Consumer motivations for engagement with
online brand related activities on Facebook
A comparative study between adolescents and older people
Lieke Meeuwissen Student number: 10199985
Master’s thesis, track: Persuasive Communication Graduate School of Communication
University of Amsterdam
Thesis supervisor: Prof. dr. Eugène Loos Date: 22-06-2016
2
Abstract
In this study the motivations of older people (aged 50 to 70) to engage with online brand
related activities on Facebook are being compared with the motivations of adolescents (aged
18 to 25). Consumer online brand related activities are becoming more and more important
influencers on consumer behavior and the group of older people keeps expanding, and
therefore forms an interesting target group for marketers. For that reason the motivations of
the older people to either engage or not engage with consumer online brand related activities
on Facebook are being further explored throughout this study. In order to reveal whether the
motivations of older people are specifically linked to this age group, their motivations are
being compared with those of adolescents. The motivations were divided into three
categories: intrinsic motivations, extrinsic motivations, and amotivation (SDT- Ryan & Deci,
2000). The motivations for different types of consumer online brand related activities were
discussed, namely consuming, contributing, and creating brand related activities (Muntinga,
Moorman & Smit, 2011). Perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use were taken into
account as possible explanatory factors for differences between the age groups. The result
showed that there were no major differences between the motivations of the different age
groups. However, this study was helpful in providing more insight into the motivations that
older people have to engage or not engage with consumer online brand related activities on
Facebook, such as information, social interaction, and social identity for engagement, and
concerns with publicity, a negative attitude towards brand related activities, and a lack of
perceived usefulness for no engagement. These insights are useful for marketers and other
3
Introduction
In recent years, it has become clear that the ageing of society is an ongoing process that will
increase even more over the years (World Health Organization, 2014). For marketers this
means that the group of older people keeps expanding and therefore becomes more interesting
for targeting purposes (Moschis, 2012). At the same time, a shift is going on from the use of
traditional media advertising towards the use of new media advertising (Bezian-Avery, Calder
& Iacobucci, 1998; Pfeiffer & Zinnbauer, 2010)The question then arises whether new media
advertising is an effective way to reach this growing target group of people over 50. In this
study, the focus will be on people aged 50-70 because according to the Share Project
(http://www.share-project.org/) everyone over 50 belongs to group of older people. People
over 70 will be excluded from this study as their new media usage is extensively low amongst
people over 70 (Dutch Statistics, 2013). Whereas young people grow up with new forms of
media called digital natives by Prensky (2001), the adoption of new media technology is not
a straightforward affaire for older people, called digital immigrants by Prensky (2001), since
they are confronted with new media technology in a later stage in life (Cjaza & Lee, 2007;
Loos, 2012; Dogruel, Joeckel & Bowman, 2015). In order to get a better understanding of the
extent to which the use of new media as an advertising tool is effective for the target group of
people aged 50-70, more insight should be gained in the motivations of this group to actively
engage with brand-related activities. This is not only relevant for practitioners in the field of
marketing, but could also provide additional insights to the current literature on new media
advertising, so this group of people in the age group of 50-70 can be targeted more effectively
through new media. Online brand related activities are a very important influencer on
consumer behavior, moreover, interactions with and about brands have a much stronger
impact on consumer behavior than traditional forms of marketing and advertising (Chiou &
4 In this study, the motivations of consumers will be examined to either engage or not
engage with online brand-related activities by conducting in-depth interviews. In order to
investigate what motivations are specifically related to older people a comparison will be
made between the motivations of older people (aged 50-70) and those of adolescents (aged
18-15), as the latter belong to the most represented group on social media (Dutch Statistics,
2013) . Since there are too many social networking sites to research within the limited time
frame, this study will solely focus on brand-related activities on Facebook, which has the
highest percentage of the population that is active on this new media platform in comparison
to other new media platforms (Celebi, 2015; Dutch Statistics, 2013). All this leads us to the
following research question:
What are the motivations of older people (aged 50-70) who are active on Facebook to either actively engage or not engage with online brand-related activities on Facebook in
comparison with adolescents (aged 18-25) who are also active on Facebook?
The main sensitizing concepts (Bowen, 2006) in this study will be the terms amotivation,
extrinsic motivation, and intrinsic motivation from the self-determination theory (Ryan &
Deci, 2000), technology acceptance perceived usefulness and ease of use (Davis, 1989;
Dogruel, Joeckel & Bowman, 2015), and consumer online brand-related activities (Muntinga,
Moorman & Smit, 2011). The self-determination theory will be used to get a better
understanding of the motivations. The concept of technology acceptance could play an
explanatory role for the differences in motivations between the different age groups. Finally,
consumer online brand-related activities are the main outcome, which level is dependent on
how motivated people are. These main concepts and their role in this study will be disclosed
5 further light on the research design, research instrument, sample, and data analysis. After the
methodological section, the result will be discussed. The answer on the research question will
be disclosed in the conclusion. Finally, there will be a critical reflection on the research and
some suggestions for further research.
Theory
Consumer online brand-related content activities
Along with the rise of new media platforms, new opportunities arose for consumers to share
and create content on these new media platforms, including content related to brands (Kaplan
& Haenlein, 2010). This had a strong impact on brands, since consumers are becoming
increasingly dependent on information provided by other consumers instead of information
provided by the companies (Cova & Dalli, 2009). Because these interactions with and about
brands have become such a strong influencer on consumer behavior, marketers, advertisers
and scientist are continuously eager to get a better understanding of consumer online-brand
related activities (Chiou & Cheng, 2003; Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011).
But what are these consumer online brand-related activities (COBRA) exactly?
