Social media influencers (SMIs) are increasingly being approached by brands to promote products, a practice commonly called influencer marketing. SMIs can take advantage of their influence to obtain ...personal rewards by entering into partnerships with brands. However, SMI followers value influencers' intrinsic motivations and noncommercial orientation. Thus, SMI–brand collaborations may result in tensions for SMIs' authenticity management. This research applies a qualitative approach based on SMI–brand partnership observations, SMI interviews, and a comparison of these data sources. Two authenticity management strategies emerged from the analysis: passionate and transparent authenticity. We articulate these strategies to propose a four-path framework that provides the first conceptualization of how SMIs can manage authenticity for themselves to resolve the tensions created by brand encroachment into their content. The results offer guidance for both SMIs and marketers on how to best partner with each other to build win–win relationships while protecting SMIs' authenticity.
Virtual influencers (VI) are fictional entities operated by third parties (freelance creators, digital agencies, or brands). Despite their increasing popularity, the way people approach these often ...human-looking yet entirely fictitious creations, and whether they view them as ‘authentic’, remains unclear. Existing conceptualizations of authenticity in the VI literature do not offer sufficient depth and richness to understand this complex phenomenon. Building on the Entity-Referent Correspondence Framework of Authenticity, this paper aims to explore different manifestations of authenticity in the context of VIs. We draw on interviews with consumers (64) and industry experts (11) to unveil different perspectives. Our findings demonstrate how the three types of authenticity—true-to-ideal (TTI), true-to-fact (TTF) and true-to-self (TTS)—apply to and manifest in a virtual influencer context. We conclude with theoretical contributions, with particular attention to the uncanny valley theory, managerial recommendations, and areas for future research.
Combining trends in style and form with religious considerations, modest fashion has grown worldwide despite a series of intense controversies in Western countries from the mid-2010s. Building on the ...sociology of scandal, we identify three rhetorical strategies that structure nontarget majority consumers' responses to modest fashion, i.e. the place of religion in modern society, the defence of freedom, and the search for a harmonious society. Interestingly, the strategies of both the detractors and promoters of modest fashion appear to be built upon common values and norms, though at a collective vs. an individual level, respectively. This discursive dynamic allows the former to moralise their attack while neutralising the defence of the latter, thereby setting the public agenda, and leading to Muslims' marketplace exclusion.
Considering that midpoints on linear scales wrongly aggregates indifferent, uncertain and ambivalent responses, this research investigates the ability of the Evaluative Space Grid (ESG) to ...disentangle uncertainty from manifest ambivalence. Uncovering situations in which respondents hold simultaneous and conflicting but certain evaluations, manifest ambivalence reveals of utmost significance for market researchers. Using a mixed approach, both qualitative and quantitative, this research confirms that the ESG isolates manifest ambivalence in its upper-right zone, and provides implications for practitioners involved in service quality and consumer satisfaction measurement.
Online shopping development went hand in hand with online self-administered customer satisfaction evaluation requirement. However, the specific context of online rating, without any face-to-face ...clarification, raises the question of accuracy and appropriateness of the chosen tool for respondents. To address this issue, this research proposes the new concept of “response fluency” to qualify the ease with which a question is processed. Applied to the Evaluative Space Grid,a new grid that has been proposed in psychology to measure overall evaluation, this research shows how response fluency mediates the influence of measurement tool design on response certainty. More specifically, it tests the effects of two alternative tool design formats (i.e., a reduction of the grid’s response cell number and the display of labels to the response cells) in terms of response fluency and certainty. Using a between-subjects experiment, we show that the display of labels in the cells actually increases response fluency and, in turn, response certainty. By contrast, reducing the response cell number does not produce any effect. We contend that well-designed measurement tools can make the process of responding more fluent and increase respondents’ subjective confidence in their capability of conveying their true evaluations. In the end, this work advocates for new research to design measurement tools likely to engage respondents when answering surveys and prevent dropout rates, which is especially challenging within self-administered electronic settings.
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to evaluate a bidimensional tool to measure overall service satisfaction: the evaluative space grid (GRID scale). The GRID scale provides a common measure for ...both positivity and negativity through 25 grid cells. The authors propose to use the GRID scale as an integrated measure of both satisfaction and dissatisfaction to capture mixed reactions or ambivalence.
Design/methodology/approach
Within a cross-sectional between-subjects survey design, this study compares overall satisfaction with bank services as measured on the GRID scale versus a traditional semantic differential (SD) scale.
