Research pick: Amusing and authentic advertisers - "A framework for enhancing the influence of Facebook advertising: the key role of personalisation and interactivity"

Personalisation and interactivity are key to boost the effect of an advertising campaign on social media, according to work published in the International Journal of Economics and Business Research. The finding has implications for how marketers and advertising teams might get the most value out of their efforts and budgets.

Taanika Arora of the Rukmini Devi Institute of Advanced Studies at the IP University in Delhi, India, has studied in detail one particularly popular area of the world of social media – the networking site, Facebook. Specifically, Arora has used Ducoffe’s web advertising model and flow theory to investigate to what extent personalisation and interactivity are determinants of purchase intention among potential consumers exposed to advertisements on Facebook.

At the time of writing this Research Pick, Facebook has almost 3000 million active monthly users. The world population is almost 8000 million, so that number represents a very large proportion of all the people on Earth, almost 40 percent of us. That, by any metric, is a vast advertising market representing a huge number of potential consumers of a product or service, even if we assume a fraction of those accounts are fake, duplicates or themselves companies with something to sell.

Arora carried out a systematic study using non-probability sampling of data obtained from more than 700 active Indian Facebook users. Structural equation modelling was used to demonstrate model fitness and to establish the validity and reliability of the adapted scales, she explains.

“The results indicate that the proposed framework is a robust tool for measuring advertising effectiveness on Facebook,” Arora writes. “This study theoretically contributes to the application of the Facebook advertising model and practically contributes influential factors for effective advertising to marketers and advertisers.” An important finding that might guide marketers and advertisers is that “credibility” and “entertainment” are critical in Facebook advertising, without the authenticity and the amusement, much is lost. In addition, advertising that is two-way or interactive helps lead potential consumers to making a purchase. The converse of all of this is that personalisation raises privacy concerns and consumers do not often tolerate any invasion of their privacy, despite being active in, to what is to all intents and purposes, the very public realm of social networking.

The bottom-line is that marketers hoping to get the most out of their Facebook advertising budget must be authentic, entertaining, and cognisant of the privacy concerns of their target market.

Arora, T. (2022) ‘A framework for enhancing the influence of Facebook advertising: the key role of personalisation and interactivity’, Int. J. Economics and Business Research, Vol. 24, No. 3, pp.305–343.