Muntinga, Moorman & Smit (2011) developed the COBRA concept to cluster all different
kinds of consumer-to-consumer and consumer-to-brand behaviors, which thus far had been
investigated separately. Because the COBRA concept includes all online brand-related
activities, Muntinga, Moorman & Smit (2011) distinguished three types of COBRA types
providing a better understanding of all the online brand-related activities and the level of
engagement that is linked to each type of activity. These COBRA types are in order from low
to high activity: consuming, contributing and creating. The COBRA ‘consuming’ type
represents all online brand-related activities that require a minimum level of effort, meaning
that people participate, without actively contributing or creating (Muntinga, Moorman &
brand-6 related videos, looking at brand-related pictures and reading comments on brand profile
pages. The COBRA ‘contributing’ type represents online brand-related activities that actually
contribute to the existing content, either through user-to-content or user-to-user interactions
about brands (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). On Facebook activities such as liking or
commenting on brand related posts or pages, joining a brand related group and engaging in
brand-related conversations, are examples of contributing activities. Finally, the ‘creating’
COBRA type represents the most effortful online brand related activities, in which people
actually produce or publish brand related content that others consume and contribute to
(Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). Activities on Facebook that are considered as creating
online brand-related activities are uploading brand-related images or videos, writing brand
related posts or setting up brand related pages.
These three COBRA types give a better understanding of what consumer online brand
related activities are and their differences in level of engagement with these activities. The
question then remains what actually motivates people to engage in these types of online
brand-related activities. In this study the self-determination theory by Deci & Ryan (2000)
will be used in order to get a better understanding of the motivations that consumers have to
actively engage with consumer online brand related content.
Motivations for COBRA’s: the self-determination theory
The self-determination theory by Deci & Ryan (2000) makes a distinction between three types
of motivation for certain behavior: intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation & amotivation.
Intrinsic motivation means that the motivation for certain behavior derives out of interest
without the necessity of separable consequences. Whereas extrinsic motivation arises from
external factors such as rewards or appreciation. Amotivation means that people either feel
incapable to perform certain behavior or that they do not see the point in performing the
7 motivation can be enhanced, since that is the most powerful form of motivation and therefore
most desirable to be generated by influencers. Deci & Ryan (2000) state that human beings
have a fundamental psychological need for competence, autonomy, and relatedness. The
satisfaction of these needs are the main key behind the performance of certain behaviors out
of intrinsic motivation. Firstly, the need for competence means that people like to feel capable
to perform certain behavior. If they have the feeling that they are not able to perform certain
behavior, their motivation will be very low. Secondly, people highly value the need to feel
autonomous. This means that if people get rewards or punishments to perform certain
behavior, their intrinsic motivation to perform will decrease, and will be replaced by extrinsic
motivation. Finally, relatedness has shown to be a reason for the maintenance of intrinsically
motivation behavior. This means that if people are being encouraged when performing
intrinsically motivated behavior they will more likely to maintain to perform this behavior.
However it is important to note that this is not a necessity, because some intrinsically
motivated behavior is performed in isolation, and if the intrinsic motivation is high enough no
encouragement is needed to maintain to perform this behavior.
Moorman, Muntinga & Smit (2011) found that people have several motivations for
engagement in consumer online brand-related content, but they did not used the
self-determination theory framework to understand whether the motivation derived intrinsically or
extrinsically. They found that there are three different motivations for the consuming COBRA
type, namely remuneration, information, and entertainment (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit,
2011). Remuneration is a clear example of extrinsic motivation, since the motivation comes
from the reward one gets for performing the behavior (Deci & Ryan, 2000). Information
could actually be both intrinsically and extrinsically motivated, since people could either want
information simply out of interest in the topic or brand or they could want information
8 brand. Entertainment is a good example of intrinsic motivation, since there is no need for an
external consequence, the activity in itself provides entertainment. Muntinga, Moorman &
Smit (2011) found that personal identity, integration, and social interaction, and entertainment
are motivations for the contributing COBRA type. Personal identity means that people like to
show their identity by either liking or sharing certain brands and products on Facebook. Social
interaction and integration means that people interact in order to meet like-minded others, and
interact with them about a particular brand (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). Personal
identity, integration and social interaction both can be seen as extrinsically motivations, since
the motivation is dependent on external factors, such as the fact that others can see one’s
personal identity or the connection with like-minded others. Finally, Moorman, Muntinga &
Smit (2011) found that motivations for creating COBRA’s are personal identity, integration
and interaction, empowerment, and entertainment. The only new type of motivation that was
mentioned with the creating COBRA type is empowerment, which means that people are so
enthusiastic about the brand, that they enjoy convincing others that the brand is worth
purchasing (Moorman, Muntinga & Smit, 2011). This is also a form of external motivation,
because the motivations to convince others depends on the extent to which they succeed.
Moorman, Muntinga & Smit (2011) do not address the reasons that people might have
to not engage in consumer online brand-related activities. Moreover, no distinction was made
between different age groups in their study. Some people experience amotivation to engage in
these brand related activities and it is also relevant to know what lies behind this amotivation.
As mentioned before, amotivation often derives from a perceived lack of capability to
perform the behavior or from the idea that there is no point in performing the behavior (Deci
& Ryan, 2000). This perceived lack of capability might play an important role for older
people, since they are confronted with these new media platforms in a later stage in life, in
9 Dogruel, Joeckel & Bowman, 2015). For older people, the acceptance of these new
technologies plays is an important determinant for their actual use of these technologies
(Dorguel, Joeckel & Bowman, 2015).
Technology acceptance
Davis (1989) found that perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use are the main
determinants for the acceptance of new media technologies. Davis (1989) defined perceived
usefulness as “"the degree to which a person believes that using a particular system would
enhance his or her job performance" (p.320). But even when people belief that engagement in
the new media technologies can be helpful, if they think it is too difficult to perform, they will
not use the new media technology. Davis (1989) refers to this as the perceived ease of use: “the degree to which a person believes that using a particular system would be free of effort”
(p.320). So a person might not perform a certain behavior if the perceived ease of use
outweighs the perceived usefulness (Davis, 1989).
