How Relationships with
Consumer Ad Creators Develop
and Affect Viewer Response
Colin Campbell
Simon Fraser University
Vancouver, Canada
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A Definition of CGA
•
“any publicly disseminated, consumer
generated advertising messages whose
subject is a collectively recognized brand”
- Berthon et al. (2008, p. 3)
•
Refers to videos consumers create, about
brands or products, and share
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CGA vs. Traditional Ads
Traditional Ads
CGA
Creator
Firm,
ad agency
Unknown,
consumer
Purpose
Persuade, inform,
remind
Unclear
Distribution
Television, movies,
internet
Internet, viral
Style
Carefully honed,
consistent
Varies
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Growth in Consumer Generated Advertising
4
Research on CGA
•
•
•
Hints of advertiser benefit (Freeman and
Chapman, 2007a, 2007b)
Demonstrated ingenuity, skill, and
determination of consumers in constructing
CGA (Muniz and Schau, 2007)
Consumer creativity has been discussed, yet
solely within the realm of consumption
experiences (Burroughs and Mick, 2004; Dahl
and Moreau, 2007; Holbrook and Hirschman,
1982; Holbrook, et al., 1984; Moreau and
Dahl, 2005)
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•
•
•
Larger goal is to look at how consumer-brand
relationships are important to both creation
and consumption of consumer generated ads
First steps: examining motivations of creators
as well as response of consumers
This paper proposes a new theory of why
consumers might respond differently to
consumer generated ads
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Overview
•
•
•
•
Goal is a framework for response to CGA
How do viewer perceptions of an
advertisement’s creator affect viewer
responses?
Propose a new theoretical approach to
conceptualizing endorsement (Friedman and
Friedman, 1979; McCracken, 1989)
Draw on social identity theory (Tajfel and
Turner, 1979, 1986)
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Research on
Endorsers
•
•
•
•
Source credibility (Lafferty and Goldsmith,
1999; Sternthal, Dholakia and Leavitt, 1978;
Sternthal, Phillips and Dholakia, 1978)
Source attractiveness (Chaiken, 1979; Kahle
and Homer, 1985)
Source-product “fit” (Friedman and Friedman,
1979; Kamins and Gupta, 1994; Kamins,
1990; Till and Busler, 2000)
Current approach limiting (McCracken, 1989)
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Traditional Ads
Product
or
Brand
Company
(Sponsor)
Creator
Ad
Endorser
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Consumer
Proposed Approach
Product
or
Brand
Company
(Sponsor)
Ad
Creator
Endorser
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Consumer
Creator as Endorser
•
Hints in existing literature that endorserconsumer fit is what matters (McCracken,
1989)
•
•
•
Celebrity as referent (Kamins and Gupta,
1994)
Expertise vs. trustworthiness in credibility
(Sternthal, Dholakia and Leavitt, 1978)
Applying existing framework to CGA might not
work and could miss a crucial characteristic of
CGA: that it’s made by other consumers
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Proposed Model
Consumer-Consumer Perceived Similarity
Perceived Creator Motivations
Consumer-Consumer Attraction
Perceived Group Prestige
Consumer-Group Identification
Group influence in the form of:
1. Public support
2. Ad rating
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•
•
Similarity Leads
to Attraction
Theories (e.g. Fiske, 2004; Heider, 1958;
Rushton, 1989) link similarity and attraction
Supported by findings for both perceived and
actual similarity (Cronbach, 1955)
1. Viewers will be more attracted to
advertisement creators that viewers deem
similar
2. Perceived motivations of creator will moderate
this perceived-creator similarity and attraction
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Proposed Model
Consumer-Consumer Perceived Similarity
Perceived Creator Motivations
Consumer-Consumer Attraction
Perceived Group Prestige
Consumer-Group Identification
Group influence in the form of:
1. Public support
2. Ad rating
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Social Identity Theory
•
•
•
•
•
Primarily from Tajfel and Turner (1986)
Individuals have social identity rooted in their
membership in social groups
Role of social categories, social groups, social
identity, self-categorization, self-enhancement
Importance of ranking, hyperbolized similarity
and differences, negative groups, self-esteem
Contrast with internalization
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Attraction Leads
to Identification
3. The more a viewer considers an ad creator’s
perceived social group’s identity to match their
own, the greater the attraction, and hence the
greater the identification with the social group.
4. The more prestigiously an ad creator’s
perceived social group is perceived by others,
the greater the attraction, and hence the
greater the identification with the social group.
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Proposed Model
Consumer-Consumer Perceived Similarity
Perceived Creator Motivations
Consumer-Consumer Attraction
Perceived Group Prestige
Consumer-Group Identification
Group influence in the form of:
1. Public support
2. Ad rating
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•
•
•
Identification
and Influence
Kelman (1961, p. 63) describes social
influence: “when an individual adopts behavior
derived from another person or a group
because this behavior is associated with a
satisfying self-defining relationship to this
person or group.”
Act publicly and privately in line with group’s
expectations - purely to retain membership
Links suggested (Ashforth and Mael, 1989;
Dutton et al., 1994; Curras-Perez et al., 2009)
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Identification
and Influence
5. The more a viewer identifies with an ad
creator’s perceived social group, the more
likely the viewer is to engage in activities that
demonstrate and support this identification,
either privately or publicly (e.g. forward link to
ad, comment on ad, rate ad, book ad).
6. The more a viewer identifies with an ad
creator’s perceived social group, the higher
the perception of the advertisement and the
brand.
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Proposed Model
Consumer-Consumer Perceived Similarity
Perceived Creator Motivations
Consumer-Consumer Attraction
Perceived Group Prestige
Consumer-Group Identification
Group influence in the form of:
1. Public support
2. Ad rating
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Conclusion
• Proposed a new approach to understanding
endorsement so as to help explain consumer
response to CGA
• Currently testing parts of the theory
• Future research in looking at negative ads, the
effect of ensuing consumer discussions, ads
with multiple brands, and more ambiguous
videos.
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