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Drawn from the concepts of processing fluency and mental imagery, the present study aims to fill the void by developing the mechanism underlying consumers' cognitive processing of visually appealing digital content in social media (i.e. Instagram) of retail brands.

Data were gathered using a web-based survey method with consumers residing in the USA (N = 328). Structural equation modelling (SEM) was employed to investigate the proposed hypotheses. In addition, measurement invariance and multigroup analyses were conducted to test the moderation effect of need for cognition (NFC).

The results supported the pivotal role of mental imagery when consumers process visual messages in the context of a retail brand's Instagram. Both comprehension fluency and imagery fluency positively influence mental imagery, which in turn cultivates positive attitude towards the brand. The mediating role of mental imagery is confirmed. Furthermore, individuals' NFC interacts with imagery fluency but not with comprehension fluency such that high NFC strengthens the effect of imagery fluency on mental imagery. That is, when high-NFC consumers process information on Instagram, their perceptions of ease of generating imagery likely evoke visual representation of the brand's messages on Instagram in their minds.

This research provides feasible ways for brands to increase the effectiveness of digital marketing communications in social media (e.g. optimising of the contextual features of visual information and employing interactive features such as filters of social media to enhance processing fluency).

Within the context of digital retailing, this study provides a new perspective of consumers' imagery processing to investigate the effectiveness of visual-focussed messages.

The purpose of this study is to explore how vulnerable healthcare consumers foster social support through visual storytelling in social media in navigating healthcare consumption experiences.

This study employs a dual qualitative approach of visual and textual analysis of 180 Instagram posts from female breast cancer patients and survivors who use the platform to narrate their healthcare consumption experiences.

This study demonstrates how visual storytelling on social media normalises hidden aspects of healthcare consumption experiences through healthcare disclosures (procedural, corporeal, recovery), normalising practices (providing learning resources, cohering the illness experience, problematising mainstream recovery narratives) and enabling digital affordances, which in turn facilitates social support among vulnerable healthcare consumers.

This study highlights the potential for visual storytelling on social media to address shortcomings in the healthcare service system and contribute to societal well-being through co-creative efforts that offer real-time and customised support for vulnerable healthcare consumers.

This research highlights that visual storytelling on image-based social media offers transformative possibilities for vulnerable healthcare consumers seeking social support in negotiating the challenges of their healthcare consumption experiences.

This study presents a framework of visual storytelling for vulnerable healthcare consumers on image-based social media. Our paper offers three key contributions: that visual storytelling fosters informational and companionship social support for vulnerable healthcare consumers; recognising this occurs through normalising hidden healthcare consumption experiences; and identifying healthcare disclosures, normalising practices and enabling digital affordances as fundamental to this process.

The post-millennial or Generation Z constitutes people born in 1997 or after. This study theorizes how news consumption habits of the post-millennial generation are reshaping the news. As the newest generation of media users, Generation Z or the post-millennials, comprising people born in 1997 or after, will inherit the millennial legacy. Generation Z has embraced the visual, verbal, and viral aspects of digital and social media platforms. They rarely engage with traditional news sources, which they deem as nearly extinct.

Based on 2019 meta-analytical research review of 16 key studies (published between 2017 and 2019) of media consumption habits of post-millennials, this research study delineates news consumption habits of post-millennials. It theorizes how this new generation of media users are embracing the visual, verbal, and viral media to reshape news content. The propensity of the post-millennials to participate in the news cycle shapes their rapidly changing preferences and usage patterns.

Over the years, news consumption has varied among different age groups. Newspapers and television were popular with the Silent generation, comprising people born between 1928 and 1945. The Internet significantly transformed media use among baby boomers, the generation born between 1946 and 1964, and Generation X, which constitutes people born between 1965 and 1980. The rise of social media has significantly transformed media use of millennials or Generation Y, born between 1981 and 1996. They were the first generation to come of age in the new millennium.

Unlike Generation X and boomers, the post-millennials or Generation Z sparsely engage with traditional news sources they deem as nearly extinct, including print media such as newspapers and magazines. They rarely watch television news or listen to radio. They report different news values with less concern about accuracy and more attention toward entertainment and interaction.

The study aims to explore why consumers engage with ordinary celebrities on social media by identifying the influential characteristics that have engaged followers and have led to opinion leadership on visual platforms, such as Instagram and Facebook.

Qualitative data were collected from 32 social media users following at least one ordinary celebrity on Instagram and Facebook in Qatar and Tunisia.

The findings of this study highlight five main characteristics that lead to fame and opinion leadership on social media visual platforms: credibility, storytelling and content quality, fit with the platform, Actual and aspired image homophily and consistency.

This research is, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, one of the first studies that highlight the features determining opinion leadership on visual platforms such as Instagram and Facebook. Second, the results of the study highlight some features that distinguish ordinary celebrities from traditional established celebrities.

The findings of this research represent a guideline for effective influential marketing development. Based on the results, recommendations are provided for companies, influencers and social media users who aspire to become influencers.

