Master’s Thesis
Exploring the Impact of Blog Type and Conversational Human Voice in Corporate Communications on Attitudes and Behavioral Intentions
Basak Naber Student ID: 11190701
Graduate School of Communication Track: Corporate Communication
Supervised by Dr. Toni van der Meer
Abstract
With the emergence of social media, influential members of blogosphere with large networks of followers increasingly influence organizations’ audiences. Today, fashion blogs are the largest segment of blogosphere. Their power is driven by two-way and friend-like communication style. As a result, besides adopting corporate blogs, organizations start to stimulate positive peer communication by sponsoring these influential bloggers. The aim of this study is to examine the impact of the blog type (sponsored user-generated without disclosure, sponsored user-generated with disclosure, corporate) and use of conversational human voice in blogs on consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions. The study was conducted in form of an online survey. The findings reveal that user-generated blogs lead to higher brand attitudes and purchase intentions compared to corporate blogs, but not to higher corporate reputation. Furthermore, it was found that there is no significant difference between using or not using conversational human voice. The gained insights of this study recommend organizations to leverage bloggers’ influential power to create higher brand attitude and purchase intentions.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 INTRODUCTION ... 4
2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ... 6
2.1 Blogs... 6
2.1.1 Corporate Blogs ... 7
2.1.2 Sponsored user-generated blog ... 8
2.2 Effectiveness of Corporate and Sponsored User-generated Blogs in Corporate Reputation, Brand Attitude, and Purchase Intention ... 8
2.2.1 The Effect of Conversational Human Voice ... 10
2.2.2 The Effect of Blog Type ... 12
2.2.3 The Moderating Effect of Persuasion Knowledge ... 13
2.2.4 Interaction Effect of Conversational Human Voice and Blog Type ... 15
3 METHODOLOGY ... 16 3.1 Research Design ... 16 3.1.1 Stimuli Design ... 16 3.1.2 Measures ... 17 3.2 Manipulation Checks 1... 20 3.3 Manipulation Checks 2... 22 3.4 Respondents ... 23 3.5 Procedure ... 24 3.5.1 The Survey ... 24 4 RESULTS ... 24 4.1 Hypothesis Testing ... 24
4.1.1 The effect of Conversational Human Voice, and Blog Type... 24
4.1.3 The Moderating impact of Persuasion Knowledge ... 29
4.2 Covariates Analysis ... 31
5 DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION ... 31
5.1 Discussion of Empirical Findings ... 31
5.2 Theoretical and Managerial Implications ... 33
5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research... 33
6 REFERENCES ... 35
7 APPENDIX A: MAIN TEST CONDITIONS ... 41
8 APPENDIX B: RESEARCH QUESTIONNAIRE ... 47
LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Frequencies of respondents per blog condition ... 23
Table 2 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Corporate Reputation ... 26
Table 3 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Brand Attitude ... 27
Table 4 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Purchase Intention ... 28
Table 5 Results of Levene's and Independent Samples t-test for Corporate Reputation, Brand Attitude, and Purchase Intention by Blog Type (User-generated vs. Corporate) ... 29
1 INTRODUCTION
In recent years, marketing messages communicated through traditional media channels have become less effective as consumers increasingly resist to excessive commercial clutter. With the launch of Web 2.0, consumers are able to produce and control the content they are exposed to. These changes required marketers to find new mediums to advertise their products and reach the target audience in a non-intrusive way (Halvorsen, Hoffmann, Manière &
Stankeviciute, 2013). To overcome these challenges of the interactive Web 2.0, organizations try to be relevant to their stakeholders and encourage them to engage with the brand via blogs.
Today, fashion blogs where peer-to-peer influence often occurs are the largest segment of the blogosphere (Halvorsen et al., 2013). The success of fashion blogs in terms of publicity results from the friend-like nature of bloggers and their two-way, conversational communication style different from traditional media channels (Colliander & Dahlen, 2011). Blogger-generated content are more interesting to consumers than company-made web content and thus, have a great ability to influence readers’ purchase decisions and attitude towards an organization (Chen, Ching, Tsai, Kuo, 2008; Chiu & Ho, 2009; Colliander & Dahlen, 2011).
In both academic literature and practical implications, opinions differ about whether blogging can serve as a strategic communication tool. Today, well-known and established brands often establish their own corporate blog. Many brands still hesitate to sponsor user-generated blogs as communication tools due to limited control over information (Okonkwo, 2007; Guzelis, 2010). However, considering the advantages of user-generated blogs over company-made content, it is advisable for organizations to stimulate positive peer communication by leveraging the influential members of blogosphere through sponsorships.
When talking about sponsorships, the relatively new regulations oblige companies and bloggers to include advertising disclosures. This brings up the question whether user-generated blogs lose their effectiveness when disclosures are included due readers’ knowledge on
marketers’ persuasion tactics. Even though there is a consensus on blogs’ effectiveness as a communication platform, it is not clear how to use them effectively (Chan & Guillet, 2011). Therefore, the aim of the study was to discover how type of blog (corporate, sponsored user-generated with advertisement disclosure, sponsored user-user-generated without advertising
disclosure) interplay with conversational human-like tone of voice (Kelleher & Miller, 2006) and affect consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions.
There is broad literature on blogs which provides a general discussion on how to use it as a part of organizations’ marketing strategy. However, there is only little research on factors that make blogs effective in facilitating positive organizational outcomes. Moreover, the combined impact of blog type and conversational human voice on attitudes and behavioral responses was not considered. Specifically, the studies on conversational human voice (Kelleher, 2009;
Kelleher & Miller, 2006; Park & Cameron, 2014) were discussed only in the context of corporate blogs, rather than discussing its effects on different blog types. This thesis aims to fill this gap. The study also provides insight on the effect of consumers’ knowledge on marketers’ persuasion tactics when considering sponsorships in user-generated blogs as there is lack of research on that topic. The results are expected to shed light on how organizations can strengthen their
relationship with customers and positively influence consumers’ behavioral intentions via using appropriate blog type and tone of voice.
Following the growing interest in and adoption of blogging in recent years, the central research question of this study is as follows:
How do blog type and use of conversational human voice in blogs affect consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions in organizational communication?
