Parker J. Woodroof, Katharine M. Howie, Holly A. Syrdal and Rebecca VanMeter
The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the type of disclosure used by social media influencers on consumer evaluations of influencer transparency, product…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the type of disclosure used by social media influencers on consumer evaluations of influencer transparency, product performance expectations and how those factors ultimately influence purchase intentions.
Design/methodology/approach
An experiment was conducted with 321 participants recruited from MTurk to test a moderated serial-mediation model.
Findings
The results indicate that when consumers become cognizant that an influencer’s branded promotional post may have been motivated by an underlying financial relationship, they evaluate the influencer as significantly less transparent if a more ambiguous disclosure is used relative to a clearer disclosure. Transparency perceptions of the influencer impact consumers’ perceptions of product efficacy as well as purchase intentions.
Originality/value
Social media influencers are rapidly emerging as a popular marketing tool for brand managers, but consumer response to this form of promotion is not well understood. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to investigate how the type of endorsement disclosure used by a social media influencer impacts consumer perception of influencer transparency, product efficacy and purchase intentions. Further, this research demonstrates the applicability of the persuasion knowledge model in the domain of influencer marketing.
Details
Keywords
Sridhar Manohar, Ramesh Kumar, Raiswa Saha and Amit Mittal
Intervention strategies are designed by policymakers to impact people by effectively changing the environment in which people make decisions. Many government-led agencies and…
Abstract
Purpose
Intervention strategies are designed by policymakers to impact people by effectively changing the environment in which people make decisions. Many government-led agencies and nongovernmental organizations promote behavioral change by adopting social marketing strategies. Social marketing uses the application of commercial ideas to influence the voluntary behavior of individuals. Under these circumstances, this study aims to examine the effect of these emerging brand-building techniques social marketing especially in public campaign.
Design/methodology/approach
This descriptive study collected opinions related to the constructs from 324 respondents across India. This study used statistical package for the social science and Smart partial leased square software to test the validity of the hypotheses.
Findings
The results of this study indicate that when the campaigns target the emotional state of the consumer, he or she crosses all boundaries like physical attributes, service parameter or even any form of assessment and provides incremental value to the campaign, thus forming a favorable behavior.
Research limitations/implications
This study provides insights on how emotional branding can be used for better involvement and relationship building, which leads to long-term engagement with the customers. The marketers can also get facilitated through this study by developing a new perspective of creating their advertisements through emotional branding techniques, especially with a focus on corporate social responsibility in the global environment.
Originality/value
In recent times, marketers have adopted a new communication strategy to build their brand through promotions that might appeal directly to customer’s emotional state, popularly termed as “emotional branding.” This new communication strategy aims at creating and nurturing a relationship between the consumer and the brand by accumulating memories, emotions, personal narratives and expectations.