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The purpose of this paper is to investigate how firms can use social media such as Facebook to recruit top job prospects.

In the context of a fictitious event presumably sponsored by a potential employer, a sample of university students became members of a new private and secret Facebook user group dedicated to this event for a period of four days. They were exposed to event sponsorship activation messages varying systematically with respect to the mode of processing (i.e. passive or active) and their focus (i.e. the brand or the event).

The results show that their expectations as regards the salary that they would require to become employees were higher in the active mode of processing. Also, their attitude toward the sponsor as an employer was more favorable when the activation messages focussed on the brand rather than on the event. In addition, further analyses showed that the effects of message focus and mode of processing on the attitudinal responses toward the sponsoring employers were mediated by the degree of elaboration and richness of social interactions of the Facebook group's members as well as their attitude toward the activation messages.

Managers seeking to gain a recruiting edge through their social media presence should use online messages that stimulate more active processing and that have high entertainment value since this leads to more favorable responses toward the employer. These messages should insist more on the brand than on the event that is sponsored.

This study is the first study to foray into the usage of social networking sites for recruitment purposes. It represents one of the few research efforts to monitor the interactions of users in a social media platform by means of a controlled experiment performed in situ through the creation of an ad hoc Facebook group.

The purpose of this paper is to thematically categorise sports sponsorship-linked Twitter content and, by drawing on uses & gratifications theory, to map the extent to which these categories cohere with known user motivations for consuming social media.

Qualitative content analysis of a sample of 1,502 tweets by London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games sponsors posted between January 2011 and September 2012 was used to develop the typology of sponsorship-linked Twitter content.

From the data, a typology is developed, comprising 17 categories grouped under four main types: informing, entertaining, rewarding and interacting. The majority of sponsor tweets (68 per cent) fell into the informing type, with 17 per cent categorised as interacting. While few (2 per cent) tweets were categorised as entertaining, the link to the sponsored event implies a degree of entertaining content even in ostensibly informative, rewarding or interactional sponsorship-linked tweets. Therefore, the typology categories highlight Twitter content produced by sponsors which engages customers, fostering dialogue alongside providing informative and entertaining content.

The typology can inform practitioners’ future sports sponsorship activation planning decisions and can also aid rights holders in tailoring appropriate sponsorship opportunities to potential sponsors, based on an appreciation of the nature of content sought by brand followers.

The typology extends existing understanding of the use of social media within sponsorship activation campaigns by thematically categorising content and mapping this against known user motivations for consuming brand-related social media content.

The potential outcomes of social media-facilitated customer–brand relationships have prompted many firms to develop strategies that would enable them to connect with as many customers as possible through social media. Nevertheless, the marketing value of these artificial connections is questionable. Therefore, this paper aims to identify determinants of customers’ intention to connect with a brand on social media (i.e. Facebook) in the absence of “pull-strategies”.

In this paper, the concept of customer–brand engagement (CBE) is applied to the intentions to “Like” a brand’s Facebook fan page using structural equation modelling.

The results show that the three dimensions of CBE collectively explain about 50 per cent of the intentions to “Like” a brand’s Facebook fan page. Additionally, the results show that the influences of two of the CBE dimensions on the two “Like”-intentions are conditional effects of brand trust.

Because of the novelty of the CBE construct, further investigation of its application in a social media setting is lacking. To address this gap in the literature, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how CBE influences customers’ intention to “Like” a brand’s Facebook page.

This study aims to examine the relationships between stimuli of website experience (information/content, interactive features and design–visual appeal) and online engagement (cognitive processing, affection and activation) with consumer-generated media and brand advocacy. Furthermore, this study examines if online engagement mediates the relationships between website stimuli of experience dimensions and brand advocacy.

A total of 183 valid online questionnaires were collected, from members of an online forum related to travel and leisure, to empirically test the measurement and structural model using partial least square path modeling. The study sample includes consumers who search for, select and book hotel rooms via Booking.com.

The findings confirm that information/content and design–visual appeal have a significant impact on all three dimensions of online engagement whereas interactive features of a website have significant impact on affection and activation. Furthermore, results suggest that affection and activation predict brand advocacy and engagement mediates the effect of stimuli of experience on brand advocacy.

This is the first attempt to explain the relationships between website stimuli of experience (information/content, interactive features and design–visual appeal), online engagement (cognitive processing, affection and activation) and brand advocacy. Altogether, these variables are not well studied and understood in current literature despite having important implications for managers, academicians and consumers alike.

