TY - JOUR
T1 - Posting strategically : the consumer as an online media planner
AU - CHEN, Yu Jen
AU - KIRMANI, Amna
PY - 2015/10
Y1 - 2015/10
N2 - How do consumers choose to post their brand reviews online? Whereas prior research examines what people say online, we investigate where consumers post their brand-related consumption experience on an online discussion forum. Using the framework of the Persuasion Knowledge Model, we suggest that consumers act as intuitive media planners to assess the extent to which they can reach their specific goals when targeting online audiences. Specifically, we examine the effects of posters' motives, message valence, and audience similarity on posting behavior. We propose and find that persuasion-motivated consumers focus on whether the message is effective in generating interest and emotion from the audience; therefore, they are more likely to post positive messages on a brand-general forum, such as a product forum, and negative messages on a brand-specific forum. In contrast, affiliation-motivated posters primarily focus on audience similarity, preferring to post on a forum where they perceive the audience as similar to them. Three experiments show the different posting patterns under the two motives and demonstrate the mediating role of message effectiveness under a persuasion motive.
AB - How do consumers choose to post their brand reviews online? Whereas prior research examines what people say online, we investigate where consumers post their brand-related consumption experience on an online discussion forum. Using the framework of the Persuasion Knowledge Model, we suggest that consumers act as intuitive media planners to assess the extent to which they can reach their specific goals when targeting online audiences. Specifically, we examine the effects of posters' motives, message valence, and audience similarity on posting behavior. We propose and find that persuasion-motivated consumers focus on whether the message is effective in generating interest and emotion from the audience; therefore, they are more likely to post positive messages on a brand-general forum, such as a product forum, and negative messages on a brand-specific forum. In contrast, affiliation-motivated posters primarily focus on audience similarity, preferring to post on a forum where they perceive the audience as similar to them. Three experiments show the different posting patterns under the two motives and demonstrate the mediating role of message effectiveness under a persuasion motive.
KW - Online communication
KW - Persuasion knowledge
KW - Social influence
KW - Word-of-mouth
UR - http://commons.ln.edu.hk/sw_master/2191
UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84941971755&doi=10.1016%2fj.jcps.2015.02.003&partnerID=40&md5=71ecc7cc78827e4fcbc693cc194ece7d
U2 - 10.1016/j.jcps.2015.02.003
DO - 10.1016/j.jcps.2015.02.003
M3 - Journal Article (refereed)
SN - 1057-7408
VL - 25
SP - 609
EP - 621
JO - Journal of Consumer Psychology
JF - Journal of Consumer Psychology
IS - 4
ER -