2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
2.1 Blogs
In the fashion industry of 21st century, consumers are not a passive recipient of news and trends, but rather actively participate in commenting, discussing, exchanging and ultimately creating fashion trends and news. The new dynamics push organizations to acquire a strong brand image and reputation, owing to the empowered consumers who request participation and interactivity (Sedeke &Arora, 2013).
These changes regarding technology and social preferences imply that organizations have to adapt their communication strategy and style (Cox, Martinez & Quinlan, 2008). Therefore, there is a need for a new kind of media which creates engagement to reach audiences and reaps the benefits of interactivity in the form of positive attitudes and behavioral intentions (Sigh, Jackson, Cullinane, 2008).
Blogs are online platforms which consist of chronologically organized entries on diverse subjects. Blogs are frequently updated and provide readers hyperlinks and ability to leave comments. Their main element is a very personal style facilitating the ongoing collective conversation. A distinct feature of a blog is that it helps individuals (either posting for
Overall, blogs are conceptually similar to the other Web 2.0 channels. However, blogs’ power is derived from their inherent interactivity resulting in unique and personalized
connectedness between organizations and publics (Singh et al., 2008).
This study identifies two types of blogs which can be used for corporate communications: corporate blogs, and sponsored user-generated blogs.
2.1.1 Corporate Blogs
Corporate blogs are defined as “a web page managed by a person or a group of people affiliated with a company” (Kelleher & Miller, 2006; Singh et al., 2008; Cox, Martinez, Quinlan, 2008). Even though corporate blogs share certain features with personal blogs, such as reverse chronological order and comment sections, they are distinct from each other with regard to purposes and authorship.
Corporate blogs combine “personal reflection and personal communication” (Ahuja & Medury, 2010) and are developed for business purposes such as advertising of products or relationship building with stakeholders. Corporate bloggers maintain the corporate blog and post in an official or semi-official capacity in an organization. Moreover, the public perceives
corporate bloggers as clearly related to the organization. Corporate blogs enable executives to convey new information about their organization, help employees to tell about events in the organization and allow marketers to gather feedback from publics (Kelleher & Miller, 2006; Singh et al., 2008; Cox et al., 2008). From the perspective of consumers, corporate blogs present information on a product or service, or provide information on company’s stance in case of criticisms (Ahuja & Medury, 2010).
2.1.2 Sponsored user-generated blog
Sponsored blogs come in the form of user-generated content and are written by
individuals who are unaffiliated with brands. They include various types of advertisements such as product reviews or links to organizations’ corporate webpage (Castellani, 2011). Bloggers integrate brands or products into their posts in exchange for compensation from sponsor organizations (van Reijmersdal, Neijens, and Smit, 2009). Companies mostly sponsor user-generated blogs by giving cash, gifts or gift vouchers, discounts, or a chance to select free products.
In sponsored posts the brand name is mentioned and product details are given, mostly accompanied by personal voice and perspective (Kulmala, Mesiranta & Tuominen, 2013). Sponsored content without disclosure can be identified as covert marketing (Campbell, Mohr, and Verlegh, 2012). Therefore, new laws have been introduced in Europe. Even though these laws oblige companies and bloggers to disclose sponsorships, it has not been made clear in which way readers should be informed (Boerman, 2014). In this study, sponsored blogs are defined as written by a blogger who receives cash compensation of any amount to endorse a brand or a product.
2.2 Effectiveness of Corporate and Sponsored User-generated Blogs in Corporate Reputation, Brand Attitude, and Purchase Intention
Among the plethora of personal and professional social networking platforms, blogs still serve as effective communication platforms for corporate communications. Their effectiveness is derived from their ability to facilitate conversations and feedback (Kent, 2010), giving readers an insight into the company, while readers’ uncensored comments in comment sections provide
organizations an insight into their publics. Corporate blogs allow organizations to directly communicate with stakeholders while still carrying the characteristics of interpersonal
communication (Kelleher & Miller, 2006; Colliander & Dahlen, 2011). Adopting a corporate blog positively influences public perception on organizations’ willingness to share information and engage in conversation as it conveys a desire to create and maintain a value-laden
relationship with stakeholders. This perceived value-laden relationship can eventually reinforce behavioral intentions as it compensates for cognitive dissonance (Ahuja & Medury, 2010; Sigh et al., 2008).
On the other hand, user-generated blogs provide personal experiences and interests which enable readers to “get to know the blogger on a personal level” (Halvorsen et al., 2013, p. 213). This emotional and personal connection attached to bloggers by their audience creates a friend-like relationship. Thus, messages conveyed by bloggers are considered highly reliable and trustworthy (Halvorsen et al., 2013; Sedeke & Arora, 2013). Serving as both source and guide for their readers, bloggers interpret the information taken from mass media and communicate it through group interactions. The commercial content blended in personal content can easily lead to readers’ identification with bloggers and thus, with the products and organizations they like (Pihl & Sandstrom, 2013).
In web 2.0 people share their experiences with an organization, its services and products regardless of the existence of a blog. It is therefore an opportunity for organizations to have a blog or to collaborate with a blog where these experiences can be requested and responded. In this way, organizations can control and manage important organizational outcomes such as reputation, brand attitude and purchase intention (Sigh et al., 2008).
Reputation is defined as an attitudinal construct which is comprised of two components: emotional and rational components (Fombrun, Gardberg, &Sever, 2000). According to Fombrun et al., (2000) reputation is “a collective representation of a firm's past behavior and outcomes that depicts the firm's ability to render valued results to multiple stakeholders”, while brand attitude is consumers’ overall evaluation of a brand. Brand attitude results from associated attributes and benefits of a brand. It is highly related to the concept of purchase intention since attitude motivates behavior (Cheng, Ching, Tsai, and Kuo, 2008). Purchase intention is described as consumers’ conscious choice (Spears & Singh, 2004) and possibility to buy a product in the future (Kim & Ko, 2012), which can result from positive brand attitudes.
Given the great potential of blogs as described above, this work examines blogs effectiveness on the interrelated concepts of corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention. However, this study argues that the effectiveness of blogs might differ depending on some elements. Therefore, this study tests the influence of two elements on the effectiveness of blogs regarding attitudes and behavioral intentions: the blog type and conversational human voice (CHV).
2.2.1 The Effect of Conversational Human Voice
The way an organization communicates can shape perceptions of stakeholders and eventually can affect the overall attitudes towards the organization. Blogs have a great potential to render corporate messages personally meaningful to people (Singh et al., 2008; Kelleher & Miller, 2006). Blogs’ two-way communication style and informal language resembles one-to-one communication, which eventually humanizes organizations (Thorson & Rodgers, 2006).
