Purpose

This study identifies a new type of advertising, sponsored ad forwarding, in microblog contexts. It tests the effectiveness of designs of a message with an ad with regard to receivers who are purely online friends or offline friends.

Design/methodology/approach

In the main experiment, a three-by-two experimental design was employed. By random assignment, message senders forwarded an ad with either an other-oriented or a self-oriented message to a group of offline friends or purely online friends. In the control group, there was no message accompanying the ad. The data of 218 effective sender-receiver dyads were collected and compared.

Findings

The results show that a message with an other-oriented appeal is more effective than one with a self-oriented appeal for dyads with an offline relationship, and a message with a self-oriented appeal is more effective than one with an other-oriented appeal for dyads with a purely online relationship. Overall, the use of appeals significantly boosts ad effectiveness.

Originality/value

This study identifies a new type of marketing practice in social media, namely sponsored ad forwarding. It also proposes appeal orientation as a novel type of message content design. It shows how to apply the right appeal orientation to the right receiver groups, that is, offline or purely online friends.

中文翻译：

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吸引力导向在微博平台上赞助广告转发中的作用

目的

这项研究确定了微博环境中的一种新型广告，即赞助广告转发。它针对纯在线朋友或离线朋友的收件人测试带有广告的消息设计的有效性。

设计/方法/方法

在主要实验中，采用了三乘二的实验设计。通过随机分配，消息发送者将带有其他定向消息或自我定向消息的广告转发给一组离线朋友或纯在线朋友。在对照组中，没有伴随广告的消息。收集并比较了218个有效的发送者-接收者二元组的数据。

发现

结果表明，对于具有脱机关系的二元组，具有另一种方向的吸引力的信息比具有一种自我导向的吸引力的信息更有效，而具有另一种方向的吸引力的信息比具有另一种方向的吸引力的信息更有效。适用于具有纯在线关系的二元组。总体而言，使用上诉可以大大提高广告效果。

创意/价值

这项研究确定了社交媒体中一种新型的营销实践，即赞助广告转发。它还提出了上诉导向作为一种新型的消息内容设计。它显示了如何将正确的申诉定向应用于正确的接收者组，即脱机或纯在线朋友。