibit a large increase in the content published (the highest activity of the three present: 198 videos in total), with the number of videos maintained at a similar level in both quarters studied (97 videos appeared in 2019, and 101 in 2020). Very little content was published at the weekend (25 total, with 15 videos in 2019 and 10 in 2020), particularly on Sundays (only 4 videos in total, all in 2019). In 2020, especially on Wednesdays and Thursdays, there were several publications a day (two to three videos).

TKN is second in terms of publishing activity (158 videos in total). TRKŹ showed a decrease in activity in 2020 (2019: 103 videos; 2020: only 57).

There is a trend of more activity on weekdays (144 posts in both quarters analysed) than at weekends (only 14 posts in 2019–2020). Although the Monday–Friday time, generally assumed as the working part of the week, showed much higher activity, one may wonder about Tuesday, which showed a decreasing trend in both quarters (in 2019: 12 videos; in 2020: only 5). Additionally, as with GN, there were several publications in one day.

The lowest activity was carried out by TRKŹ, which posted a total of 13 videos (2019—12 videos, and 1 in 2020). With such an insignificant level of activity, it is difficult to analyse publishing patterns; it appears more likely to be a case of “testing” YT as a channel supporting the medium’s activities. Such a considerable drop in activity in 2020 may even indicate that the YT channel has been recognised as a useless medium for content distribution.

As we can see in

Table 8. Components in the post content on the Instagram profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies (2019–2020).

2019	Hashtags	Emoticons	Tagging	Total Number of Elements	Total Number of Posts
GN	6	0	4	10	97
TRKŹ	0	0	12	12	12
TKN	0	0	0	0	103
2020	Hashtags	Emoticons	Tagging	Total Number of Elements	Total Number of Posts
GN	10	0	1	11	101
TRKŹ	0	0	1	1	1
TKN	5	0	0	5	57

Source: personal collection.

, the content does not contain a large number of additional elements, such as hashtags (in GN, during the study period, there were a total of 16 of them, in TKN—5, and none in TRKŹ) or tagging (in TRKŹ—13, in GN—5, and none in TKN). Tagging, or basically mentioning other media, occurred mainly on the TRKŹ profile (in 2019—12, and in 2020—1). These are the media on which the review of the issue is broadcast. Emoticons were not used at all in the study period, which may be surprising, since in mediated communication they are often a form of complementing the verbal layer and can indicate the context of the utterance.

The text components always consisted of a title and, for the most part, a description. There was a characteristic lack of indications of specific people and the authors of videos. If there were other elements, these were mainly indications of places (pinned to the content).

Geographical coverage, if indicated, primarily covered Poland (88.94% of all three media in the study period). Much less coverage was given to Europe (4.02% of the indications) and the world (7.04%). This was particularly visible on the TKN profile, where 93.62% of the posts referred to Poland, and TRKŹ, where such a situation was observed for 61.9% of the posts. GN mainly publishes content without indicating a specific place.

The topics of the video materials were mainly related to religion and self-promotion (the medium’s own achievements and activities), as presented in

Table 9. Topics of posts on the YouTube profiles of the selected Catholic weeklies (2019–2020).

2019	Religion	Society	Politics	Economy	Culture	Sport	Law	Self-Promotion	Other
GN	95	41	3	1	6	0	0	89	6
TRKŹ	12	8	2	2	2	1	0	12	2
TKN	92	48	9	3	13	4	0	49	6
2020	Religion	Society	Politics	Economy	Culture	Sport	Law	Self-Promotion	Other
GN	101	42	1	3	4	1	0	101	1
TRKŹ	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	0
TKN	54	33	4	0	14	0	0	32	2

Source: personal collection.

.

The religious content of each medium was respectively, TKN—40.22%, GN—39.60%, and TRKŹ—32.23%. In terms of self-promotional content, GN is the leader (38.39% of all the content), followed by TRKŹ (30.23%) and TKN (22.31%). With the focus on self-promotion, it can be seen that a large proportion of posts were about the current or next issue (most in TRKŹ), and the content included links to the weeklies’ own media (mostly in GN, while in TRKŹ, no links to its own media were recorded in the period studied). TRKŹ’s materials were its own materials created with the intention of publishing them in other media (TV Trwam and Radio Maryja). They are also available on its own YT channel. Information on market achievements did not appear; it was only in GN that the success of its employees was reported. TKN also published information on subscriptions and announcements of changes in the layout.

Society was also a large part of the content. In the case of TKN, it accounted for more than a fifth of all content (22.31%), while slightly less is noted for TRKŹ (18.6%) and GN (16.77%). There were also videos referring to culture, politics, economy and sport, while legal aspects were not covered at all.