This study identifies personal voice, two-way communication via comment section, informal language, and interactivity inherent in blogs as mentioned above, as the indicators of CHV. CHV is described as “an engaging and natural style of communication as perceived by an organization’s publics based on interactions between individuals in the organization and
individuals in the publics” (Kelleher, 2009, p.177). Its indicators include characteristics of informal communication, such as creating a dialog via conversational communication, treating others as human, and using humor and informal language, usually not associated with traditional corporate communication (Kelleher & Miller, 2006).
The use of CHV inherent in blogs leads to positive relational outcomes from publics owing to the open and trust-based organizational communication (Floreddu, Cabiddu, Evaristo, 2014). And this holds true even in times of crisis by creating a perception of transparent and open dialogue (Park & Cameron, 2014; Sweetser & Metzgar, 2007). The studies by Dywer (2007), Kelleher (2009), and Kelleher and Miller (2006) found that CHV has a positive impact on relational outcomes (e.g. trust, satisfaction) which are described as antecedents of high corporate reputation. Moreover, Coliander and Dahlen (2011) confirmed the positive effect of blogs on attitudes owing to their humanized nature compared to traditional communication channels.
Given the suggested positive influence of CHV in blogs on readers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions the following hypothesis is proposed:
H1: Blogs with conversational human voice (CHV) lead to higher corporate reputation, brand attitude and purchase intention than blogs without conversation human voice, regardless of the blog type.
2.2.2 The Effect of Blog Type
Blogs have become increasingly attractive for organizations due to their potential ability of encouraging consumer-to-consumer recommendations and the higher credibility in
comparison to marketer-generated content (Kulmala, Mesiranta & Tuominen, 2013). The interpersonal communication style of these “fashionable friends” (Colliander & Dahlen, 2011) has become effective in influencing the attitudes of their connected network (Uzunoglu & Misci-Kip, 2014; Colliander & Dahlen, 2011).
One might argue that the control over the user-generated content in blogs is limited and this makes it inefficient for organizations. Accordingly, many companies prefer to start their own corporate blog in order not to rely on third-party mediators. However, corporate blogging also carries the risks of having limited control over information communicated to audiences, which might harm organizations’ reputation (Cox et al., 2008). As a result, one might doubt the successful adoption of blogs in the corporate context (Huang, et al., 2007), leaving established companies reluctant to adopt them in their communications. Instead, they prefer to collaborate with bloggers who create valuable content on behalf of organizations (Sedeke & Arora, 2013).
Previous research seems consistent on the effectiveness of user-generated content compared to corporate blogs due to perceptions of higher genuineness. Booth and Matic (2011) argues that leveraging the influential members of social network communities provide a strong ability to control corporate reputation as these influencers nowadays “impact brand equity as never before”. Hence, trying to manage corporate reputation by simply having a presence on social media platforms is just an illusion of control. Influential members act as the new brand ambassadors, and can be leveraged to shape and even protect an organization’s reputation (Booth
et al., 2011). Concordantly, a study from Van Norrel, Kommers, van Hoof, and Verhoeven (2014) showed that recruiting celebrities who are seen as experts on a specific topic is effective in repairing damaged corporate reputation on Twitter (Van Norrel, et al., 2014).
Consumers trust peer reviews a lot more than corporations, and therefore they are more likely to use information provided by users for making purchase decisions (Hsu, Lin & Chiang, 2013; Ho, Chiu, Chen, & Papazafeiropoulou, 2015; Lee and Koo, 2012; Chen, Ching, Tsai, Kuo, 2008). Chang (2011) found that before making purchase decisions, consumers had more positive attitudes after reading user-generated blogs than corporate blogs.
In summary, a blogger who knows the organization well and is engaged in the brand can serve as an important partner for organizations (Sigh et al., 2008). Organizations can benefit from blogs as a source of publicity by leveraging bloggers’ influential power via collaborations (Uzunoglu & Misci-Kip, 2014; Colliander & Dahlen, 2011). Given the prevailing opinion in literature that fashion bloggers are the most influential members of the blogosphere, this study test the following hypothesis:
H2: User-generated blogs leads to higher corporate reputation, brand attitude and purchase intention than corporate blogs regardless of being sponsored or not.
2.2.3 The Moderating Effect of Persuasion Knowledge
Previous research yielded contradictory results about possible positive effect of user-generated blogs with advertising disclosure (AD) compared to that of corporate blogs on consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions. Lu, Chang, and Chang (2014) and Halverson et al., (2013) found that even when the sponsorships are disclosed, consumers’ attitudes are not negatively affected. If bloggers are honest about being sponsored, readers do not question
bloggers’ authenticity and trustworthiness (Lu et al., 2014; Halverson et al., 2013). Kulmala et al., (2012) explained this by the resemblance of marketer-influenced content to naturally-occurring content in fashion blogs regarding communication style. If bloggers reveal
compensations and continue to maintain their own personal language, style and feeling of the blog, readers perceive them still as trustworthy (Halverson et al., 2013; Lu et al., 2014; Kulmala et al., 2012).
On the contrary, there is empirical research which suggests otherwise. Lee & Koo, 2012 stated that when bloggers disclose the collaboration with an organization, the readers feel that the blogger is biased, which renders the persuasive intent of the messages ineffective. Petty and Andrews (2008) discussed that readers consider bloggers who receive cash payments for reviews less credible than those who receive gifts or vouchers. Campbell et al., (2013) also found that AD in TV shows negatively affect consumers’ attitudes towards the brand.
Taken together, existing research mostly suggest that sponsorship disclosures make readers aware of persuasion attempts which eventually leads to negative attitudes and behavioral intentions. Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed:
H2a: The user-generated blog without advertising disclosure leads to higher corporate reputation than the user-generated blog with advertising disclosure and corporate blogs.
The concept of Persuasion Knowledge by Friestad & Wright (1994) can be used to explore how the effect of sponsorship disclosures on consumers’ attitudes changes. The Persuasion Knowledge model explains how people develop knowledge about marketers’ persuasion attempts over a life time. As people become aware of persuasion attempts, they activate their persuasion knowledge to control the marketers’ influence on them (Friestad &
Wright, 1994). Consumers become resistant to messages when the persuasive intent is apparent (Hass & Grady, 1975) and develop negative attitudes due to distrust of sponsored content (Campbell, Mohr, and Verlegh, 2007; Boerman, van Reijmersdal & Neijens (2012).
