Social medias användningsområde har under de senaste åren ökat. Från att till enbörjan användas av privatpersoner till att nu även vara en del av flertalet företag.Tekniken kan skapa nya tillfällen att synas, skapa kundrelationer samt kommunikationsmöjligheter. Det finns olika syften med att använda social mediamen värdet kommer inte från plattformen i sig utan från hur den används. För attett företag ska använda social media kan det finnas anledning att acceptera och varamedvetna om att kritik riktat till företaget offentliggörs. Forskning pekar på attföretag förväntas bemöta åsikter, uppfattningar och upplevelser från konsumenter.Dock saknas tydlig vetskap om hur eller på vilket sätt. Vi har genom en kvalitativstudie, intervjuat representanter från olika företag gällande deras sätt att bedrivakritikhantering på social media. Studien resulterade i tre övergripande teman medunderliggande exempel som beskriver hur företag hanterar kritik på social media. / The use of social media has increased in recent years. Individuals used it first, andnow it has become a part of multiple companies. Technology can create newopportunities for companies to show them self publicly, create customer relations aswell as communication opportunities. The purposes of using social media arevarious, but the value it brings is not from the platform itself, but from the ways it isbeing used. In order for a company to use social media, there may be reason toaccept and be aware of that criticism addressed to the company will be public.Research indicates that companies are expected to respond to opinions, perceptionsand experiences from customers. However, clear knowledge of how or in what wayis missing. We have through a qualitative study, interviewed representatives fromvarious companies regarding their way of conducting criticism management onsocial media. The study resulted in three overarching themes with underlyingexamples illustrating how companies manage criticism on social media.

This study aims to investigate how companies formulate external communication in social media and sustainability reports when dealing with public criticism linked to sustainable development, in a society where information spreads quickly via social media and thus risk leading to loss of legitimacy and damaged reputation. The study is based on a qualitative method with quantitative elements. A qualitative directed content analysis has been conducted on six different companies' Twitter and Facebook pages as well as sustainability reports, where data has been interpreted, categorized and analyzed based on Image Repair Theory's communication strategies. A selection was made among 14 295 words in social media and 80 234 words in sustainability reports to find out which strategies the companies used in their crisis management, which strategies were most common in each medium and why. The results show that strategies such as corrective action and mortification were equally common in both channels. In social media, it was also common for companies to formulate posts using strategies such as defeasibility and sympathy, while the content of sustainability reports often could be linked to strategies such as information, bolstering and transcendence. The study shows that companies' choice of communication strategies is based on a combination of the type of recipient and the type of channel used. A combination of one-way and two-way communication is thus important for the company to be able to meet the specific needs of both of these factors. Furthermore, the study shows that Image Repair Theory could be expanded with more strategies such as sympathy and information, as these were common in all companies' crisis management. Finally, the study shows that the monologic or dialogic characteristics of a medium have a major impact on how communication is formulated in response to public criticism.