Dorgruel, Joeckel & Bowman (2015) used this technology model, to conduct a study
how this technology acceptance model applies to older people (e.g. people over 50). They
found, in line with Davis (1989), that perceived usefulness plays a key role in the acceptance
of new media technologies (Dorguel, Joeckel & Bownman, 2015). In their study they refer to perceived usefulness as ‘enjoyment’. For elderly to adopt the new media technology, it is
essential that they belief that they are able to use the new technology. Their generated
self-efficacy has to be high. If so, the next precondition is their previous experience with new
technologies. If an older person does not have a lot of expertise or experience, it is possible
that they suffer from technophobia. However, if the new technology is perceived to be easy to
use and enjoyable then they might use it anyway (Dogruel, Joeckel & Bowman, 2015).
The acceptance of new media technologies plays an important role for older people.
10 therefore comes natural to them. On the other hand, previous research also found that even
though older people did not grew up with this new media technologies, if they are acceptant
toward the technologies and have a lot of experience with it, then the experience is more
important than age (Hill et al., 2011; Loos, 2011). But since the older people were confronted
with these new media technologies in a later stage in life, they often are less accepting and
have less experience with these technologies.
For this reason, it is likely that there is a difference between motivations to engage
with consumer online brand related activities of older people and the motivations of
adolescents. The technology acceptance might cause amotivation amongst older people, since they might feel like they are not capable to engage with COBRA’s or they might not see what
good it does to engage with COBRA’s.This will be examined further throughout this study.
Method
For this study a qualitative research strategy is best suited. The focus of this study is on the
motivations of the participants to engage or not engage with brand related activities on
Facebook. A qualitative research strategy is therefore necessary, since it prioritizes the vision
of the participant, which is exactly what is being done during this study (Bryman, 2008).
Besides that, a qualitative research is also best suited, since there are no studies performed in
Netherlands yet that concentrate on the role that age plays in the motivations for engagement
with brand related activities. Hence the fact that a explorative qualitative research strategy is
best suited.
The research design of this study is called a comparative study. This design is
typically used for studies that focus on a comparison between multiple groups (Bryman,
2008). Because in this study the motivations of older people are being compared with the
motivations of adolescents to either engage in Facebook advertisements or not, this is a
11 In order to gain extensive and detailed information about the motivations of the older
people and adolescents to actively engage or not engage with Facebook advertisements,
semi-structured interviews were used as the research method for this study. The interviews help to
identify the motivations of the participants about engaging with brand related activities on
Facebook. The interviews were semi-structured (based on topics from the sensitizing
concepts: consumer online brand related activities, amotivation, intrinsic motivation, extrinsic
motivation, and technology acceptance), because it created room for new ideas from
participants, which had not come up in the theoretical framework.
Research instrument and sensitizing concepts
Throughout the interview, the sensitizing concepts intrinsic motivations, extrinsic
motivations, amotivations, online consumer brand related activities, perceived usefulness, and
perceived ease of use were be brought up and were subject to further examination (Appendix
A). Before starting to discuss online brand related activities, the participants were given an
explanation of what can be considered as a brand. The description by Novagraaf, an institute
that gives consultations on the establishment of brands, was used: “Everything that
differentiates itself from other products or services by a name or a symbol can be labeled as a brand” (http://www.novagraaf.com/). After carefully explaining this and naming several
examples, the extent to which the participants engaged with certain types of online brand
related activities was explored. The COBRA typology by Muntinga, Moorman & Smit (2011)
was used a guidance for all the different types of consumer online brand related activities.
Once the participant had given an indication of the level of engagement with the brand related
activities, the motivations for this level of engagement were further discussed. This was done
by determining whether the motivation derived intrinsically or extrinsically, or is there was
amotivation, using Deci & Ryan’s (2000) definitions. In the case of amotivation, there was
12 ease of use outweighed the perceived usefulness, using Dogruel, Joeckel & Bowman’s (2015) and Davis’s (1989) theory on technology acceptance model.
Sample
As mentioned before, this study is focused on older people and adolescents. According to the
share project everyone over 50 belongs to the group of older people
(http://www.share-project.org/). However, research also showed that people over 70 are hardly active on
Facebook (Dutch Statistics, 2013). Since it is necessary for the participants to have a
Facebook account (in order to at least have the opportunity to engage with Facebook
advertising or not), the older people over 70 were excluded from the sample. The motivations
of the older people are being compared with adolescents in the age of 18-25 years old, since
they are the most represented age group on Facebook (Dutch Satistics, 2013). The sample of
this study includes both men (50%) and women (50%), and as many different ages within the
50-70 and 18-25 years ranges as possible (Appendix B). This differentiation within the
sample group was necessary since the sample must be a good representation of the groups of
older people and adolescents in order to make sure that the results can be applied to these
groups as a whole, and not just to the respondents (Bryman, 2008).