As people differ in their persuasion knowledge, their reaction to persuasion attempts might differ when being exposed to sponsorship disclosures in user-generated blogs. Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed:
H3: When the user-generated blog adopts an advertising disclosure and people have high persuasion knowledge, this will result in lower corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention than when people have low persuasion knowledge.
2.2.4 Interaction Effect of Conversational Human Voice and Blog Type
There is little research on the combined effectiveness of blog type and CHV on
consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions. Only Morimote and Trimble (2012) found that when consumers search online for product information, personal and informal language used in user-generated blogs was more effective in influencing purchase decisions than corporate blogs.
Given the fact that both user-generated blogs and CHV are expected to have a positive influence on consumers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions, it is worth investigating if they amplify each other. Therefore, it can be hypothesized that blog type and CHV interacts to influence attitudes and behavioral intentions.
H4: User-generated sponsored blog without advertising disclosure and with CHV leads to higher levels of corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention than User-generated blog with advertising disclosure and with CHV, User-User-generated blog with
advertising disclosure and without CHV, User-generated blog without advertising disclosure and without CHV, Corporate blog with CHV, and Corporate blog without CHV conditions.
3 METHODOLOGY
3.1 Research Design
An experimental research was conducted employing a 3X2 between-subjects design. The respondents in the survey were randomly assigned one of the conditions to assess the effect of independent variables blog type (user-generated blog without AD, user-generated blog with AD, and corporate blog) and conversational human voice (with or without) on the dependent
variables: brand attitude, and purchase intention, and corporate reputation. However, the
independent variable advertising disclosure was not applied to corporate blog as corporate blogs include company-made content. Moreover, Persuasion Knowledge was included as a moderating variable in the research.
3.1.1 Stimuli Design
3.1.1.1 Material.
A Fashion blog and a corporate blog for one hypothetical brand was developed by using Google: Blogger. A fictitious brand called “LessIsMore” and a blogger called “Belia B.” were created to prevent participants from being prejudiced by existing brand associations. The brand was developed as a fashion apparel brand for both men and women.
All blogs had a blog title, and “About Me” section. The background was identical in all of the conditions to avoid participants’ biases which might occur due to their preferences towards certain presentation styles. Blog title indicated the type of the blog as in reality it can often be identified by blogs’ titles whether a blog is a personal or company-owned. The “About Me/ the Blogger/ Us/ LessIsMore” sections of the blogs also indicated by whom the blog was written and what can readers find in the blog.
The layout of the blogs was kept the same in all of the conditions in order to control for different perceptions caused by blogs’ visual elements. Respondents were exposed to the same information about the same product in each condition. In order to test the effect of CHV the wording of blogs differed. Each blog type had two conditions: one with CHV and one without. In order to reflect this difference, the messages’ tone was slightly different. The blog conditions with CHV were written in the first person and included personal and informal communication by using everyday language. They included a comment section and asked readers to tell their
opinions. However, blogs without CHV had more like a corporate voice and provided only straightforward information written in the third person. These blogs made it more obvious that the author tries to persuade readers to eventually buy the product. Moreover, the content of “About Me” section was different for blogs depending on the presence or absence of CHV.
In order to measure the effect of persuasion knowledge of readers on the relationship between the blog type and attitudes and behavioral intentions, the blog conditions differed in the inclusion of AD. Since the inclusion of disclosures can be only be applied to user-generated blogs, corporate blog conditions were exempted from disclosures. Therefore, one of the user-generated blog conditions had a clear AD, while the other did not. The way the disclaimer was formulated was also adapted to whether CHV was present. For more information see Appendix A for the fictitious blog pages developed for this study.
3.1.2 Measures
Purchase Intention. The purchase intention was measured using two scales. One 7-point scale
was from Spears and Singh (2004) with one item: ‘I would buy this product’ (1: strongly disagree; 7: strongly agree). The second 7-point scale by Bone and Ellen (1992) with the
following item was included: ‘The next time I buy a coat, I will buy LessIsMore’ (1: strongly disagree; 7: strongly agree). The two scales are combined to form a new purchase intention interval scale by taking a mean score from the ratings of the 2 items and had a Cronbach’s alpha of .83. The purchase intention scores ranged from 1.0 to 6.0 (M = 3.56, SD = 1.28). Purchase intention was non-normally distributed, with skewness of - .42 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - .58 (SE = .37).
Brand Attitude. The Brand attitude 7-point scale by Spears and Singh (2004) (α=.94) with the
following items were used: ‘bad-good’, ‘unappealing-appealing’, ‘unpleasant-pleasant’, ‘unfavorable-favorable’, and ‘unlikable-likable’. For further analyses, a mean score from the ratings of the 6 items was calculated to form a new brand attitude interval scale. The brand attitude scores ranged from 1.0 to 7.0 (M = 4.75, SD = 1.18). Brand attitude was non-normally distributed, with skewness of - .65 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - .88 (SE = .37).
Corporate Reputation. “The Reputation Quotient: A multi-stakeholder measure of corporate
reputation” 7-point scale by Fombrun, Gardberg, and Server (2000) with 7 items on three dimensions was adapted to the study: ‘I have a very good feeling about the brand’, ‘I admire and respect the brand’, ‘The brand stands behind its products and services’, ‘The brand offers high quality products and services’, ‘The brand offers products and services that are good value for the money’, ‘I trust the brand’, and ‘I trust the brand to do right thing if it were faced with a product or service problem’. For further analyses, a mean score from the ratings of the 7 items was calculated. The new interval scale had a Cronbach’s alpha of .86. The corporate reputation scores ranged from 1.0 to 6.29 (M = 4.35, SD = .89). Corporate reputation was non-normally distributed, with skewness of - .46 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - .76 (SE = .37).
Persuasion Knowledge. Items from four different scales were combined to measure persuasion
knowledge. For further analyses, a mean score from the ratings of the 7 items was calculated. The new 7-item interval scale had a Cronbach’s alpha of .78. The persuasion knowledge scores ranged from 2.45 to 6.8 (M = 4.20, SD = .76). Persuasion knowledge was non-normally
distributed, with skewness of .47 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of .65 (SE = .37).