Each video was edited, with subtitles and graphical elements applied. It is worth noting that from 2020 onwards, subtitles are visible in most videos published by GN. The videos mainly show people (employees, journalists, clergymen, people involved in culture and ordinary people) and other elements such as artefacts, gadgets, places; magazine covers and excerpts from articles are also visible. Graphic materials depicting a person together with other elements dominated in GN (78.83%) and TKN (67.29%), while magazine covers and article excerpts were most frequently observed in TRKŹ (33.33%).

Audience reactions were predominantly positive. However, the profiles did not respond to comments or did so very rarely (only in the case of GN—a reaction under three posts during the two quarters studied).

The vast majority of posts can be commented on. In 2019, TKN disabled the commenting option under 31 videos, and GN in 2020 under 10 publications. The question of the audience commenting on posts is also interesting. The total numbers of commented posts for GN were 99, 0 for TRKŹ, and 135 for TKN. When analysing the individual quarters, it was noted that for GN content, the number of posts commented on by the audience doubled (in 2019—17; in 2020—38), while for TKN it decreased (in 2019—25; in 2020—18).

When analysing the authorship, 100% of the posts in the examined period for GN and TKN were qualified as original posts created specifically with the intention of publishing them on YT. The TRKŹ posts were qualified as mixed: original and shared. The analysed media did not publish any posts that could be described as shared.

The study also analysed the length of the videos shared, counting it as total time in seconds. With this particular factor—total length—in mind, TKN achieved the highest rate, as it published posts with a total duration of 68,049 s, followed by GN with a total duration of 43,922 s, and finally TRKŹ with 3809 s. The analysis of the duration of content published in each quarter is interesting. In the case of GN, there was a significant increase, as the duration of the materials posted in 2019 was 23.44% (relative to the period under study), while in 2020 it was as high as 76.56%. The opposite trend was observed for TRKŹ, where the total duration of materials published in 2019 was 93.54% (in 2020—6.46%). A comparable total time of posted content was noted for TKN, with 51.32% of the time of published content in 2019 (relative to the period under study) and 46.68% in 2020.

6. Conclusions

The aim of this article was to examine how Catholic weeklies in Poland use the marketing potential of the Instagram and YouTube social media sites.

The analyses carried out indicate that out of the five selected magazines, two do not have accounts on Instagram. GN, TKN and PK have accounts, but none of the weeklies makes full use of the platform’s functionalities. What is common here is the fact that they do not use the Shop function, and therefore do not commercialise their profiles. In addition, the media do not provide all the details, such as their emails or addresses (and it is worth noting that IG offers the possibility to include this information outside the bio). PK basically does not offer any description of its profile. Of the media analysed, only GN occasionally uses the option to publish content on IGTV, and the other editors do not use this option (RQ5).

It can be concluded that the weeklies fulfil their brand potential quite well in their basic scope: they maintain visual coherence and refer to the visual identification of each printed magazine. Links to websites are also visible, encouraging users to read articles in digital formats or visit the main website of a given magazine. This means that the publishers try to control the flow of audience attention between different platforms. Apart from link placement, other self-promotional activities are also noticeable: the promotion of new issues and inserts, events organised or patronised by a given weekly, social campaigns and books released by the publishers. Additionally, the thematic selection of the published content (which, apart from self-promotion, is mainly religious) and the tagging of the profiles of people or entities associated with faith maintain the integrity of the brand. It can therefore be concluded that the image potential in relation to the published content was used quite well (RQ1, RQ4, RQ7), despite the fact that the IG posts do not contain references to other in-house social media, such as Facebook (this is only visible in stories).

The form of the published posts is predominantly image with text, with occasional photo galleries with text or video (RQ6). The content on the analysed profiles is original, but a clear and well thought-out publication schedule is not apparent (although it should be emphasised that GN in particular regularly publishes announcements of new issues or promotes current issues by encouraging the reader to read the articles. Similar posts also appeared on the profiles of PK and TKN). Reactions of the profiles to the audience comments are rare, and most often take the form of hearts rather than a direct written response. The highest number of comments under the posts and reactions can be seen on the GN profile, but this is probably due to the intense publishing activity compared to the other weeklies. One can also see an increase in the number of likes and comments in 2020 compared to 2019. The vast majority of the commenting users treat the profile as a place for expressing their religious feelings and opinions on the given topic. On the other hand, there is no reason to believe that the concept of the profile as a marketing space is not acceptable for the users (RQ2, RQ3, RQ4).

