Computers n Human Behavior 112 2020) 100443,
Contents lists available a ScenceDisect
Computers in Human Behavior
journal homepage: hii>:/vw elsevi
.comlocate/comphumbeh
®
The effects of visual congruence on increasing consumers’ brand cr
engagement: An empirical investigation of influencer marketing on
instagram using deep-learning algorithms for automatic
image classification
Young Anna Argyris, Zuhui Wang", Yongsuk Kim , Zhaozheng Yin”
+ bro ead orton, Mn St Lita, 408 Wier Raa st Lan, Ml A USA
pmo Cpa Sime, Say Bro ay, Sy rk, NY, 1794, A
<0 Be Se, Seyi Libri Sea South Kr
Ince ating
Inflencers are non celebrity indvidons who gain popularity on social media by posting visllywtrctive
nent fe photo and video) and by Interacting with other wer (Le, Followers) to etete mses of
sathentcity ad ends. Brand partner with Eeences to gris enggemen rm their target conser
inanew marketing strategy kiown a lfencer marketing” Nonetheless, the theoreti inden osc
remains unkown. We niggest a new concept framework of "Vint Congrurme-indveed Soil Inver
(WCSD,” which cantexunies the Similarity Atraction Moe nthe Soil fence tear. Using VCS, we
delineate how lflences we visa congraece ns representations of shared interetinw speefcaen to bal
Strang bonds with Followers. This inate wlliton catalyze (e,sedtes) the positive elets of i
ongrence on Followers bd engagemest. To tt thea hyphae, we conducted in vive chueeations of
Infleneer marketing on Intngram. We cllected >45 00 images mel socal mein wage bir eter 2
tment. We then plied desplenning algorithmically cay each image ad wed social mein
tigi to dichne hidden ssciatcns betmen via clan nd band engagement. Our hype eating
‘esl provide empirical supprt for VCS, dancing theories Into the ply growing elds of maltinoda
Content ad Infveoernurketing.
2. Introduction! (etaovick, 2013), These tnlueneers have surpassed celeetes asthe
favorite social media personalities among illennils, who have become
“Influencers” are ordinary individual, not celebrite, who have
mised laige numbers of Followers on social media sites by posting
visually ataetive content that showeaves thei lifestyle and merchan:
lise preferences (Coiter, 2019). "Followers" are those individuals who
and some Influencers boast tent of
thousands of Followers, creating “fandom” (Abidin, 2019). Unlike ee
lebrities, Influencers cultivatea sent of intimacy among their Followers
‘through sharing authentic and lived experiences inthe areas in which
they claim expertise (Cotter, 2019). The growth of mebile applications
for image-sharng, suchas Instagram, has fueled the rise of Influencers
* Corresponding bor
Ema eran ocjris@rs.ed (YA, Argyl wang@stnyb
"te fllowings ar the albeviatons sed in thi paper Sinai
ty Wan,
ration Model: SAMSocial Infience: SIV Congrucne Indaced Sora Ife
the largest purchasing age group ln the U.S. sinee 2019 (', 2919)
Recognizing millennils" purchasing poser, brand managets collaborate
‘with Influencers who have builefanein bean pertinent areas, hoping co
connect with large crovide of constimers in ther niches (i, 291°).
‘An examples the beauty brand, Glaser, which enlists make-up experts
to showcase Glosser products inthe brand's social media posts (Rav,
2018). Glosser is valued at 1.2 billion USD as of November 2019 (Roo!
‘& Chernova, 2019).