First, “Knowledge about persuasion tactics scale” by Boush, Friestad, and Rose (1994) with one item on a 7-point scale (1: not hard at all, 7: very hard) was used: ‘When the blog talks about the product, how hard is the advertiser trying to make you want the product?’.
Secondly, “Conceptual and attitudinal persuasion knowledge scale” by Boerman, Reijmersdal and Neijens (2012) was used with the following items both measured on a 7-point scale: ‘Do you think the blog post about the product was an advertising?’ (1: definitely not, 7: definitely yes), and ‘I think the blog post about the product was: honest; trustworthy; convincing; biased; not credible’ (1: strongly disagree, 7: strongly agree). The first three items (I think the blog post about the product was: honest; trustworthy; convincing) were reverse coded.
The third was “Persuasion knowledge scale” by Boerman, Reijmersdal and Neijens (2014) with two items measured on 7-point scale (1: strongly disagree, 7: strongly agree): ‘While reading the blog, I criticized the message of the blog post about the brand’; ‘While reading the blog, I was skeptical toward the blog post about the brand.’
Finally, “Perceived appropriateness of covert marketing scale” by Wei, Fischer and Main (2008) with the items measured on 7-point scale (1: strongly disagree, 7: strongly agree): ‘It seems acceptable to me if the brand had paid to be mentioned;’; ‘It seems fair to me if the brand had paid to be mentioned’. These two items were reverse coded.
Blog Reader. The control variable Blog Reader was measured on a 7-point scale (1: never, 7:
often) with one item measuring whether the respondents read fashion blogs in general or not. The blog reader scores ranged from 1.0 to 7.0 (M = 3.08, SD = 1.92). Blog reader variable was non-normally distributed, with skewness of .49 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - 1.12 (SE = .37).
Blog Follower. The control variable Blog Follower was measured on a 7-point scale (1: never, 7:
often) with one item measuring whether the respondents follow blogs in general or not. The blog follower scores ranged from 1.0 to 7.0 (M = 3.73, SD = 1.89). Blog follower variable was non-normally distributed, with skewness of .12 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - 1.20 (SE = .37).
Involvement. The control variable Involvement was measured on a 7-point scale by Chebat,
Charlebois and Gélinas-Chebat (2001) (α=.93) with the following items:
‘unimportant-important’, ‘irrelevant-relevant’, ‘meaningless-meaningful’, and ‘unnecessary-necessary’. For further analyses, a mean score from the ratings of the 4 items was calculated in order to form a new interval scale involvement variable. The involvement scores ranged from 1.0 to 7.0 (M = 4.16, SD = 1.38). Involvement variable was non-normally distributed, with skewness of - .10 (SE = .18) and kurtosis of - .09 (SE = .37).
3.2 Manipulation Checks 1
A pre-test was conducted to see if the manipulations were successful. It was analyzed whether the respondents were able to distinguish the author of the blog, saw the AD, and were able to differentiate content with CHV from content without CHV. The manipulation check allowed the researcher to include any minor adjustments before conducting the final test. The pretest was conducted on 30 respondents using the survey software Qualtrics. The response rate was 100%. 70% of the respondents were female.
The recognition of the author of the blog was tested using crosstabs. The results showed that 100% of the people who were in the corporate blog condition was able to recognize the author of the blog. However, only 40% of the participants in total could identify the author in user-generated blog conditions.
The recognition of the AD was tested using crosstabs. The results showed that 90% of the respondents in the Corporate Blog conditions were able to distinguish whether there is a
disclosure. However, in User-generated Sponsored Blog with AD condition only 40% of the participants indicated that they saw a disclosure, while 90% of the participants in User-generated Sponsored Blog without AD condition indicated that there was no disclosure.
The CHV scale is initially tested for its internal consistency. The 7-point scale (1: strongly disagree to 7: strongly agree) consisted of 9 items which were taken from 11 item conversational human voice scale by Kelleher and Miller (2006): ‘Invites people to
conversation’, ‘Is open to dialogue’, ‘Uses conversation-style communication’, ‘Tries to communicate in a human voice’, ‘Tries to be interesting in communication’, ‘Uses a sense of humor in communication’, ‘Attempts to make communication enjoyable’, ‘Would admit a mistake’, ‘Treats me and others as human’. For manipulation checks and further analyses, a mean score from the ratings of the 6 items was calculated to form a new interval scale.
Independent sample t-test was conducted to determine whether the blog posts with CHV and the blog posts without CHV are associated with different levels of CHV score. There was a significant difference in the scores for blogs with CHV (M = 4.55, SD=.88) and blogs without CHV (M = 3.61, SD = 1.21) conditions; t = 2.43, p = .021. The results suggest that CHV does have an effect on how the participants perceive the blog. Specifically, when blog posts include
CHV, participants consider the blogs as more human. This means that the stimuli developed to measure the effect of CHV can be carried out for the final experiment.
The results of the pre-test suggested that the respondents were not able to distinguish the author of the blog and whether there was a disclosure. Therefore, advertising disclosure and blog type (author) had to be manipulated again. However, due to limited time a second pre-test was not conducted. Therefore, after the data collection was complete and before starting the analysis, the stimulus for advertising disclosure was changed into a more noticeable disclosure, using a bigger, bold and red sponsorship sign to be used in the final survey. The stimulus for the blog type was made more distinguishable by placing the “About” section of the blog to a more central position. For the user-generated blog conditions, the author of the blog was made more salient by placing the blogger’s name under the main title of the blog.
3.3 Manipulation Checks 2
Before testing the hypotheses, the manipulation checks for the final survey were conducted. After the adjustments of the stimuluses for blog type and advertisement disclosure, the crosstabs showed that 72% percent of the respondents in the corporate blog condition was able to recognize the blog as written by the company. Similarly, 69% of the respondents in user-generated blog condition identified the blog as written by a user-blogger.
Results of the crosstabs showed that 73.2% of the participants who were assigned to the user-generated blog with AD group noticed that there was a disclosure. 78.7% of the participants who were in the user-generated blog without AD group indicated that they did not see any disclosure.
An independent sample t-test was conducted to compare CHV scores in blogs with CHV and blogs without CHV conditions. There was a significant difference in the scores for blogs with CHV (M = 4.70, SD = 1.00) and blogs without CHV (M = 3.70, SD = 1.02) conditions; t (168) = 6.40, p =.001. The results suggested that when participants read the blog posts with CHV, they interpret the blog content as including more CHV.
