Social Networking Versus Facebook Advertising to Recruit Survey Respondents: A Quasi-Experimental Study

Abstract

BackgroundIncreasingly, social contact and knowledge of other people’s attitudes and behavior are mediated by online social media such as Facebook. The main research to which this recruitment study pertains investigates the influence of parents on adolescent alcohol consumption. Given the pervasiveness of online social media use, Facebook may be an effective means of recruitment and intervention delivery.ObjectiveThe objective of the study was to determine the efficacy of study recruitment via social networks versus paid advertising on Facebook.MethodsWe conducted a quasi-experimental sequential trial with response rate as the outcome, and estimates of cost-effectiveness. The target population was parents of 13-17 year old children attending high schools in the Hunter region of New South Wales, Australia. Recruitment occurred via: method (1) social recruitment using Facebook, email-based, social networks, and media coverage followed by method (2) Facebook advertising.ResultsUsing a range of online and other social network approaches only: method (1) 74 parents were recruited to complete a survey over eight months, costing AUD58.70 per completed survey. After Facebook advertising: method (2) 204 parents completed the survey over four weeks, costing AUD5.94 per completed survey. Participants were representative of the parents recruited from the region’s schools using standard mail and email.ConclusionsFacebook advertising is a cost-effective means of recruiting parents, a group difficult to reach by other methods.

Using Facebook ads with traditional paper mailings to recruit adolescent girls for a clinical trial

“…Facebook advertising can be more cost-effective and time-efficient than other internet recruitment methods (Loxton et al, 2015; Ramo & Prochaska, 2012; Ramo, Rodriguez, Chavez, Sommer, & Prochaska, 2014). Studies have used Facebook to successfully recruit adult participants (Batterham, 2014; Nelson, Hughes, Oakes, Pankow, & Kulasingam, 2014) as well as adolescent participants (Altshuler, Storey, & Prager, 2015; Chu & Snider, 2013; Ellis et al, 2012; Fenner et al, 2012; Gilligan, Kypri, & Bourke, 2014; Mustanski, Greene, Ryan, & Whitton, 2015). With the exception of Mustanski et al (2015), however, these studies were cross-sectional and did not require parental permission for adolescent participation.…”

The role of epidemiology in MS research: Past successes, current challenges and future potential

“…62,[64][65][66] There is necessarily a limitation in that the populations accessed by these methods will vary as a function of age and access to technology; however, similar issues have arisen with the use of classical methods, like landline phone communication, particularly among younger populations. 67,68 The reverse age limitation is found with social media and mobile methods 66 .…”

Evaluating different recruitment methods in a longitudinal survey: Findings from the pan-European PASTA project (Preprint)

“…due to an increase in exclusive use of mobile phones or email rather than traditional mail or landline phone. Opportunistic approaches such as recruitment via social media promise cost savings [4,[7][8][9][10][11][12] and a better coverage of person groups that are hard to reach with the traditional recruitment methods, like parents of adolescents [8], adolescents themselves [10], people with special conditions [13,14], smokers [15] or low-income people [16]. Social media, like Facebook and Twitter, can potentially have a strong snowballing effect [17] given their intensive use and continuing growth (around 1.94 billion monthly active Facebook users worldwide [26]), their feature that information can be shared very easily among networks [17], and are therefore able to reach a large number of people in a very short time.…”