All the weeklies have YouTube profiles; however, three of them (PK, TRKŹ and I), despite maintaining a consistent visual brand, are practically inactive. The content is not updated and the marketing potential of the platform is not used. The analysed profiles do not make use of all the technical possibilities offered by YouTube; for example, there were only a few hashtags under videos (GN—16, TKN—5). The published content always has a title and, in most cases, a description as well. However, there is a characteristic lack of references to specific people, such as the authors of the videos.

Of the three channels, GN stands out the most because it is the only one to expose its hashtag and link to the magazine’s other social media (and the publisher’s other media), thus attempting to steer the flow of audience between the different components of the media brand. It also uses its profile for promotional and distribution purposes, for example, by the systematic management of playlists (the weekly’s journalists appear, and there are previews of future issues and new content on the Gospel). TKN is a good example of image inconsistency. The channel is called Studio TV Niedziela and looks like a separate medium, which is clearly based on a weekly magazine. There are playlists, but unfortunately, some of them are not updated, including those related to self-promotion (RQ1, RQ5, RQ6).

The media were active on YT mainly on weekdays, with less activity at weekends. GN and TKN sometimes published several videos in one day. TRKŹ was the least active in publishing. In 2020, a significant decrease in engagement was recorded, which may indicate that this channel of content distribution has been recognised as useless.

As regards the authorship of the posts, all the content of GN and TKN was classified as original posts created specifically for publication on YT. The content published by TRKŹ was identified as mixed posts—original and shared. There were no posts that could be classified as shared ones.

The profiles do not usually respond to audience comments, or do so very rarely. The videos could be commented on, although in 2019 TKN disabled this option under 31 posts, and GN did so in 2020 under 10 posts. Audience reactions to the published content are largely positive, and usually relate to the experiences and emotions of the commenters rather than to the marketing efforts of the profiles (RQ2, RQ3). The vast majority of the publications are self-promotional: the media eagerly refer to their activities, so the brand image is consistently enhanced. There are also religious and social themes, referring to lifestyle, worldview questions and other issues (RQ7).

The question is whether and how the pandemic effect became apparent in the periods studied. Admittedly, the two quarters analysed are not enough to determine a trend conclusively, but the year 2020 is clearly distinguishable from 2019 in the case of IG. The number of IG posts for GN and PK (TKN data cannot be compared, as the profile did not yet exist in 2019) increased by around 50% in 2020 compared to 2019. A similar trend was observed in content elements of the posts (hashtags, emoticons, tags)—for GN, there was an increase of approximately 50%, while PK recorded a 2.5-fold increase. There was also a characteristic growth in the number of posts with religious, cultural, social and self-promotional themes. It can be presumed that the significant activation in 2020 (the fourth quarter) was associated with a change in the way audiences functioned, which may have been reflected in the marketing policy of the media (which means that, due to restrictions on stationary activities, online activity was probably increased). A similar trend was not detected for YT. On the contrary, there has been a slowdown or a significant drop in activity (GN and TKN).

However, when comparing the activities of the weeklies on IG and YT, there is a greater action awareness and publishing activity on IG.

It is worth noting that for all the profiles analysed, GN performs best on both platforms. The published content looks the most professional, especially on YT, for example, in terms of video editing, ways of recording material, and the use of additional elements such as texts, graphics and animations.

As regards TKN, the situation is comparable, although its activities on YT are not as extensive and consistent as those of GN. Both IG and YT content is mostly self-promotional and religious, with the promotion of the magazine’s own activities, patronage, social campaigns and new issues of paper editions. For both platforms, again, not all available technical options are used. Moreover, some profiles, especially on YT, are not updated, or there is a long time gap between publications. There is also a lack of fully thought-out concepts and strategies (RQ8, RQ9).

Considering the above findings, it can be concluded that some Catholic weekly newspapers manage their IG and YT accounts in a moderately professional way (RQ8, RQ9). They use their visual and distribution potential and some functions of the platforms (linking, hashtags, tagging) quite efficiently. On the other hand, they do not apply a regular and purposeful self-promotion strategy, do not use important mechanisms of the platforms, such as the Shop and IGTV (on IG), and they do not consistently build a profile or create playlists on YT.

The study offers several theoretical and practical implications. In the first area, by developing a very specialised theory (on the marketing aspects of the use of IG and YT by Catholic media), it fills in the observed research gaps. In the second area, the research identifies weaknesses in the conducted social media activities, providing a set of practical recommendations to help the publishers introduce necessary changes to their activity on social media platforms.

The article also has some limitations. These are mainly the limited research sample (which was enriched by analysing activities in 2020) and the focus on weeklies. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that the obtained data made it possible to diagnose and evaluate the marketing activity of Catholic publishers. On this basis (as a result of the conceptualisation of the research process, including the research threads and categories), it is worth undertaking further research, extending both the number of posts and the types of media analysed (such as the radio, television, and Catholic portals).