3.4 Respondents
An online experiment disseminated via Facebook was conducted to acquire respondents. The online questionnaire was administered to a convenience sample of friends and family of the researcher. In total, 200 people participated in the survey. However, due to incomplete answers 170 remained. A data clean-up was done by filtering incomplete answers. 69.4% of the
respondents was female, and the sample was relatively young (M = 27.51, SD = 8.60). 34.7% of the respondents had a master’s degree, followed by bachelor’s degree by 33.5%. Table 1
represents the number and percentages per each blog condition. Table 1 Frequencies of respondents per blog condition
Blog Type
Corporate Blog User-generated Blog with Advertising Disclosure
User-generated Blog without Advertising Disclosure Conversational Human Voice n % n % n % present 30 34.5 27 31 30 34.5 absent 23 27.7 29 34.9 31 37.3 Note. N = 170.
3.5 Procedure 3.5.1 The Survey
The survey started with an introduction which explained the respondents what the research was about, how much they would be spending filling out the questions, and assured them of their anonymity. Every respondent was provided a link which includes a screenshot of one randomly chosen blog type. They were asked to fully read the blog post and pay close attention to the blog profile and answer the questions based on the post shown. After finalizing the survey, the nature of the experiment was fully explained. The complete survey can be found in Appendix B.
4 RESULTS
Before conducting the analyses two new variables were computed: “IV_BlogType” for blog type, and “IV_CHV”. Normality tests and Levene’s test were carried out and the
assumptions were met except normality. However, the robustness of ANOVA allowed the researcher to carry out the analyses.
4.1 Hypothesis Testing
4.1.1 The effect of Conversational Human Voice, and Blog Type
A two-way ANOVA analysis was employed to explore the hypothesized relationships and determine if blog type, CHV, or the interaction of blog type and CHV had an effect on readers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions. The assumption of equal variances in the population has been met for the dependent variables Corporate Reputation [F (5, 164) = .65, p = .658]; Brand Attitude [ F (5, 164) = .61, p = .692]; Purchase Intention [F (5, 164) = .66, p = .649].
4.1.1.1 Corporate Reputation.
Interaction effect. Hypothesis 4 assumed that user-generated sponsored blog without
advertising disclosure and with CHV leads to higher levels of corporate reputation than all the other conditions with differing advertising disclosure and CHV. To address the interaction effect between blog type and CHV on corporate reputation as hypothesized in H4, a univariate two-way ANOVA was used. The interaction effect of blog type and CHV was not significant, F (2, 164) = .50, p = .607. Therefore, H4 could neither be confirmed nor rejected.
Blog Type. The main effect of blog type yielded an F ratio of F (2, 164) = 1. 22, p = .296, indicating that the effect of blog type on corporate reputation was not significant. The lack of significance resulted in the rejection of H2a which stated that user-generated blogs without advertising disclosure leads to higher corporate reputation than the user-generated blog with advertising disclosure and corporate blogs. No significant differences between subjects who read user-generated blog with AD, user-generated blog without AD or corporate blog was established. Conversational Human Voice. The results indicated that the main effect of CHV on corporate reputation was not significant, F (2, 164) = .74, p = .389. Therefore, H1 which stated that blogs with CHV result in higher corporate reputation than blogs without CHV was rejected. No significant differences between subjects who were exposed to blogs with CHV or blogs without CHV independent of the blog type (user-generated vs. corporate) was established. Table 2 provides the two-way ANOVA analysis results for corporate reputation.
Table 2 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Corporate Reputation
Sum of Squares df Mean Square F p
IV_CHV 0.60 1 0.60 0.74 0.389 IV_BlogType 1.99 2 0.99 1.22 0.296 IV_CHV*IV_BlogType 0.81 2 0.40 0.50 0.607 Error 133.27 164 0.81 Total 3360.24 170 Note. N = 170. 4.1.1.2 Brand Attitude.
Interaction effect. Hypothesis 4 assumed that user-generated sponsored blog without
advertising disclosure and with CHV leads to higher levels of brand attitude than all the other conditions with differing advertising disclosure and CHV. A two-way ANOVA was carried out for the interaction effect between blog type and CHV on brand attitude. The interaction effect of blog type and CHV was not significant, F (2, 164) = .74, p = .476. Therefore, H4 could neither be confirmed nor rejected.
Blog Type. The main effect of blog type yielded an F ratio of F (2, 164) = 2. 74, p = .067, indicating that the effect of blog type was not significant. The results suggested that no
significant differences between subjects who read user-generated blog with AD, user-generated blog without AD or corporate blog was present. Therefore, H2 which stated that user-generated blogs without AD leads to higher brand attitude than the user-generated blog with AD and corporate blogs was rejected.
Conversational Human Voice. The main effect of CHV on brand attitude was not significant, F (2, 164) = .01, p = .895. No significant differences between subjects who were exposed to blogs
with CHV or blogs without CHV independent of the blog type (user-generated vs. corporate) was established. Therefore, H1 which stated that blogs with CHV result in higher brand attitude than blogs without CHV was rejected. Table 3 provides the two-way ANOVA analysis results for brand attitude.
Table 3 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Brand Attitude
Sum of Squares df Mean Square F p
IV_CHV 0.02 1 0.02 0.01 0.895 IV_BlogType 7.54 2 3.77 2.74 0.067 IV_CHV*IV_BlogType 2.04 2 1.02 0.74 0.476 Error 225.39 164 1.37 Total 4083.44 170 Note. N = 170. 4.1.1.3 Purchase Intention.
Interaction effect. Hypothesis 4 assumed that user-generated sponsored blog without advertising disclosure and with CHV leads to higher levels of purchase intention than all the other conditions with differing advertising disclosure and CHV. A two-factor ANOVA was carried out for the interaction effect between blog type and CHV on purchase intention. The interaction effect of blog type and CHV was not significant, F (2, 164) = .04, p = .957. Therefore, H4 could neither be confirmed nor rejected.
Blog Type. The main effect of blog type yielded an F ratio of F (2, 164) = 2. 92, p = .057, indicating that the effect of blog type was not significant. The results suggested that no
significant differences between subjects who read user-generated blog with AD, user-generated blog without AD or corporate blog was present. Therefore, H2 which stated that user-generated
blogs without AD leads to higher purchase intention than the user-generated blog with AD and corporate blogs was rejected.