The sample size was 16 participants in total. The sample size could not be larger, due
to time restrictions. However, 16 respondents were enough to reach a point of saturation in the
data, which means that the collection of new data did not shed any further light on the issue
under investigation (Mason, 2010). Lastly, the research was performed in the Netherlands,
which meant that all the participants had a Dutch nationality. Altogether, this meant that the
sample of this study consists of sixteen Dutch participants (eight women and eight men)
within the age of 18 to 25 and 50 to 70, who are active on Facebook. These participants were
found through snowball sampling. This means that the network of a few familiar participants
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Data-analysis
Once all the interviews had been conducted, each interview was transcribed. Since the
interviews were conducted amongst Dutch people, the interviews and the transcriptions were
in Dutch as well. After the transcription phase, the interviews were analyzed in three different
phases, using the qualitative analysis program atlis.ti as the main coding tool. The first phase
was the open coding phase in which all the data (relevant or not) were labeled with a code
(Boeije, 2014). Since the goal of this study is to compare the motivations of older people with the motivations of adolescents, all codes were labeled with an “A:” when it concerned an
adolescent and with a “O:” when it concerned an older person. This was done in order to be
able to compare them afterwards. Besides that, the codes and quotes were translated into
English in order to be able to include them in this study. Secondly, during the axial coding
phase, all these codes were sorted and placed in different categories. In the final phase, the
selective coding phase, the categories were linked together so that the overlapping themes
were being revealed. This resulted in a categorized coding list for both the older people and
the adolescents, on which the concept indicator model was based.
Credibility, transferability, and reliability
In qualitative research credibility means that the results of the study seem credible from the participant’s perspective (Bryman, 2008). As Cope (2014) states: “A qualitative study is
considered credible if the descriptions of human experience are immediately recognized by
individuals that share the same experience” (Cope, 2014; pp. 16). In order to meet this
criteria, the results were discussed with the participants after they have been analyzed in order
to check whether they appeared to be recognizable and credible to them.
Transferability means that the study can be generalized to a larger group (Bryman,
2008). In this study the differentiation within the sample groups was taken into account to
14 adolescents (18-25) as a whole. This means that the findings on motivations for engagement
with COBRA’s are applicable on the whole group of older people and adolescents and not just
to the sample group itself. Finally, there were no assumptions made that the results are
applicable to groups other than the groups that were being researched in this study.
Reliability in qualitative research has always been difficult since it is impossible to
replicate and get the exact same data. However, in order to maintain as much reliability as
possible, verification throughout the entire research process is required (Morse et al., 2002).
Verification in qualitative research means that data were systematically checked, focus was
maintained, and the fit of the data and the conceptual work of analysis and interpretation were
monitored and confirmed constantly (Morse et al., 2002). Besides the fact that the data were
constantly checked and reconsidered, the research process was described as clear and detailed
as possible in order to make sure that the data can be verified to preserve the reliability.
Finally, the reliability was enhanced by letting several peers and a thesis supervisor check the
data.
Results
In this section the results derived from the interviews will be discussed. First, a short
summary of the Facebook usage of the participants in general will be discussed and then the
brand related activities and the motivations of the participants to either engage or not engage
with those activities will be disclosed. This will be done separately for the consuming brand
related activities, the contributing brand related activities, and the creating brand related
activities on Facebook (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). The motivations will be
discussed separately for each type of online brand related activity in order to get a profound
understanding of the motivations and the differences in motivations of the older people and
15 activities on Facebook in general will be summarized in two concept indicator models: one
for adolescents and one for the older people.
Overview of Facebook usage in general
At first, every participant was asked about his or her Facebook usage in general. This
information was requested because it could be an explanatory factor for the extent to which
one engages with brand related activities. If a person is not that active on Facebook, they are
also more likely to not be very engaged with brand related activities as well.
The adolescents that were being interviewed were active on Facebook since four to
eight years. Most of them created a Facebook account simply because everyone did. All of
them were daily Facebook users and the time spent on Facebook ranged from fifteen minutes
a day to two hours a day. They usually went on Facebook when they were bored, and while
being on Facebook their main activities were checking their timeline, checking what friends
are up to, looking up events and people, and checking their notifications.
The older people that were interviewed were active on Facebook since three to eight
years, which is somewhat similar to the adolescents. Most of them created a Facebook
account to keep in touch which friends and family, and also partly just because everyone did.
The older people were slightly less active on Facebook than the adolescents, their amount of
time spent on Facebook ranged from an hour a day to half an hour a week. The main activities
of the older people were checking what friends and family are doing and posting things
themselves.
Motivations to engage with consuming brand related activities
In terms of brand related activities, the first topic that was being discussed was the
motivations to either engage or not engage with consuming brand related activities. These are
16 (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). Consuming brand related activities such as watching
brand related videos or reading comments on brand related post were discussed. Typical for
these activities is that they are not very visible to others.
The intrinsic motivations of adolescents to engage with consuming brand related
activities were that they thought it was entertaining or because they were personally interested
in the topic. For example, a lot of participants mentioned that they found it entertaining to
read the comments on brand related posts when it was about a controversial topic:
“E: Sometimes when I see kind of controversial movies pop up, I think it’s funny to read the comments, because, and that sounds quite evil, the comments are so stupid sometimes.”
Besides the motivation that it is entertaining, participants also look at brand related images or
videos out of personal interest in the topic:
“G: Mostly it’s entertainment, but sometimes you have those interesting videos about for example a new research that meat is bad for you. Then I just find it interesting to watch it because I think it’s an interesting topic.”
Another participant was a big fan of field hockey, and looked at field hockey brand related
posts out of this personal interest.
“S: I look at game reports, pictures from the game, pictures from training days, well a lot of different things. But they are almost always related to field hockey.”
The older people had the same intrinsic motivations as the adolescents, entertainment
and personal interest. They also mentioned that the comments on controversial brand related
posts can be very entertaining to read:
“R: It’s entertaining, and maybe this sounds a bit strange, but I also read them just because I enjoy to criticize those people.”
The difference in personal interest however was that the adolescents were often interested in things related to their hobby’s such as for example surfing or hockey, but the older people
were more interested in topics related to their profession.
17 Next to the intrinsic motivations, the participants also mentioned extrinsic motivations
to engage with consuming brand related activities. For the adolescents information and social
interaction were the most important motivators. For example, one participant looked at brand
related images to keep up with trends:
“D: I like to see what trends are out there, I always think that’s cool.”
