Web Rhetoric: Intentionality and textuality on the web pages of insurance and reinsurance companies

Textual agency in organizations originates form the intention to frame minds and stimulate emotions in order to drive the recipients of signals to certain modes of thought and action. This aspect discussed by the organizational theorist François Cooren, implies intraorganizational rhetoric. However, business organizations do not solely rely on internal rhetoric. In order to create new market dynamics, or in order to exploit the existing ones, there is a need for developing external rhetoric. Firms must send signals to the customers (or clients), and mobilize their various business partners (from shareholders and other creditors to the suppliers and providers which constitute their specific inter-organizational environment). There was always a rhetorical aspect in the interconnection between businesses and the public. Advertisement and various verbal and visual signs made this apparent.