Social media in advertising campaigns: Examining the effects on perceived persuasive intent, campaign, and brand responses

Inspired by the increasing popularity of advertising on social media, and especially on social network sites (SNS), the aim of this study was to give insight into the effectiveness of SNS advertising. The first experimental study compares consumer responses to advertising on SNS and TV and demonstrates that while TV campaigns are evaluated more positively, SNS campaigns result in more favourable cognitive responses. Moreover, the persuasive intent of SNS campaigns is less recognized than for TV campaigns. Since SNS are often combined with traditional media in advertising campaigns, the second study examines whether campaigns combining TV and SNS lead to so-called synergy effects. Results showed that this was not the case: single-medium and multimedia campaigns were equally effective. The third study examines the role of perceived persuasive intent in this relationship and tests whether there is an indirect effect of type of campaign (multimedia or single medium) on consumer responses via perceived persuasive intent. Results show that SNS-TV campaigns are perceived as less persuasive than SNS-only and TV-only campaigns, resulting in more favourable campaign and brand responses. In sum, the paper provides empirical evidence for the value of integrating social media with traditional media in advertising campaigns.