Another participant also really wanted to learn something from the brand related video’s: “E: Think those surf videos are very entertaining, but also interesting, because I surf myself and never had many lessons. So I look at those video’s too to see how they do certain things. Not that I manage to do it myself afterwards, but that’s a different story.”
The social aspect turned out to be a motivator for some participants because they wanted to be able to discuss certain video’s or images with friends.
“A: Sometimes people talk about those videos, and then I think I saw those too, and then we can discuss them together.”
Social interaction as a motivator for engagement with brand related activities has a slightly
different meaning here than discussed by Muntinga, Moorman & Smit (2011). They described
social interaction as interaction in order to meet like-minded others, and interact with them
about a particular brand. However, for the participants in this study social interaction meant
interacting with friends and family about certain brand related activities. Therefore social
interactions will be approached as interaction with familiar people in this study.
For the older people this social aspect was not a motivator to engage with consuming
brand related activities. However, information was indeed a motivator for them as well to look at some brand related video’s or images.
“H: I also look at them to see what the prices are and when it will happen.”
Some participants were also interested in reading the comments on brand related posts
because of the information.
“LM: Why do you read them? M: Well, because I would like to know from the people who bought the product, whether they have had a positive experience.”
18 For one of the older persons remuneration was the reason why he looked at certain brand
related images:
“M: Social media is also organized in such a way that if you click on a brand related image and look at the product, that you get an advertisement two days later that you can get a twenty percent discount. And that’s also the way how I use social media.”
On the other hand, there were also quite some adolescents and older people who had
amotivation to engage with consuming brand related activities. This was either caused by the
fact that they just did not feel the need or by the fact that they had a negative attitude towards
certain brand related activities. Especially sponsored advertisements caused amotivation. As
one of the adolescents mentioned:
“S: I have the feeling that it’s obtrusive, I don’t like that. So just because of that I kind of force myself to skip them.”
Some older people also mentioned their negative attitude towards brand and brand related
activities:
“K: I never watch videos that in some way related stimulating purchases or brands.” “T: I’m just not the type of person who is interested in brands.”
Finally, amotivation amongst older people and adolescents was also caused by the fact that
they thought other forms of media were better suited for those consuming brand related
activities. For example, when the participants were asked why they did not read the comments
on brand related posts when they wanted customer reviews, they responded with the answer
that other media were better suited to look for customer reviews. “B: I would just Google it.”
“V: I would check the professional review pages for that.”
Altogether, there were not that many differences in the motivations of adolescents and
older people to engage with consuming brand related activities. A difference was that social
interaction was a motivator for adolescents, which did not came up during the interviews with
19 looking at brand related images or watching brand related images so they would be able to
discuss them with friends. Another small difference was that personal interest of the
adolescents was more related to hobbies whereas the personal interest of the older people was
more related to their profession.
Motivations to engage with contributing brand related activities
After the motivations for the consuming brand related activities were discussed, the
participants were asked to what extent they were motivated to engage with contributing brand
related activities. This includes all activities that interact with brand related content which is
not created by the person itself (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). Activities such as liking,
commenting, tagging, and sharing brand related posts are examples of contributing brand
related posts.
It was interesting that in contradiction with the findings of Muntiga, Moorman & Smit
(2011), both the adolescents and the older people did not engage with contributing brand
related activities purely out of intrinsic motivation. They often did mention that they found it
important that the brand related posts were related to their personal interest, but even then
they still had an extrinsic motivation as well to engage with brand related post, such as that a
friend requested them to like a certain post, or that they wanted to make people aware of
something by sharing a certain brand related post.
When participants were extrinsically motivated to engage with contributing brand
related activities the motivations were information, social identity, social interaction, and
remuneration. All these types of extrinsic motivations were both mentioned by the
adolescents as by the older people. When the participants mentioned that information was
their main motivator, this often meant that they liked a certain brand page in order to get more
20 “S: They always posts new hockey stick collections, new shoes, whether they have discounts, and whether have discovered something new.”
“B: I like brand related pages when I’ve bought a product of them and I want to see more of their new products.” “Y: I liked the Facebook page of Marie Jo, a lingerie brand. I look at their photos to see what’s new.”
When the participants were asked whether they were trying to create a certain social
identity by liking and sharing certain brand related posts and pages, quite some people, both
adolescents and older people, answered that they unconsciously might take it into account. It
seemed that there was some embarrassment to admit that they were actively creating a social
identity and therefore were a bit careful in admitting that they were thinking about it. “E: In terms of identity, well.. maybe.. that you think about it a little bit. But it’s not like I’m consciously thinking about it.”
“V: Yes, but in a limited extent. But it is true that I think that I shape my identity by doing that.” Social interaction was one of the extrinsic motivations for engagement with
contributing brand related activities that was mentioned very often by both adolescents and
older people. The participants often liked or shared certain brand pages because a friend
requested it and they wanted to help that friend with the promotion of his or her brand. “LM: Which brand pages do you like then? O: The pages that friends requested me to like. I like them, so that their brand awareness will increase.”
However, this was only done under the conditions that there was a strong tie with that person
and that the topic of the brand related post or page was in line with their own personal
interest.
“S: There are also many people who invite you to like their page even though I never talk to those people anymore. Or if it really doesn’t interest me, than I would do it either. But the people I really care about, I would support them without a second thought.”
People not only wanted to support the brands of friends, but they also wanted to support
brands of which they felt they were involved with.
“H: Only when it’s for a charity. Alpes d’Huez.. that is the kind of stuff I like.”
21 Another aspect of social interaction as a motivator to engage with contributing brand
related activities was that participants wanted to do others a favor by tagging them in certain
brand related posts. This was often because they thought the post was entertaining and they
wanted their friends to have a laugh too.