This research, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, is among the first to shed light on opinion leadership through ordinary celebrities on visual social media platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, and thus, adds new insights to the area of social media marketing.

The purpose of this paper is to determine whether the presentation medium of corporate social and environmental web site disclosure has an impact on user trust in such disclosure, and to examine the effect of media richness on user perception about corporate social and environmental responsibility.

The paper's methodology is a three‐by‐two between‐subjects design experiment, manipulating presentation medium and industry type. Participants viewed social and environmental web site disclosures and completed and communicated their perceptions of trust and the experimental companies' corporate social responsibility.

The presentation medium richness of social and environmental web site disclosures is positively associated with: trusting intentions, but not trusting beliefs, of web site users; and user perception of corporate social and environmental responsibility.

As with all controlled experiments, the research design focused on internal validity to maintain control over the task design, manipulation, and measurement of variables. While this required trade‐offs with external validity, the task was designed based on real‐world scenarios to maintain high levels of external validity within the experimental setting.

The paper provides evidence that corporations could use enhanced web‐based technology to potentially mislead users regarding their performance in the social domain.

The paper extends the visual disclosure literature by examining the richness of the image/visual media, and investigates whether user perceptions are impacted by the variations in its richness.

Social media influencers increasingly determine what is fashionable. By creating and sharing visual contents, predominantly on Instagram, they shape what social media users see and aspire to. Their contents reflect Instagram esthetics and their own personal brands. This chapter argues that their visuals also represent emerging visual practices and styles that are typical of influencers and transcend fashion and tourism contexts. Using a netnographic approach, this chapter examines Instagram posts of 20 tourism and fashion mega-influencers. It finds common practices but also identifies differential ways in which fashion and tourism visuals are constructed. This chapter highlights how the subjects have intertwined, especially when it comes to influencers.

This paper aims to examine the effects of visual themes and view perspectives on users’ visual attention to brand posts on Instagram. The impact of visual attention on brand attitude and recognition is also explored.

The authors conducted a 4 (visual themes: customer-centric, employee-centric, product-centric and symbolic visuals) × 2 (view perspectives: first-person view vs third-person view) between-subject factorial eye-tracking experiment to explore their effects on viewers’ visual attention (fixation frequency and fixation duration), attitude toward the brand and brand recognition.

Results showed that, under a first-person view, participants spent the longest time viewing customer-centric images and paid the most attention to product-centric and customer-centric images. For images in the third-person view, product-centric images received the longest fixation duration and highest fixation frequency. Customer-centric image and product-centric image generated significantly higher amount of fixation duration and fixation frequency than the symbolic image, regardless of view perspective. Brand recognition was positively influenced by fixation frequency but not by fixation duration.

This study is an extended application of Aaker’s (1996) brand identity planning model in visual branding on Instagram. As the findings indicated, the effective use of visual strategies could lead to more positive responses toward the brand. By understanding how optical elements stimulate visual branding processing, marketing professionals will be able to improve information designing skills in visual-based social media platforms (such as Instagram).

Online images can convey sensory-based elements affecting digital users' emotions and digital engagement. The purpose of this study is to investigate which image-based features are more effective in conveying and stimulating particular emotions and engagement towards organizations operating in the food industry.

An online experimental survey was implemented. Two image-based features, narrativity and dynamism were chosen. The stimuli comprise four images, one with high and one with low level of narrativity, and one with high and one with low dynamism, published by a food company on its official Instagram account. Food-identity, emotional appeals and digital visual engagement behaviours were measured. A total of 141 students between 19 and 25 years old of a European University completed the questionnaire. Data was analysed through SPSS software using t-test analysis.

Results show that both narrativity and dynamism impact digital users' emotions and it was found to impact digital visual engagement attitude. Food involvement was measured in terms of food identity impact the effects of specific image-based features on emotions and visual engagement.

The study focuses on only two visual social semiotics features – narrativity and dynamism – and therefore, only partially captures the potentialities of images in digital communications.

This study provides professionals with empirical evidence and insights for effectively planning a visual social media strategy.

This paper contributes to the stream of research in social media communications by investigating the visual social semiotic features of images published online by a food company.

This paper aims to investigate how the abstract marketing concept of brand heritage is operationalized through visual elements on social media.

A mixed-methods approach combines interviews with marketing experts, a focus group with specialized academics, an open coding of Instagram images and the systematic coding of 800 images of eight champagne brands (company-generated content).

The study identifies 20 brand heritage codes (e.g. groupings of brand heritage visual cues with homogenous meanings). These codes are combined in three different factors (brand symbols, product legacy and consumption rituals) that discriminate between brands.

The paper offers a description of what brand heritage looks like in practice. This visual operationalization of brand heritage is based on a single category, a limitation that further research can address. The results also contribute to research on visual brand identity and provide practical insights for the management of brand heritage at the product brand level.

This paper bridges the gap between the strategic management of brand heritage as a resource and the way it is concretely made available to the consumers.