Effects of Beliefs and Concerns on User Attitudes toward Online Social Network Advertising and Their Ad Clicking Behavior

Abstract

Since last few years social network sites (SNSs) have rapidly grown in popularity and user acceptance globally. They have become the main place for social interaction, discussion and communication. Today, many businesses advertise their products on SNSs. The current study aims to assess the effects of SNSs consumers/users' beliefs and concerns of social network advertising (SNA) on their attitudes toward SNA and SNS banner ad-clicking behavior. Data was collected from a sample of 397 university students of Pakistan. Results show the beliefs of SNA as informative and entertaining have positive effects on user attitudes toward SNA and their ad-clicking behavior. Similarly, user concern of SNA as irritating has negative effects on both their attitudes toward SNA and adclicking behavior. Good for economy is an important socioeconomic belief which affects user attitudes toward SNA positively. The overall results indicate that utilitarian and hedonic aspects of SNA make SNS banner ads effective.

Attitudinal and Direct Association between Personal Value Beliefs and Users’ Banner Ad-Click Response on Social Network Sites

“…Specifically, users believe that SNS advertising provides them with valuable and easily accessible information. Furthermore, users deem that SNS advertising provides them latest information (Mir, 2015).…”

“…Another benefit that users believe they receive from advertising is entertainment (Ducoffe, 1995). Users believe that SNS advertising is entertaining, enjoyable, and pleasing (Alalwan, 2018: Mir, 2015Wiese &Akareem, 2020). Users' belief about advertising as entertaining is innately hedonic (Ducoffe, 1995).…”

“…The current study conceptualizes the personal level beliefs about SNS advertising as PVB. PVB about SNS advertising has three dimensions, informative (Mir, 2015), entertaining (Alalwan, 2018), and social image (Natarajan et al, 2015).…”

“…Several studies (e.g., Chu, Kamal & Kim, 2019;Mir, 2015;Hamouda, 2018;Wiese &Akareem, 2020) have studied the link between users' PVBand theirSNS advertising acceptance. Most of them (e.g., Wiese &Akareem, 2020) examined the association between personal beliefs and users' attitude towards SNS advertising.…”

“…Furthermore, the association of users' SNS banner ad-click response with their OSB is examined. PVB include information, entertainment, and social image (Hamouda, 2018;Kamal & Chu, 2012;Mir, 2015).…”