“A: Well I often tag friends in funny video’s because I know that my friends will have a laugh too.”
“LM: Why do you tag people then? P: Well because it makes me laugh and then I think to myself, that person will for sure think that is funny too.”
Besides to entertain others, the participants also tagged others in brand related posts when
they thought that the information in the brand related post would interest the other person. “K: If I see something like an interesting article or whatever, and I think that is something for Pietje or Rietje, then I would write Pietje look at this, or something like that.”
Remuneration was mentioned less often, but still quite some participants, both
adolescents and older people, have liked or shared certain brand pages or posts in order to win
certain things or to get a discount. When discussing remuneration as a possible motivator
people also seemed to be a bit careful with admitting that they have participated in such
promotions.
“S: When I see that my own hockey stick is almost broke, and I see a promotion pop up that says like and share and get the chance to win a new hockey stick, than I would try it. But as soon as the promotion has ended I delete it from my timeline.”
The fact that people were a bit careful in admitting that they have participated in
winning promotions, might be caused by the fact that there were also a lot of participants
who mentioned that their amotivation was caused by a negative attitude towards such ‘like
and share’ promotions.
“O: I did respond to a post once, but I think like & sharing is quite an annoying concept, so normally I don’t participate in them. Sometimes when friends participate in something like that I think it’s kind of sad.. because, the way I see it, you’ll never win anyway, and you know in advance that it’s just a stunt.”
22 Besides the negative attitude towards certain brand related activities, such as ‘like and
share’, other amotivations that were being mentioned by both the adolescents and the older
people were a lack of perceived usefulness, and concerns with the privacy and publicity of
these contributing brand related activities. Both adolescents and older people were concerned
that if they liked or shared certain posts that they might get associated with certain things
which they did not wanted to be associated with.
“P: I think that’s why I don’t really do it, because I don’t really want to be associated with certain brands, I don’t think that’s necessary.”
“H: There are certain things which I definitely don’t want to be associated with.”
Next to the concerns with the publicity of liking and sharing certain things, a lot of
participants neglected to comment on brand related posts because they also did not like the
fact that everyone is able to see that.
“E: I think Facebook is too public for that… I think it’s quite stupid if you post all kind of comments which don’t even interest most people.”
“S: I don’t like the way you present yourself then. You’re posting a public comment on a public video and then everyone can judge you for it.”
Finally, it was also mentioned very often that people just simply did not feel the need
to engage with certain brand related activities, because there was no perceived usefulness. “B: I don’t know. I just never feel the need to share anything, I never see anything that makes me think wow that’s so cool, I want to share that.”
“O: I don’t feel the need. I don’t want to participate in those discussions.. especially when they are discussions with strangers. I don’t feel the need to get involved in that.”
When it comes down to contributing brand related activities no major differences were
found between the motivations of the adolescents and the older people. It was interesting to
notice that the motivations to engage with contributing online brand related activities did not
23 was often a precondition, but there had to be some higher goal as well in order for the
participants to perform the contributing brand related activity.
Motivations to engage with creating brand related activities
As a final topic, the motivations to engage with creating brand related activities were
discussed with the participants. This is the ultimate level of online brand related activeness
(Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011). Creating brand related posts or pages are examples of
creating brand related activities on Facebook. Both some of the adolescents as some of the
older people were highly engaged with these activities, since they either owned their own
brand or were strongly involved with one.
Similar to the motivations to engage with contributing online activities, the
motivations did not derive solely intrinsically. Again the entertainment or personal interest
factor was some sort of precondition, but not a goal in itself. The extrinsic motivation that was
mentioned most often as the reason why the participants created online brand related content
was empowerment, which refers to the fact that people are trying to influence other people or
companies by the brand related content they create (Muntinga, Moorman & Smit, 2011).
Participants often mentioned that they created brand related posts or pages because
they wanted to promote their own brand, or the brand they were involved with.
“M: I post calls to come to my studio for a photoshoot, calls for workshops, I organize several things for which I want people to come, and social media, Facebook in particular, is very well suited for that.”
One of the adolescents was also very excited about the fact that since he started to manage the
Facebook page of his own hockey club, the number of followers increased.
“S: And I have noticed that when I started we had 151 likes and now we 350 likes or something like that. Well, I think that’s awesome.”
Another way in which participants were trying to influence others by their posts and pages
was by trying to inform them about certain topics.
24 Besides empowerment as an extrinsic motivation to engage with creating brand related
activities, social identity also turned out to be a extrinsic motivator to create brand related
posts. This often happened on a more unconscious level, since people often posted a photo in
which the brand was obviously visible, but their intention was to show friends what they were
up to, instead of that they were trying to promote a brand.
“E: For example, when your drinking a nice Desporados beer, then it’s nice to post that. Or when your paintballing with friends. But yeah, then it’s actually promotion for the paintball company.”
Another example, one of the older participants often posted a picture of a beer, in which the
brand was obviously visible, but that was not done with the intention to promote that brand. “R: It’s more that you want to show to your friends that you’re in Istanbul at a terrace enjoying a nice beer.”
Since creating brand related activities are labeled as the most intense level of brand
related activities and requires the most amount of effort quite some people, both adolescents
and older people, were also quite often amotivated to engage with these activities. Most of the
times simply because people did not felt the need.
“LM: Did you ever post a brand related photo or video? A: No, I never have anything that I need to post that is related to my work or my education, and I also don’t have a brand of which I’m a big fan of, which would make me post all kind of stuff on my timeline.”
Besides that, participants also mentioned again that they found that other media forms
were better suited for certain creating brand related activities. For example, when I asked one
of the participants whether they ever posted anything such as a positive of negative
experience with a brand, she responded that she thought Twitter was more suited for that. “G: It is just my personal opinion, but I think Facebook is not very suited for that kind of stuff, I think Twitter is a better medium, because that’s where people share their opinions of certain topics. I don’t feel the need to do that on Facebook.”