Conversational Human Voice. The main effect of CHV was not significant, F (2, 164) = 1.80, p = .181. No significant differences between subjects who were exposed to blogs with CHV or blogs without CHV independent of the blog type (user-generated vs. corporate) was established. Therefore, H1 which stated that blogs with CHV result in higher purchase intention than blogs without CHV was rejected. Table 4 provides the two-way ANOVA analysis results for purchase intention.
Table 4 Results of Two-way ANOVA for Blog Type, Conversational Human Voice, and Purchase Intention
Sum of Squares df Mean Square F p
IV_CHV 2.93 1 2.93 1.80 0.181 IV_BlogType 9.48 2 4.74 2.92 0.057 IV_CHV*IV_BlogType 0.14 2 0.07 0.04 0.957 Error 266.25 164 1.62 Total 2441.75 170 Note. N = 170.
4.1.2 The effect of Blog Type (User-generated vs. Corporate)
Hypothesis 2 assumed that user-generated blogs in general leads to higher corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention than corporate blog. To test this, a new variable “UGvsCorp” which combines user-generated blogs with advertising disclosure and without advertising disclosure was created. An independent samples t-test was conducted to compare the corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention scores for user-generated and
The results showed that there was no significant difference in corporate reputation
between user-generated (M = 4.41, SD = .92) and corporate blogs (M = 4.22, SD = .83); t (168) = 1.28, p = .202, 95% CI [ - .103, .483]. However, there was a significant difference in brand attitude between user-generated (M = 4.880, SD = 1.179) and corporate blogs (M = 4.48, SD = 1.14); t (168) = 2.03, p = .044, 95% CI [ .011, .775], and in purchase intention between user-generated (M = 3.71, SD = 1.28) and corporate blogs (M = 3.24, SD = 1.22); t (168) = 2.23, p = .027, 95% CI [ .054, .882].
Taken together, these results suggest that blog type has an impact on brand attitude and purchase intention, but not on corporate reputation. Specifically, when people read a product review on user-generated blogs, they tend to develop more positive behavioral intentions. In conclusion, hypothesis 2 can be partially accepted. Table 5 provides the results of the independent samples t-test.
Table 5 Results of Levene's and Independent Samples t-test for Corporate Reputation, Brand Attitude, and Purchase Intention by Blog Type (User-generated vs. Corporate)
Test for Equality of Variances t-test for Equality of Means
F p t df p
Corporate Reputation 0.18 0.667 1.28 168 0.202
Brand Attitude 0.10 0.747 2.03 168 < 0.05
Purchase Intention 0.12 0.726 2.23 168 < 0.05
Note. N = 170.
4.1.3 The Moderating impact of Persuasion Knowledge
Hypothesis 3 suggested that when the user-generated blog adopts an AD and people have high persuasion knowledge, this will result in lower corporate reputation, brand attitude, and
purchase intention than when people have low persuasion knowledge. Before conducting the analysis, the continuous scale variable “PersuasionKnowledge” was transformed into a categorical variable “PersKnow_Low_High” by taking the median as the cut point. By doing this, the researcher was able to identify participants who score below the median as low in persuasion knowledge, and vice versa. Afterwards, a two-way ANOVA was carried out to see whether the interaction of blog type and persuasion knowledge had an effect on readers’ attitudes and behavioral intentions. The assumption of equal variances in the population has been met for the dependent variables Corporate Reputation [F (5, 164) = .47, p = .791]; Brand Attitude [F (5, 164) = 1.07, p = .379]; Purchase Intention [F (5, 164) = .71, p = .616].
A two-way ANOVA was carried out to see whether the effect of blog type on corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention was dependent on the level of persuasion knowledge.
4.1.3.1 Corporate Reputation.
The results of the analysis showed that there was no statistically significant interaction between the effects of blog type and persuasion knowledge on corporate reputation, F (2, 164) = .27, p = .757. Therefore, the Hypothesis 3 is rejected for corporate reputation.
4.1.3.2 Brand Attitude.
The results of the analysis showed that there was no statistically significant interaction between the effects of blog type and persuasion knowledge on brand attitude, F (2, 164) = .35, p = .699. Therefore, the Hypothesis 3 is rejected for brand attitude.
4.1.3.3 Purchase Intention.
The results of the analysis showed that there was no statistically significant interaction between the effects of blog type and persuasion knowledge on purchase intention, F (2, 164) = .22, p = .802. Therefore, the Hypothesis 3 is rejected for purchase intention.
4.2 Covariates Analysis
In order to eliminate the effect of covariates on the relationship between the independent variables (blog type and conversational human voice) and dependent variables (corporate reputation, brand attitude, and purchase intention), a two-way ANCOVA is conducted. The covariates were “Involvement”, “Follower”, “Reader” to control for individual differences. The results showed that only the covariate Involvement was significant which account for the 18% of the variability in Corporate Reputation, 24% of the variability in Brand Attitude, and 26% of the variability in Purchase Intention. There was a significant relationship between Involvement and the dependent variables corporate reputation, F (1, 161) = 35.27, p < .05, partial η2 = .18; Brand Attitude, F (1, 161) = 53.00, p < .05, partial η2 = .24; Purchase Intention, F (1, 161) = 58.92, p < .05, partial η2 = .26. However, the inclusion of the covariate did not change the relationship between blog type, CHV, and the dependent variables.
5 DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION 5.1 Discussion of Empirical Findings
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of blog type (sponsored user-generated with AD, sponsored user-user-generated without AD, corporate blog) and using CHV in blogs on attitudes and behavioral intentions of consumers.
Contrary to the initial hypothesis, no significant differences were found between blogs with and without CHV. The results are also contrary to the previous findings (Dywer, 2007; Kelleher, 2009, Kelleher and Miller; 2006). The insignificant effect might be attributed to the setup of the experiment with screenshots of a fictional blog, which might be very different to the experience of following an actual blogger and building a trust-based relationship over time. Future research could choose respondents among actual followers of actual blogs.
