Understanding different attitudes towards advertising on Instagram and Facebook

Abstract

The concept of attitude towards advertising has been widely tested. However, the concept lacks work regarding social media. The present study, therefore, provides important new insight regarding a topic that is both important for academics and managers. As consumers are bombarded with thousands of advertisements every day and the use of digital marketing is constantly increasing, social media appear to be where managers are investing their money. We, therefore, want to provide insight and guidelines as to what aspects of advertisements managers should focus on and which platform is best suited to achieve the aspired attitudes. Through an online study with 246 respondents, the current paper finds clear evidence that Instagram is perceived more positively than Facebook and that informativeness has the biggest impact on attitude towards advertising on a social media platform. However, in contrast to previous studies, this study does not find evidence that entertainment has a significant impact on attitudes. The advice is, therefore, to focus on timely and relevant advertising to make the messages more informative.