本论文旨在检验网站体验卖点（信息/内容、互动功能、设计-视觉吸引力）、对消费者自发媒介（CGM）的在线参与（理性思维方面、情感感性方面、和行动力方面）、以及品牌拥护的关系。此外, 本论文还检验在线顾客参与是否从中调节了网站体验卖点和品牌拥护的关系, 从而变成了中间变量。

本论文采用在线问卷采样形式, 一家在线旅游网站的成员为问卷样本, 有效样本数量为183份。本论文采用偏最小二乘回归的样本数据分析方法来分析数据。其中样本是从Booking.com搜索、选择、预定酒店的消费者。

信息/内容和网站设计-视觉吸引力对三种在线顾客参与的维度都有显著作用。而网站的互动性只对在线顾客参与的情感感性维度和行动力维度上有显著作用。此外, 研究结果还证明感性参与和参与行动促进品牌拥护, 因此, 在线参与成为网上体验卖点和品牌拥护的中间变量。

本论文是仅有几篇解释网站体验卖点（信息/内容、互动功能、和设计-视觉吸引力）与在线参与（理性思维方面、情感感性方面、和行动力方面）和品牌拥护之间关系的文章之一。总而言之, 这些变量还处在研究前沿阶段, 现有文献尚未全面研究这些变量, 尽管它们对于管理者、学者、以及消费者有着很重要的意义。

信息/内容、互动功能、设计-视觉吸引力、在线参与、品牌拥护

研究论文

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to marketing communications literature by exploring consumer responses to covert advertising (CA) in a social media context.

The persuasion knowledge model was used to explore the impact of CA on brand evaluations. A factorial design experiment was conducted in a social media context (YouTube).

The results of the study show that triggering knowledge about CA changes the way consumers respond to unfamiliar brands that use such tactics. This implies that for unfamiliar brands, with future development of persuasion knowledge, CA in social media will not only be ineffective but also detrimental with damaging effects on the brand.

An important contribution of this study lies in the application of the persuasion knowledge model to social media context.

The results indicate that firms should desist from covert product and brand communications in social media contexts, and instead employ disclosed brand communications.

Given that the effects of CA have not been investigated in an online context, this study makes a unique contribution to brand communications research by providing valuable insights and better understanding of the effects of CA in social media, specifically YouTube.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze how fashion consumers behave when they make purchases using social media platforms – specifically, Instagram. In particular, the work examines the role played by consumer–brand involvement and self–brand connection (SBC) as predictors of customer brand engagement (CBE).

In this paper, social commerce-adoption is modeled, using three variables: customer engagement, SBC and fashion-consumer brand-involvement. Using a personal online survey, data on social media users classified as millennials and Generation Z were collected. The model is analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM).

Consumer involvement in fashion has a positive effect on cognitive processing and activation, but not on affection. SBC has a positive effect on all three analyzed dimensions. Finally, gender is found to exert a moderating effect on the relationship between the “CBE activation” dimension and brand loyalty.

The research was conducted during the lockdown imposed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which may have influenced the responses. Other limitations and potential lines of research for the future are presented at the end of the paper.

Some of the results of this study can directly inform the social media strategies of fashion companies that use Instagram as a channel of communication with their customers. They can also contribute to incentivizing co-created content and increasing consumption among both men and women.

The present study contributes to addressing the scarcity of studies dealing with CBE and social commerce in the fashion sector and, in particular, fashion-consumer behavior on social media (specifically, Instagram).

This study explores the use of event-related promotional hashtags by non-sponsors as a form of social ambushing, akin to newsjacking, as potential means of ambushing major events and the potential challenges facing commercial rights holders.

Framed within the context of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games, the present research takes a descriptive analytical approach to social media analysis. Social media data were accessed from Twitter's API across a six-week Games period and subsequently coded and categorized based upon strategic intent, content and key structural characteristics. A quantitative analysis of Tweet distribution, frequency and buzz was then conducted, providing insight into the impacts and effects of social ambushing via newsjacking.

Importantly, the study's findings suggest that whilst newsjacking by non-sponsors throughout the Games was pervasive, the potential reach and impact of such social ambushing may be limited. Non-sponsoring firms primarily adopted Games hashtags for behavioural or diversionary means, however consumer response to such attempts was minimal. These findings offer renewed perspective for scholars and practitioners on social ambushing and ambush marketing interventionism.

This research provides an important investigation into the manifestations and potential implications of social ambushing and illustrates the potential for brands to newsjack sporting events through unauthorized hashtag usage, necessary advances in sport marketing research.

Customers nowadays would expect more than just the sales process. As loyal customers are crucial for businesses, research indicates that engaged consumers exhibit greater loyalty to brands. Despite its significance, consumer brand engagement (CBE) remains a concept worth deeper investigation. Building on the cognitive-affective-conative (CAC) model, this paper aims to address this lacuna by examining the precursors of CBE and tests CBE as a higher-order construct consisting of three formative dimensions, namely, cognitive processing, affection and activation.