What also came up once again was that people did not create any brand related posts
because of the fact that those posts are public, and that they would prefer to remain more
25 “O: When I would have a problem with a company, or when I would have a question, whether that’s with my health insurance or with the KLM or whatever, I would prefer to do handle that in a private message.”
Another reason for amotivation that was mentioned, and this was interesting enough
only mentioned by the older people, was that they never created any brand related posts
because they never thought about the possibility to do so. “LM: Why did you never do that?” Y: Well, I never thought about it.”
Another example was when I asked one of the older persons whether she ever created a post
that was about a positive or negative experience with a brand, on which she responded that the
idea never even occurred to her.
“J: Oh well, that might be an idea. I never really thought about that. But yes, maybe if I would have a negative experience that I would like to share that.”
Looking at the motivations of creating brand related activities as a whole, it can be
said that the adolescents and older people that were motivated to engage with these activities
were either engaged with a brand themselves or were creating brand related posts without the
intention to promote the brand. In terms of amotivation it was an interesting finding that the
possibility to create brand related posts themselves often did not ever occur to some older
people, whereas it occurred to adolescents. This could be explained by the fact that these
particular older people were mostly on Facebook to keep in touch witch friends and family, so
they were not very aware of brand related activities, and creating brand related activities in
particular might have been one step too far for them. In conclusion, the motivations for
creating brand related activities were similar for adolescents and older people, except for the
fact that older people regularly never thought about these activities, as did adolescents.
Concept indicator models
All the motivations that the participants mentioned to engage with the brand related activities
in general are captured in two concept indicator models. The first concept indicator model
26 concept indicator model presents an overview of the motivations of the older people
(Appendix D). These concept indicator models resulted from the open, axial, and selective
coding process as described in the methodological section.
When looking at the concept indicator models it once again becomes very clear that
there are no major differences in the motivations of the adolescents and the older people to
engage with online brand related activities. One of the few differences that was found, was
that social interaction was not a motivator for older people to engage with consuming brand
related activities, which was a motivator for adolescents. However, social interaction was a
motivator of the older people for contributing brand related activities, therefore this
motivation is displayed in both of the concept indicator models. Another small difference was
that the intrinsic motivation of personal interest had a tendency towards hobbies amongst
adolescents and a tendency towards profession amongst older people. Since personal interest
as an intrinsic motivation was applicable to both age groups, it is also projected in both of the
concept indicator models. The only difference which is also visible in the concept indicator
model was that the lack of motivation amongst older people was sometimes caused by the fact
that they never even thought about the possibility of that brand related activity. This never
came up during the interviews with the adolescents.
Conclusion
In this section, the answer on the research question what the motivations are of older people to
either actively engage or not engage with online brand related activities on Facebook in
comparison with adolescents will be formulated.
Conclusion
This study successfully revealed the motivations of older people to engage with consumer
online brand related activities on Facebook. The motivations of the older people can be
27 (motivation to not engage with the brand related activities). The intrinsic motivations the
older people had, were that they found it entertaining to participate in certain brand related
activities or that they were personally interested in the topic. These intrinsic motivations most
often applied when the brand related activities concerned watching brand related images or
brand related videos. The extrinsic motivations that were disclosed in this study were that the
older people wanted to gain information, that they desired a certain reward that was linked to
the activity, that they wanted to create a certain social identity, that there was some sort of
social interaction or involvement with the brand or because they wanted to influence others by
their activities. Especially the contributing and creating brand related activities were driven by
extrinsic motivations.
The amovations of the older people were a very interesting topic in this study as well,
since the previous research on consumer online brand related activities by Muntinga,
Moorman & Smit (2011) did not make any distinctions between age groups and solely
concentrated on what motivated people to engage with brand related activities, and not on
what motivated people to not engage with those activities. This study revealed the following
amotivations amongst older people: a lack of perceived usefulness, concerns with the privacy
and publicity of the activities, a negative attitude towards brand related activities, the
perception that other media forms were better suited, and the fact that the idea to perform a
certain behavior never occurred to them. The concerns with the publicity of the brand related
activities especially was driven by the fact that the participants were afraid that their identity
might get negatively affected if they liked certain brand pages which they did not wanted to
be associated with.
When these motivations of the older people were compared with the motivations of
the adolescents, it was shown that there were no major differences between the motivations of
28 motivator of older people to engage with consuming brand related activities, that personal
interest of older people if often related to profession and to hobbies amongst adolescent, and the fact that some of the older people’s amotivation derived from the fact that the idea to
engage with creating brand related activities never occurred to them, which was not
mentioned by the adolescents.
As described in the theoretical section, the expectation was that the technology
acceptance model could also be an explanatory factor for amotivation amongst older people.
However, this did not come up during the interviews with the older people. There were some
comments made that indicated that the perceived ease of use outweighed the perceived
usefulness, but it was definitely not mentioned often enough to include in the concept
indicator model. It is very likely to assume that the fact that all the older people that were
interviewed were active on Facebook for at least three years which explains why the older
people did not experienced any difficulties in the performance of the brand related activities.
This idea that experience is more important than age when it comes down to dealing with new
media technology is also backed up by research of Hill et al. (2011) and Loos (2011), as
mentioned in the methodological section.
In conclusion, this study was successful in disclosing the motivations of older people
to either engage or not engage with consumer online brand related activities. It is an
interesting finding that the motivations of the older people do not really differ much from the
motivations of the adolescents. The differences that were found, such as that social interaction
was not a motivator for consuming brand related activities and that personal interest was
mostly related to profession amongst older people and mostly related to hobbies amongst
adolescent are interesting, but these cannot be characterized as major differences. The only
bigger difference that the older people often do not think about the possibility of creating
29 there is no different approach needed by marketers if they want older people who are active
on Facebook to engage with their online brand related activities on Facebook. A side note that
comes with that statement is that it is only applicable to older people that are active on
Facebook for a longer period, otherwise the technology acceptance might play a role.