When a comparison was made between the three types of blogs, there was no significant effect. This may be attributed to the near identical layout of the blogs, especially for the case of user-generated blogs. However, there are significant results when respondents of user-generated blogs were combined into one group. They showed higher brand attitudes and purchase
intentions compared to corporate blogs, but were not significantly different regarding corporate reputation. This supports previous research which showed that user-generated blogs are more effective in positively influencing readers’ attitudes and purchase intentions (Chang, 2011; Colliander & Dahlen, 2011; Gillin & Moore, 2009; Hsu, Lin & Chiang, 2013; Ho, Chiu, Chen, & Papazafeiropoulou, 2015; Chen, Ching, Tsai, Kuo, 2008; Lee and Koo, 2012). The insignificant result for corporate reputation might again be related to presenting a fictitious brand/blogger, since reputation is formed based on an organization’s past actions and stakeholders’ direct interactions (Floreddu, Kabiddu & Evaristo, 2014. Some respondents supported that assumption by stating that it was difficult for them to evaluate an organization they are not familiar with.
The interaction effect between the blog type and CHV did not yield any significant results. One could argue here that the content included primarily product information which could have been off-putting to respondents’ perceptions of genuineness. Moreover, persuasion knowledge had no moderating effect on the relationship between blog type and attitudes and
behavioral intentions. This might be ascribed to the fact that readers perceived all blog types, even the ones without disclosure, as sponsored.
Overall, it can be concluded that the results do not confirm the initial hypotheses, except for the significant differences between user-generated (with and without disclosure) and
corporate blogs.
5.2 Theoretical and Managerial Implications
This study provides theoretical insight if and how organizations’ communication
strategies can leverage blogs to create positive organizational outcomes. The current study aimed to discover the components of an effective communication platform in the context of blogs. Moreover, it aimed to contribute to research by comparing user-generated blogs with corporate blogs as a platform for reaping positive organizational outcomes.
The findings suggest that organizations should communicate to their audiences through user-generated blogs rather than adopting corporate blogs. Since the study used fictitious brands, the results can be especially beneficial for organizations which are new to the market.
5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research
First, a small sample size makes it difficult to generalize the results to larger populations. The results suggested that blog type has a significant positive effect only when user-generated blogs (with and without disclosure) were combined, which could be related to the larger sample size of that group. Future research with larger sample sizes could provide further insight on that matter.
As discussed above, the choice of using a fictitious blogger and brand might have
hindered the expected effects on attitudes and behavioral intentions. Therefore, researchers could focus on using familiar brands and actual blogs to be able to reach highly involved, real fans of bloggers/ brands. Consumers with already established sense of credibility towards bloggers/ brands can help researchers better understand how to improve organizational outcomes via blogs. Alternatively, a future study could extend the results of the current research by including
repeated exposures to blogs in order to make participants familiar with the brand and blogger. This would allow researchers to eliminate the hindering effects of one-time exposure to information about fictitious brands/ bloggers.
The current study’s focus on fashion blogs does not provide implications for different industries. Future research may want to consider low involvement products or other high involvement products in blogging context in order to find out if different product types leads to different results.
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7 APPENDIX A: MAIN TEST CONDITIONS
Condition 1: User-generated blog with advertising disclosure and without conversational human voice
Condition 2: User-generated blog with advertising disclosure and with conversational human voice
Condition 3: User-generated blog without advertising disclosure and without conversational human voice
Condition 4: User-generated blog without advertising disclosure and with conversational human voice
8 APPENDIX B: RESEARCH QUESTIONNAIRE Welcome,
Thank you for participating in the survey for my Master Thesis at the Graduate School of Communication of Amsterdam. This study is about blogs.
As a part of the study, I conduct an online experiment. First you will be shown a blog post. Please read it thoroughly and afterwards answer the questions. It will take about nine minutes to complete the questionnaire. This an anonymous study, your information will be used solely for academic purposes. There are no correct answers to the questions; please fill in the questions based on your personal opinion. Even if you think you cannot give a definite answer to a question, just try to respond to the best of your abilities.
You are kindly asked to read the following terms and conditions before starting the survey: I agree, fully and voluntarily, to participate in this research study. With this, I retain the right to withdraw my consent, without having to give a reason for doing so. I am aware that I may halt my participation in the experiment at any time. My personal data will not be passed on to third parties without my express permission. If I wish to receive more information about the research, either now or in future, I can contact Basak Naber (basak.naber@student.uva.nl). Should I have any complaints about this research, I can contact the designated member of the Ethics Committee representing the ASCoR (ascor‐secr‐fmg@uva.nl).
Thanks for your time. Basak Naber
Q1 Please click the link below. A new tab will be open and you will see an image of a blog post. You are kindly asked to fully read the blog post and pay close attention to the blog profile as the following questions are about this blog post. After you have finished reading the post, please come back to the tab where the questionnaire is and continue by clicking the "next" button.
Q2 By whom do you think the blog post you just read was written? The Company
A Fashion Blogger
Q3 Did you see any disclosure of sponsorship indicating that the author of the blog gets compensation/ payment for the blog post?
Yes, I have. No, I have not.
Q4 Please indicate to what extent you agree with the following statement. Strongly disagree Disagree Somewhat disagree Neither agree nor disagree Somewhat agree Agree Strongly agree I would buy this product from this brand. The next time I buy a coat, I will buy from this brand.
Q5 The following questions are about your perception of the brand LessIsMore you acquired while reading the blog post.
Please express your opinion on the brand LessIsMore: I perceive the brand as...
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Bad Good Unappealing Appealing Unpleasant Pleasant Unfavorable Favorable Unlikable Likable
Q6 The following question is about your perception of the brand LessIsMore you acquired while reading the blog post.
Please indicate how you feel about the brand LessIsMore. Strongly disagree Disagree Somewhat disagree Neither agree nor disagree Somewhat agree Agree Strongly agree I have a very good feeling about the brand.
Q7 The following question is about your perception of the brand LessIsMore you acquired while reading the blog post.
Please rate your admiration and respect for the brand LessIsMore. Strongly disagree Disagree Somewhat disagree Neither agree nor disagree Somewhat agree Agree Strongly agree I admire and respect the brand.
Q8 The following questions are about your perception of the brand LessIsMore you acquired while reading the blog post.
Please indicate to what extent you agree with the following statements regarding the products of the brand LessIsMore.
Strongly disagree Disagree Somewhat disagree Neither agree nor disagree Somewhat agree Agree Strongly agree The brand stands behind its products and services. The brand offers high quality products and services. The brand offers products and services that are good value for money.
