Introduction
Tobacco marketing includes text and visual content, which conveys important meaning to consumers and influences use. Little is known about the marketing tactics used by a popular brand of cigarillos on social media to promote their products, including their visual design.
Methods
A content analysis was conducted to analyze text and visuals for all posts on Swisher Sweets’ official Instagram account from Jan 23 2013 –Feb 28 2020. We assessed product depictions (e.g., warnings, smoking cues), presence of FDA-prohibited or potentially misleading claims (e.g., lower risk, organic), marketing tactics (e.g., celebrities, selling propositions), flavors, and demographic representation.
Results
We coded 1402 posts. Smoking cues (e.g., images of people smoking, product imagery) were in 764 posts (54.5%), and a warning appeared in 690 (49.2%) posts, but obscured in 29.4% of those instances (n=203). No posts included FDA-prohibited claims, but some potentially misleading language was identified, including the use of words or visual depictions of smooth (n=254, 18.1%) and quality/well-made (n=239, 17%). Marketing tactics such as scarcity (n=159, 11.3%), event promotion (n=586, 41.8%), and alcohol depictions (n=171, 12.2%) were common, and flavor names appeared in 598 posts (42.7%). People depicted were often young adults (n=709, 50.6%), Black/African American (n=549, 39.2%), and in groups (n=473, 33.7%).
Conclusions
Both text and visuals are used to market Swisher Sweets on their Instagram account. Using social images of young adults, especially Black individuals, signals the intended use of the product. These images of visual-based social media may influence appeal, glamorization, and normalization of cigarillo smoking among vulnerable populations.
Implications
Tobacco marketing, including from popular cigarillo brands like Swisher Sweets, is widely used to influence consumer perceptions and behavior. Social media marketing includes text and visual, both of which increase product appeal and encourage use. Visual-based social media from the industry itself have been understudied, particularly for cigarillos. This study characterizes the ways in which Swisher Sweets uses text and visuals to market their products through their Instagram account, including smoking cues, potentially misleading language, use of celebrity endorsers, and promotion and sponsorship of events.
