A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: How Humanized, Retargeted Ads Intrude in Social Contexts

Abstract

A great deal of past work has demonstrated that ads that “fit” or blend into their context evoke favorable responses because consumers perceive such ads as less intrusive. The current work posits that when aspects of the ad make persuasive intent salient—such as exposure to retargeted ads, which are generated based on consumers' past online browsing behavior—this relationship reverses such that fit between an ad and its context elicits higher perceptions of intrusiveness. Specifically, ads that present ad copy in a conversational style “fit” with a social media context on the dimension of social presence. Across three studies, we show that retargeted ads that “fit” the context on the dimension of social presence evoke higher levels of perceived intrusiveness, which, in turn, influence downstream responses such as attitudes toward the ad.

Non‐deceptive counterfeit purchase behavior of luxury fashion products

“…Hence, we concur with De Matos et al (2007) who suggest that an effective approach to address the purchase of counterfeit products is to influence social acceptance. Producers of luxury products could build on this recommendation by using advertisements embedded in social context (Hamby & Ilyuk, 2019) that portray counterfeit purchasing consumers in embarrassing social situations. Such a strategy could be especially effective in collectivist cultures where people's self‐image is defined by the group rather than by the individual (Hofstede et al, 2011).…”

Social media advertising reactance model: a theoretical review

“…Including mixed-method studies, seven take qualitative approaches, such as focus group interview, in-depth interview, and semantic analysis (Deraz, 2019;Kongsagoonwong and Ngamkroeckjoti, 2018;Mattke et al, 2018a;Riedel et al, 2018; Note(s): One study published in 2020 is not included Truong and Simmons, 2010;Tsimonis et al, 2020;Youn and Kim, 2019a). Additionally, seven articles involve more than one study (Ahn et al, 2017;Belanche et al, 2017;Celebi, 2015;Hamby and Ilyuk, 2019;Huang, 2019;Park et al, 2016;Tsimonis et al, 2020).…”

“…And specifically, when designing SMA, it is wise to get rid of the "sales channel" stereotype and show "proof of friendship" (Keller and Fay, 2012). Presenting advertisements with a human figure (Hamby and Ilyuk, 2019;Huo et al, 2018) or in an "exchange language style" (Lee et al, 2015) helps.…”

“…Riedel et al (2018) adopted the term "obtrusive" to refer to an ad that is large and covers a significant proportion of the screen Presence format A wide range of formats can be considered for SMA, such as video, carousel or photo (Riedel et al, 2018); different levels of arousal (Belanche et al, 2017;Gracia et al, 2017); content variation or repetition (Huang, 2019) Format consistency Format consistency relates to the format similarity or congruence between advertisements and native content. It is also known as "ad-context fit" (Hamby and Ilyuk, 2019) and "presentation consistency" (Fan et al, 2017)…”

“…Third, social media advertising (SMA) can be customized by accessing user data even without authorization, which triggers overcustomization or privacy concerns Korgaonkar, 2016, 2018). Fourth, as social media has put too much effort into advertising, users often complain that social media has deviated from its original social-oriented purpose (Hamby and Ilyuk, 2019).…”