‘Nonetheless, academic research on Influencers is lagging in three
Internwined aspects. Fist, most prior studies have focused on textual
vl (Yin
ngskim kk. (Kim, zyx stony
\Vesiellower? engagement with thei Ilaencer’ pots: Fl engngementFellowenr engagement wth poof the Band endorsed ly ther Inlweer: -B
ips//do.og/10.1006/) tn this study, “engagement eer o one dimension ec, the behavior
cergagement-of cnsumer brand engagersent (CE concep tht conte of
fogaive, emotional, and Lehvioal dimensions (Sods sly 201). Out
Sty employed «data-driven approach; this, we fected any the beaviora
Alinension of engagement observable i seal medi data YA Argrivet a
Peery
era
tothe brand
ata ue
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
Pee
Geta cue)
Fig. Research Model. Our research me contains three hypathees one of which poss the mediating role o {engagement between isa congrece and
‘engaged in thelr lfluencets' content that features the brand, Followers
perceived familiarity with che brand will increase, even chough an
explicit brand endorsement is absent. The effectiveness of seemingly
‘unintentional product placement (aiming to inerease consumers’ expo:
sure tothe product is widely known in advertising (Willams, Petrosky,
Hemandez, & Page Jr, 2011). Familiar objects are accepted with ease
and with less resistance from recipients, thus bypassing the rigorous
verffeation often required when accepting an unfamiliar object (%e",
Lewandowsky, Oberauer, & Chee, 2010; Evans & Stanovich, 2013;
Penaycook & Rand, 2018) Im addition, since the audience members
shave developed positive atinides toward the Influences content, they
anticipate similariy likeable conten from the brand (Ji «Pio, 2014).
Accordingly, Followers are more likely to adopt Influencers’ prosoeal
‘behaviors toward the featured brand (9 & Pha, 2014). We argue that
rosocial behaviors toward the brand will be manifested inthe forms of
‘engaging with the brand's posts in ease of Influencer marketing
‘The credibility of a message source is known to be a predictor of
message acceptance in advertising (Bla, Jayswval & Patel, 2013; Le,
Lee, & Hansen, 2016 Toumala& Petty, 2004). ABsueh, many advertisers
hhave employed celebrities who are considered to be credible in
spreading their brand messages. Sinee Influencers have obtained
:miero-celebrity status on Instagram and have earned their Followers
engagement, we ean expect tha they have aso earned credibility from
their Followers, which wil cultivate positive brand attitudes among the
Followers. Jin sid Milam (2019) have shown that Influencers who
feature a brand increase customers’ perceived credibility, likeability,
nd attractiveness ofthe brand, Jin and Mugla (2019) employed an
‘online experiment where subjects were presented with, among others,
(Instagram images featuring Influencers and the brand, and (i)
Instagram images featuring the brand only. The results have shown that
brand eredibility, attractiveness, and lkeability were higher when the
Images contained both the Influencer and the brand than the product
nly Gin & Mugaddam, 2019)
Based on the pesitve impact involving (J) the familiarity of stimu
fon message acceptance and (I) che credibility of Influencers on their
Followers’ brand attitudes, we argue that Followers’ engagement with
Influencers will garner thelr engagement with the brand's poss
‘Thetefore, we hypothesize the following
Hypothesis 2. Followers’ engagement with Influencers) posts will
Inrease Followers’ engagement with the band’s posts endorsed by the
Influencer,
4.2. Mediating role of follower’ engagement with influencers Between
‘sual congruence and rand engagement
‘So far, we have hypothesized that visual congruence will be assoc
ated with an inerease i F- engagement, whieh in turn will increase F-B
‘engagement. In this section, we post the mediating ole of Ft engagement
in de relationship becveen visual congruence and F-B engagement. SAM
does not sufficiently explain or predict that Influencers can positively
fect theis Followers’ decisions or behaviors to engage with the brand's
ests because two parties in a dyadic relationship can be simultaneously
attracted to.a brand due to their common interests (val Volker
2014). Thus, visual congruence alone is limited to solely rendering F-B
engagement. Instead, we argue that visual congruence must be accom
panied by F-tengagement to have postive impact on F-B engagement.
‘Both theoretical and empirical sipport for this claim eomes frm the
St literature (ai & Waller, 2014), as noted earller in Section 3.