It might also be interesting for marketers to take the amotivations into account, for
example by not being too obtrusive since that often causes a negative attitude. Finally, the
overview of the motivations to engage with brand related activities can be helpful for
practitioners in the field of brand related activities on Facebook, since they can effectively try
to make use of a certain type of motivation. For example, if you want people to look at your
brand related images or videos, marketers could try to make them as entertaining as possible
so people will be intrinsically motivated to look at them. Or if someone wants more
promotion for their brand, it could be interesting to ask friends and family to help with
promoting, because they are often tended to help people they are close to. Another factor that
is interesting for marketers to take into account is that people want to feel like they are
involved with or interested in the brand and the post. This can be done by for example by only
letting a certain sponsored advertisement about surfing be displayed on the timeline of people
who have liked certain surf related pages. These are all examples of ways in which the
overview of motivations for engagement with brand related activities on Facebook is useful.
Discussion and suggestions for further research
Some critical notes related to the theoretical section and the research design can be made.
First of all, the technology acceptance model did not really seem to play a role, even though
this was expected from a theoretical perspective. However, just like mentioned in the result
section, this is probably caused by the fact that all of the older participants were active on
Facebook for more than three years. Another possibility could be that, even though attempts
30 participants still might have felt embarrassed to admit that they did had difficulties with
performing certain brand related activities. The same goes for the extrinsic motivation to
create a social identity. People might also feel a bit embarrassed to admit that they were
actively trying create a certain identity.
Another critical note that can be made is that people were not always aware of what
brand related activities were, since they often did not know when something can be labeled as
a brand. This was explained and made clear to all the participants, but they might still think
that some activities were not brand related, even though they actually were. Therefore my
suggestion for further research would be to fulfill an analysis of one’s Facebook page and
brand related activities before the interview, in order to be able to refer to specific brand
related activities the participant had performed. During this study the participants were asked
to recall these activities themselves, so they might have forgotten some of their brand related
activities or they might not have been aware of the fact that a certain activity was brand
related activity. It could also be interesting to investigate whether the motivations to engage
with online brand related activities are also applicable to other media forms than Facebook.
This might result in an even better understanding of what drives adolescents and older people
to engage with brand related activities.
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34 Appendix A: Interview (English translation)
Introduction
This research is about the motivations of different age groups to be actively engaged with online brand related activities. I will introduce different topics and if you have any questions regarding the topics, please feel free to ask them.
You have already agreed upon it, but yet again the question whether you agree with the fact that I am recording this conversation? I am doing this research in order to write my master thesis and I will never make any references to specific people, so this interview will be completely anonymous.
I also want to emphasize that there are no good or wrong answers, honest answers are most valuable.
This interview will take about 30 to 45 minutes. Do you have any questions before we get started? Topic 1 – Facebook usage in general
First, I would like to get an image of your Facebook usage in general, so I have a few questions about that.
1.1) Since when are you active on Facebook?
1.2) What was your most important reason to create a Facebook account? 1.3) How much time do you averagely spent on Facebook a day?
1.4) What are your main purposes when you’re on Facebook? Topic 2 – Consuming online brand related activities
Now I would like to chat with you about brand related activities on Facebook. These are all the activities on Facebook, for example liking, sharing, and looking at posts that are in some way related to a brand. It is good to know that everything that distinct itself from other products or services with a symbol or a name can be labeled as a brand. So for example a certain party like Sensation White or a soccer club like Ajax, they can both be labeled a brand. Try to keep this in mind when I’m talking about brand related activities.
2.1) To what extent do you watch videos on Facebook that are posted by a brand or that are about a brand?
2.1.a) If so, what kind of videos do you watch why do watch these videos? (extrinsic; information gaining or intrinsic; because it’s entertaining)
2.1.a) If not, why don’t you watch these videos? (amotivation caused by the fact that the perceived ease of use outweighs the perceived usefulness?)
35 2.2) To what extent do you look at images that are posted on Facebook by brands or that are about brands?
2.2.a) If so, at what kind of images do you look and why do look at those images ? (extrinsic; information gaining or intrinsic; because it’s entertaining)
2.2.a) If not, why don’t you look at those images? (amotivation caused by the fact that the perceived ease of use outweighs the perceived usefulness?)
2.3) Do you ever read the comments on brand related posts?
2.3.a) If so, when do you read the comments and why do you read them? (extrinsic; information gaining or intrinsic; because it’s entertaining)
2.3.b) If not, why don’t read the comments? (amotivation caused by the fact that the perceived ease of use outweighs the perceived usefulness?)
2.4) Do you ever play a brand related video game?
2.4.a) If so, what kind of games do you play and why do you play them? (extrinsic; information gaining or intrinsic; because it’s entertaining)
2.4.b) If not, why don’t play brand related games? (amotivation caused by the fact that the perceived ease of use outweighs the perceived usefulness?)
Topic 3 – Contributing online brand related activities
The questions I have asked so far were mostly about brand related activities that are not very visible to others. However, there are also activities that others can see, which therefore are of influence on the brand itself. I have some questions now about activities like that.
3.1) To what extent do you rate brand related posts or pages? By this I also mean ‘liking’ a ad or page of a certain brand.
3.1.a) If so, what posts or pages do you rate and why do you rate them? (extrinsic; rewards, creating social identity or social interaction intrinsic; because it’s
entertaining)
3.1.b) If not, why don’t you rate brand related posts? (amotivation caused by the fact that the perceived ease of use outweighs the perceived usefulness?)
