Seeing is not always believing: an exploratory study of clickbait in WeChat

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to unpack the antecedents and consequences of clickbait prevalence in online media at two different levels, namely, (1) Headline-level: what characteristics of clickbait headlines attract user clicks and (2) Publisher-level: what happens to publishers who create clickbait on a prolonged basis.Design/methodology/approachTo test the proposed conjectures, the authors collected longitudinal data in collaboration with a leading company that operates more than 500 WeChat official accounts in China. This study proposed a text mining framework to extract and quantify clickbait rhetorical features (i.e. hyperbole, insinuation, puzzle, and visual rhetoric). Econometric analysis was employed for empirical validation.FindingsThe findings revealed that (1) hyperbole, insinuation, and visual rhetoric entice users to click the baited headlines, (2) there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the number of clickbait headlines posted by a publisher and its visit traffic, and (3) this non-linear relationship is moderated by the publisher's age.Research limitations/implicationsThis research contributes to current literature on clickbait detection and clickbait consequences. Future studies can design more sophisticated methods for extracting rhetorical characteristics and implement in different languages.Practical implicationsThe findings could aid online media publishers to design attractive headlines and develop clickbait strategies to avoid user churn, and help managers enact appropriate regulations and policies to control clickbait prevalence.Originality/valueThe authors propose a novel text mining framework to quantify rhetoric embedded in clickbait. This study empirically investigates antecedents and consequences of clickbait prevalence through an exploratory study of WeChat in China.

The mechanism leads to successful clickbait promotion in WeChat social media platforms

“…This finding is consistent with previous studies (Chen et al, 2015;Potthast et al, 2016). Those clickbait readers may feel tricked or used when their expectations are not consistent with fact, which may lead to decreased perception of trustworthiness, expertise that relates directly to the credibility level of the source (Zhang et al, 2020). If the seller is regarded as having higher credibility, consumers are more likely to follow his/her recommendation in their purchase decisions.…”

“…Therefore, the headlines of messages or online articles are inclined to be catchy and exaggerated; thus, they are usually referred to as "clickbait headlines." For content providers, the purpose of clickbait headlines is to attract as many people as possible, in order to maximize the number of visitors to the particular portal (Zhang et al, 2020). It enables businesses with the page view boost and increases interaction with their customers.…”

“…However, no matter how attractive, the news that starts with clickbait headlines increasingly becomes the subject of expert criticism for the inconsistency between the title and the content. Namely, these headlines usually hide actual information (Zhang et al, 2020). Thus, clickbait is a valuable technique to attract users to the web, but it could make a loss of credibility and threaten to block social media channels (Potthast et al, 2016).…”

“…As the information behind these headings was incomplete and often inconsistent with the content, research has confirmed that clickbait can cause confusion and deception among readers, and even negative attitudes which question online media's credibility are becoming increasingly common (Chen et al, 2015). Consequently, clickbait has high risk to be caught in the vortex of business ethics discussions because of its "trick" on information transfer (Park and Lee, 2017), which furtherly leads to the concern that clickbait is considered to be untrustworthy (Zhang et al, 2020). Hence, clickbait may have an adverse influence on consumer perceived credibility.…”

“…Hence, clickbait may have an adverse influence on consumer perceived credibility. Considering the advantages and disadvantages of clickbait, it can gain traffic for promoters but whether it can boost sales is unclear (Stroud, 2017;Zhang et al, 2020).…”