Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to shed light on the boundary conditions of the effect of the valence of word-of-mouth on social networking sites (sWOM) on consumer responses (attitude toward ...the service provider, purchase intention and positive word-of-mouth intention). Specifically, the authors examine two moderators: the tone of voice (factual vs emotional) of the sWOM and service type (utilitarian vs hedonic) of the service that the sWOM is about.
Design/methodology/approach
A 2 (message valence: positive vs negative) × 2 (tone of voice: factual vs emotional) × 2 (service type: utilitarian vs hedonic) full-factorial between-subjects online experiment with 400 respondents was conducted and the data were analyzed using Hayes’ PROCESS macro.
Findings
The results show that message valence exerts a greater impact on consumer responses with factual sWOM messages compared to emotional ones. Furthermore, the impact of message valence is stronger for hedonic services compared to utilitarian services. In contrast to the authors’ expectations, there is no significant impact of matching the tone of voice to the service type.
Practical implications
First, for sWOM senders, factual messages are found to be more influential: backing an sWOM up with arguments and specific details increases the chance of it affecting consumers’ responses. As a result, marketers, especially of predominantly hedonic services, should encourage their followers and customers to spread positive factual sWOM about their service.
Originality/value
The study tests two previously unstudied moderating variables that affect the relationship between message valence and consumer responses to sWOM messages. Moreover, this study provides interesting insights for marketers and bloggers or reviewers.
Sustainable food consumption is seen by many as a significant challenge. Green marketers are trying to combine newer formats of marketing communications, such as influencer marketing, to change ...consumer’s behaviour to a more environmentally sustainable food choice. Especially, adolescents and young adults have been found to be relevant target groups. In this study, based on persuasion knowledge and reactance theory, we examined the moderating role of disclosures on the effectiveness of food influencer posts, both for sustainable and non-sustainable products. In an online 2 (non-sustainable vs. sustainable food) × 2 (no disclosure vs. disclosure) experiment (N = 332) this study finds that, surprisingly, sustainable food posts are more often recognized as advertising compared to non-sustainable food posts. Nevertheless, a disclosure increases the likelihood that a non-sustainable food post would be recognized as advertising compared to no disclosure. Finally, the recognition of selling intent decreases source credibility and ultimately decreases attitude towards the post and product, as well as liking intention.
We study the effect of perceived personalization in advertising on social networking sites (SNSs) on consumer brand responses. In study 1 (N = 202), we test a parallel mediation via perceived ...personal relevance and intrusiveness on brand attitude (Ab) and click intention (CI). Perceived personalization improves Ab and CI by increasing the perceived personal relevance and, unexpectedly, by decreasing the perceived intrusiveness of the ad. Study 2 (N = 264) extends the processing mechanism of personalized advertising by additionally including the mediating effects of self-brand connection and reactance toward the ad. Perceived personalization has a positive indirect effect on self-brand connection via perceived personal relevance, but not via perceived intrusiveness. Self-brand connection, in turn, has a positive effect on consumers' responses. Contrary to expectations, reactance does not significantly affect brand responses. Study 2 also examines the moderating role of perceived privacy protection by the SNS. Higher levels of perceived privacy protection by the SNS do not strengthen the indirect effects of perceived personalization.
Drawing on recent research and debates in social sciences, this paper situates replication in an advertising research context. We clarify the role of replication in the field and outline the ...challenges inherent in replication studies in advertising research. We further elaborate on how researchers should engage in replication research to increase the truth value of advertising research while overcoming the obstacles to replication research. Finally, we discuss how advertising scholars, reviewers, and editors can facilitate replication research to reduce the share of false-positive results and accumulate knowledge in the discipline. We see replication as critical in advertising research, given the high variability of experimental factors and the applied nature of the field. Therefore, a better understanding of replications and the challenges of advertising research should inspire scholars to engage in more replication attempts and reviewers and editors to consider it for publication.
In two studies, this paper examines how perceived personalization in advertisements on social media affects brand engagement and ad avoidance. Using a preregistered between‐subjects cross‐sectional ...survey (n = 794), we tested four different moderated mediation models with perceived creepiness and perceived relevance as competing mediating variables, and hedonic and eudaimonic well‐being as moderating variables. Perceived relevance explains the positive effect of perceived personalization on brand engagement and the negative effect on ad avoidance. Moreover, perceived creepiness explains the negative effect of perceived personalization on ad avoidance. Contrary to our hypotheses, we find positive effects of perceived personalization via perceived creepiness on brand engagement and ad avoidance. Then, a qualitative think‐aloud survey (n = 36) shows that participants are accustomed to personalized advertisements and scroll to avoid them unless there is relevant or useful content. Independent of their well‐being, participants are not creeped out because of personalized advertising; however, it does raise their privacy concerns. Finally, the findings of our two studies indicate that advertisers and social media need to particularly consider consumers' negative affective well‐being to effectively deliver personalized advertisements due to the increase in creepiness and/or privacy concerns.