‘Through large seale in vivo experiments, Arla Walker (2014) have
shovin thatthe de strength Benen to individuals increases the socal
inlence of one person tothe other, Tie strength i defined as “a com
bination of the amount of time, the emotional intensity, the intimacy,
and the reciprocal services which characterize the tie” (Granovette
197, p. 1361). Strong ties are generally measured as the frequency of
bya interaction as @ proxy (Bon, Fariss, & Jones, 2012), the rela
tionship category (Such as “Follower”), the frequeney of information
fexelionge and interactions andthe perceived importance and intimacy
fof the relationshipe (Gronovetter, 1909). Consequently, frequent in
teractions and increased social affiliation and itiniey indiate greater
Influence conducted between individuals connected online (Aral &
Walker, 2014),
Recall that Influencers create a sense of friendship, teust, and
authenticity among thelr Followers perceptions of them (Section 21) in
‘their attempt to increase theie Followers engagement with their content
(bidin, 20795 Cotter, 2019), We argue dhat sucha strong bond whiel
Influencers built with their Followers is equivalent 10
sttong te 1lationship in Si iteratare based of the increased intimacy
fflintion, and interactions in_Influencer-Follower relationships At
sich, lfluencers” opinions will matter more for their Followers" de:
‘sions on engaging with dhe brand. Based on the notion of strong ties,
‘we argue that there must be ineeaced social aflintion and frequent
interoetions between Influencers and their Followers inorder for Infli-
cencers to induce their Followers’ brand engagement, because frequent
social interactions are predictive of greater influence. Therefore, we
argue:
Hypothesis 3. Followers’ engagement withthe Influencers’ posts wil
{ally mediate the effects of visual congruence on Followers’ engagement
swith the brane’ posts
‘Tablet
Data collection time pero purposes.
Tine Pein CFD mn Vind enone of the pss ht
Fellower nga oes ne
nen’ pe (ng in ad
enti) nel ther et ay
‘nino be sd ar yas sig
se king atl 2 omen) at
orton eng
Thera pos eg, llonins,
‘can te el fo sali
twats
"et ah 3008 oA 009 YA. Arrieta
5. Overview of methodology
‘5.1. Data collection and selection of methods
We collected Instagram data during two time periods (T1 and 72),
ach of which covers 13 months (a total of 26 months in Toble 1).
Collecting observations for more than two years allows us to examine
hhow Influencers earn engagement from ther Fllowers, and how they
gradually pass postive brand attitudes to their Followers. That i, an
‘observational period of 26 montis enables us to capture the long:
standing effects that Inflvencers have on their Followers” brand
fengagement, whereas a short-term observational period cannot. Tie
Jong-term investigation suits our interest in Influencers, who build deep
relationships with their Followers, and noe celebrity brand endorsers,
‘who are incentivized by immediate sales increases.
For the data analyses, we employed (1) deep-learing algorithms to
automatically classify the visual components of Instagram posts and (2)
feconometules modeling to conduct social media analytes (Ps. 2), as
noted in Section © on! 7, respectively
5.2. Suudy context
‘The brand we chose for this study i Luluemon Athletiea (Nasa
LULU, Lalulemon, henceforth), which specializes in high-end active
wear, especially yoga and fies apparel. The company reported reve.
‘nues of 3.3 billion USD in 2018, which represents 227% growth from 2.6
billion USD in 2017 (Yaloo! Finance). Critiques attribute this substan
tial growth to the Influencer marketing campaigns known as “Uniting
‘Community in Real Lif.” This eampaign was designed to build, sustain,
and expand Lululemon's loyal customer base in local communities. To
promote the success of this campaign, Lululemon enlisted yoga/ftness
trainers and athletes who are well known in their rexpective local
‘communities and who have established a social media presence. Lil
Jemon invites them to atend various complimentary training programs
and networking opportunities, and seknowledges them with the hon:
‘rary title of "brand ambassadors” (Vsn\asng, 2018). These comp
‘mentary events and recognition are intended to nurture loyalty among
(6.1 Data Callection
6.2 Automatic image Cassifeaton
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
Fig 8. Inftencer’ posts matrally nterate Lalulemon procs de o thee
Iran loyalty An example of an nen’ post engaged in pial mtv
es postings.