Using a non-probability purposive sampling method, data was collected from a sample of 237 Malaysian consumers who subscribe to any of the local telco service providers. Data was then analysed using the partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique.

Communication effectiveness, core service quality and corporate social responsibility strategy are important determinants that explain consumers’ brand engagement. Furthermore, it was found that CBE prompts consumer satisfaction, which then leads to brand loyalty towards a telco service provider. Additionally, confirmatory tetrad analysis reassured CBE as a formative construct.

CBE should be best assessed as a higher-order reflective formative construct composed of cognitive processing, affection and activation.

Telco companies seeking to attain brand loyalty and consumer satisfaction should ensure that their customers are engrossed, inspired and energized in their interaction with the brands.

Drawing on the CAC model, this study contributes to consumer marketing literature by filling the gap regarding the precursors and outcomes of CBE. In addition, the multidimensionality of CBE as a higher-order reflective formative construct was established.

Consumers often use various cues such as health stars and nutrition claims on product packaging to draw inferences regarding healthfulness. However, much less is known regarding the role of brand names in consumer decisions around healthfulness. The purpose of this study is to introduce angelic branding as a brand naming strategy that may act as a supernatural agent benevolence (i.e. loving, kind and merciful) prime that leads consumers to perceive that the brand’s products are healthful.

Study 1 examines the effect of angelic brand names on brand healthfulness perceptions. Study 2 investigates the mediating role of brand virtuousness perceptions on the relationship between angelic branding and brand healthfulness perceptions and the downstream consequences on purchase intention. Study 3 explores the moderating role of authoritarian supernatural agent belief (i.e. angry, vindictive and punishing) on the relationship between angelic branding and brand virtuousness perceptions, and subsequent brand healthfulness perceptions and purchase intention.

The results of this study demonstrate that angelic branding results in healthfulness perceptions for a healthy product (i.e. vitamins; Study 1a), an unhealthy product (i.e. cookies; Study 1b; eliminating perceptual fluency as a potential alternative explanation for the phenomenon) and across different product categories (i.e. surface spray; Study 1c). The results from Study 2 find that angelic brand names prime brand healthfulness perceptions because of the activation of brand virtuousness perceptions (not brand quality perceptions; eliminating a general halo effect as a potential alternative explanation for the phenomenon). The results of Study 3 show that strong belief in authoritarian supernatural agents attenuates the angelic brand name–brand healthfulness priming effect.

This research is limited, as it only considers angelic brand naming and not any other benevolence cues in brand logos, such as halos and angel wings. This research is also limited in that it only considers healthfulness perceptions drawn from English angelic brand name cues and from participants within the USA and the UK.

This study has important implications for brand managers in the development of new brand names. Angelic brand naming is suggested as a strategy for brand managers to prime perceptions of brand virtuousness and brand healthfulness and to influence consumer behavior. However, brand managers are cautioned against the use of this brand naming strategy if it is intended to mislead or deceive consumers, resulting in detrimental effects on their health.

This research makes a unique and novel contribution to the literature in brand names on consumer decision-making. Angelic branding is introduced as a brand naming strategy that can act as a supernatural agent religious prime to influence perceptions of brand virtuousness, brand healthfulness and consumer behavioral intentions (i.e. purchase intention).

This paper aims to show that strength-based theories of memory provide only a partial description of how consumers retrieve brands from memory. Dual-process theories of memory such as the Source of Activation Confusion (SAC) model provide a more robust explanation of brand retrieval by accounting for the separate effects of brand familiarity and category knowledge.

This paper examines brand image associations for 27 brands in three product categories using marketing field data. The authors apply a quasi-experimental approach to divide respondents into four groups based on their levels of brand familiarity and category knowledge. The authors compare brand retrieval for each group to test whether the SAC model, a dual-process theory of memory, or traditional strength-based theories of memory better explain brand retrieval.

Familiar brands are harder to remember when consumers know more about the product category. This effect cannot be explained by strength-based theories of memory, but it is a prediction of the SAC model. This outcome is a critical test that discriminates between competing theories of brand retrieval.

Researchers may draw on the SAC model to identify new ways of analysing brand image data to better understand how consumers retrieve brands from memory. This includes, above all, developing methods to separately measure the effects of brand familiarity and category knowledge.

To maximise the chance that consumers will remember brands, managers of highly familiar brands should avoid promoting category knowledge through their branding and communications strategies. By contrast, managers of less familiar brands should promote category knowledge by linking their brand to episodes of category consumption.

This work illustrates that a quasi-experimental approach can be used to extend quantitative psychological models from laboratory experiments to marketing field data. It also illustrates the use of a critical empirical test to discriminate between competing theories in marketing.