Social media are increasingly popular for delivering branded content to consumers worldwide. A central task for researchers is to understand what consumer brand-related motivations and brand appeals ...drive consumer engagement and benefit brand outcomes across different cultures. Based on the Uses and Gratifications theory, this study explores how individuals' motivations for social media use and branded content reflecting these motivations affect three focal consumer brand responses (viral behavioral intentions, click intention, and purchase intention) across different cultural contexts, namely Western European (i.e. Austria, Belgium, Sweden) and Latin (i.e. Brazil, Chile, Portugal) cultures. Our results exhibit significant positive effects of motivations (Remuneration) and branded appeals (entertainment appeal) on consumer responses that prevail in both Western European and Latin cultures. Managers implementing cross-cultural social media marketing can use the insights of this paper as a guide to target audiences with brand appeals, enhancing the effectiveness of their brand communication activities on social media.
•To elicit perceived personalization it is best to use interests, location or age.•Gender, life-events or friend referrals elicit less perceived personalization.•Results remain stable across product ...perceptions.•Results remain stable across socio-demographic characteristics.
On social networking sites, consumers disclose information about themselves which advertisers use to personalize advertisements. The underlying assumption is that personalized advertisements are more persuasive. However, it is not clear to what extent actual personalization elements (as intended by advertisers) determine consumers’ perceptions of the extent to which an ad is personalized, and it is the latter that drives responses. The current study investigates the relative weight of different actual personalization elements (age, gender, location, life events, interests, and friend referrals) in Facebook ads in eliciting perceived advertising personalization. We conduct conjoint analyses for six products (a bank, a smartphone, tableware, furniture, a restaurant, a fashion retailer) with 595 consumers from the United States. The findings show that the most important elements in eliciting perceived personalization are (in order of importance) a person’s interests, location, and age. This result remains stable across different product perceptions (product category involvement, product qualities, and buying motivations) and across different socio-demographic characteristics (gender, age, and education). In sum, to evoke the perception of personalization, advertisers should primarily target consumers based on their interests.
This paper aims to better understand the effect of visual attention on the processing of banner and native advertisements on Facebook and consequently on brand recognition and brand attitude. Using ...an eye-tracking experiment (N = 90), we show that a native advertisement attracts more and longer visual attention (i.e., total fixation duration, fixation count, and average visit duration) compared to a banner advertisement. Moreover, we show that longer visual attention (i.e., total fixation duration and average visit duration) increases persuasion knowledge and the recognition of an advertisement, which in turn leads to better brand recognition. Second, we show that neither conceptual persuasion knowledge nor critical processing mediates the effect of visual attention on brand attitude.
Previous research has consistently found an effect of the valence (positive vs. negative) of electronic word of mouth in general and of word of mouth on a social networking site (sWOM) specifically ...on consumer responses. The current study investigates how interpersonal and person-to-site relational characteristics (homophily, tie strength, and source credibility) moderate this effect on consumer responses to sWOM (behavioral and positive word-of-mouth intention). The results show that interpersonal homophily and source credibility both significantly reinforce the effect of sWOM valence on behavioral intention and positive word-of-mouth intention. Only considering person-to-site relational characteristics as antecedents, (person-to-site) homophily and source credibility reinforce the effect of sWOM valence on behavioral intention and on positive word-of-mouth intention. However, including both the interpersonal and the person-to-site relational characteristics as antecedents results in all person-to-site relational characteristics becoming nonsignificant as moderators. This study advances the sWOM literature by concurrently examining how both interpersonal and person-to site relational characteristics moderate the effect of message valence on sWOM responses. The findings imply that marketers should try to stimulate sWOM from credible sources that are homophilous to the target audience, as these relationships reinforce the positive impact of sWOM valence on behavioral intentions.
This paper examines the extent to which the level of personalization in advertisements on social networking sites from four online sources affects source attitudes. Based on the privacy-calculus ...theory, the trade-off between perceived personal relevance and perceived creepiness is tested. We also examine the moderating role of source type. We used a factorial survey by setting up a 3 (level of personalization: low vs. moderate vs. high) x 4 (source type: health vs. governmental vs. commercial vs. news) between-subjects design. We tested a moderated mediation model with perceived creepiness and relevance as competing mediating variables and source type as the moderating variable based on the privacy calculus theory and social exchange theory. The results indicate that perceived creepiness negatively explains personalization perceptions. The tipping point can be found between the low and moderate level: a moderate (vs. low) level of personalization increases perceived creepiness, but high personalization does not increase it further. Contrary to our expectations, perceived relevance does not act as a positive explanatory mechanism. Finally, our findings demonstrate that source type is important: the privacy calculus for each personalization level differs for different online sources.
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