Findings
The results show that the GRID scale performs as well as the SD scale with respect to different criteria, such as reliability and discriminant, convergent, nomological and predictive validity. However, it allows to measure separately indifference and ambivalence.
Practical implications
Such a distinction assists decision-makers with recommendations on different strategies not only to create customer loyalty based on satisfaction but also to encourage them to think how to decrease the levels of dissatisfaction and ambivalence.
Originality/value
The GRID scale would address survey needs of every business suffering from average performances. This tool provides them better in-depth overall satisfaction information, especially regarding the “middle-ground” customers.
Findings of Moulard et al's study should help "social media influencers" (SMIs) manage their authenticity under threat as it suggest that they can either use Passion or Information. SMIs should be ...cautious to report the reality of the partnership and the product in their "word-of-mouth marketing" (WOMM) contents. Similarly, they should keep producing noncommercial messages about brands they are really passionate about. In the same vein, managers should be attentive to let SMIs selects products in order to increase enthusiasm for the brand and minimize constraints to give room for personalized communication aligned with SMFs style and opinions.
La littérature en méthodologie pointe un important problème lié à l’utilisation des différentiels sémantiques pour mesurer les évaluations globales des individus. Au centre de ces continua bipolaires ...opposant une paire d’adjectifs antagonistes, sont en effet agrégées de manière artificielle et fâcheuse deux types d’évaluations : les réactions indifférentes et les réactions ambivalentes. Or, la distinction entre ces deux types d’évaluation est un enjeu dans la mesure où elles recouvrent des réalités différentes. En effet, l’indifférence correspond à l’absence de réaction positive ou négative, tandis que l’ambivalence décrit une évaluation composée à la fois de réactions positives et négatives. Cette recherche démontre l’intérêt d’utiliser un nouvel outil de mesure issu de recherches en psychologie, l’Evaluative Space Grid (Larsen & al., 2009), pour saisir la part d’ambivalence contenue dans les évaluations globales de consommateurs. A l’aide d’un design mixte comportant cinq études empiriques, nous montrons que l’Evaluative Space Grid présente des propriétés psychométriques aussi bonnes que le différentiel sémantique tout en permettant de différencier les réactions indifférentes des réactions ambivalentes, ce que ne peut pas faire un différentiel sémantique. Ce travail de recherche constitue donc une contribution méthodologique importante qui devrait intéresser chercheurs et praticiens.
Literature on methodology reveals a serious problem related to the use of semantic differential scales to measure individuals’ global evaluations. Two types of evaluations are incorporated—in an artificial and unsuitable way—into these bipolar continuums that contain two opposing adjectives: indifferent reactions and ambivalent reactions. The distinction between these two types of evaluation is significant because they reflect different realities. While indifference corresponds to an absence of positive or negative reactions, an ambivalent evaluation is composed of both positive and negative reactions. This research demonstrates the advantages of using a new measurement tool, the Evaluative Space Grid (Larsen & al., 2009), developed in psychology research; this tool is able to capture the ambivalent component in consumers’ global evaluations. Using a mixed design method comprising five empirical studies, we demonstrate that the Evaluative Space Grid has psychometric properties that match those of semantic differential scales; however, in contrast to semantic differential scales, the ESG is capable of differentiating between indifferent reactions and ambivalent reactions. This research therefore constitutes a major methodological contribution that will be of interest to both researchers and practitioners.
Literature points out a problem related to the semantic differential scales to measure global reactions of individuals. Three different types of evaluations that cover different realities could be ...rated at the mid-point: ambivalence, indifference and uncertainty. With two empirical studies, this research demonstrates interest of introducing measurement tool from psychology, the Evaluative Space Grid that helps to distinguish the previous types of evaluations. This work provides a methodological contribution by proposing a tool that captures consumers' ambivalent reactions. From a managerial point of view, such a tool helps to distinguish evaluative responses associated with various behaviors.
Considering that midpoints on linear scales wrongly aggregates indifferent, uncertain and ambivalent responses, this research investigates the ability of the Evaluative Space Grid (ESG) to ...disentangle uncertainty from manifest ambivalence. Uncovering situations in which respondents hold simultaneous and conflicting but certain evaluations, manifest ambivalence reveals of utmost significance for market researchers. Using a mixed approach, both qualitative and quantitative, this research confirms that the ESG isolates manifest ambivalence in its upper-right zone, and provides implications for practitioners involved in service quality and consumer satisfaction measurement.