Taflence wolpan Wal Walpeas ‘alia
it Pye! showing ety Tene
6.3 Vakation 64 Ensemble
; LET Suost |]! i [enone |!
| Dataset in 11 for Conventional | wl] it] curacy |i i] Emgambe ||
tere ame oman | 4 saurtratwons | Vu conqencein ]} }] Seamer |i | :
! annotation of terms of 1 it} t
1 the data as 6 ae TT ‘Human mm 1
1] ataset tore anna) |\{—anaer |] sgseatectites |"! tans |!) ermtcon |
{| aining/vatdaton validation sot mg > pets 11] dotaintne |} | ‘Resute” |!
i st 1} Lvaiiotonset | | :
vata
conguence
11 Data Colecton, 72 Operatenaizabon ofthe Varabes ae
Influencers’ and their followers’ social ra
Imada ectvy data colecon dung T1" Inlsocan’ and wer flowers socal || Eronamation
‘media activity data collection during T2™* |! 2
15-74 Hypothesis
71 (Time Pav a data colecton19 mani rom January 2017 to February 2018 Textng Rests
"72 Time Pered 2 or data callecton:13 months rom March 2018 to Apri 2019
Fig. 2. We combined dp learning algorithms for ise clacton with socal pedi salyis to ts our hypotheses ing age to
two tle periods surounding the real-world Infoencer tke
data collected over YA Argrivet a
‘the ambassadors, thus resulting in more Lululemon clothing integrated
Into thelr dally posts. For instance, they may post pieturs of themselves
practicing yoga wearing Lalulemon clothing ("c.). Since they already
have an established social media presence, their wearing Lululemon
clothing (even though not accompanied by a dect promotion message)
helps create positive brand attitudes among theit Followers (in
Moqaddam, 2019). As sueh, we chose these Lululemon brand ambas
saddors as the fnfunces
‘The data support our choice of Lalulemon ambassadors (she 2)
Forty-six percent of Lululemon ambassadors’ posts show physical ac
tivities (eg, an ambassador practicing Yoga, Fs. 3), and 439 oftheir
posts contain Llulemon style clothing. Further, in 75% of their posts
showing physical activities, Llulemon ambassadors wear Lululemen-
style clothing (as in Fic. 3). However, they do not directly promote
the brand, as evidenced by only 3 oftheir posts containing Lululemon
hhashtags'As such, Lululemon brand ambassadors demonstrate th
‘expertise in brand pertinent areas, showease the brand, and yet, pro
‘mote the brand indireetly, whieh closely fits our defiition of infu
‘encers. Detailed descriptions of how we classified the visual themes of|
thelr images in Setion 6.
Followers are those individuals who subscribe to Influencers” posts
‘on nstagram, which provides feature ealled “follow thatallows one to
receive upeates fom selected accounts, The difference betwee “follow
‘on Facebook and on Instagram is thatthe former requires approval to
receive updates, while the later does not. Anyone can follow a user's
public profile, As user engagement tools, Instagram provides following,
liking, ad commenting; however, sharing reporting isnot available on
Instagram,
6, Deep learning algorithms for image classification
We developed deep-leaming algorithms to clasify dee visual
‘themes—(i) physical activites (to measure visual congruence for by-
pothesis testing), (i) Lululemon-syleelothing (whieh was not used for
hypothesis tesing, but was necessary to confirm that the Lululemon
ambassadors featuced the brand in their post in Section 5.2, Table 2),
‘na ll) pets (which were not used for hypothesis esting, but were used
for one ofthe robustness cheeks in Section 7, wherein detailed just
Acations for choosing pets ae provided).
6.1. Data collection
In TL, we selected Influencers from the list of Lululemon brand
ambassadors onthe brand's oficial website, We didnot choose profiles
‘with fewer than 2000 Followers at T1 becauze common practices start
‘with 2000 Followers as the minimum base (Cotes, Co, « Rover, 2017).
In February 2018, there were 110 Influencers with 2000 or more Fel
lowers. Of the 110 profiles, we randomly selected 30 accounts fer the
data analyse, following the principles of probability sampling (Wa
bess, 1978). Probability sampling isa fair way to select a sample, and it
{reasonable to generalize the results from the sample back to the
population (Walberg, 1978). To ensure that the randomly selected
sample represents the population, we adhered to a pre-established
procedure (Washers, 1978). Speelfieally, we fst created a list of the
110 Influencers on a spreadsheet, asigned a nique ID to each of them,
generated 30 random numbers, and chose the Influencers with those
‘robles
Comparisons betecen non tke ikes
‘cere cemaly He nero gran A564 1566
be of commen evel per at 2 wr
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
numbers.
Inthe same manner, we next randomly selected 30 Followers per
Influencer who had engaged with the Influencer's posts (¢¢.,
commenting) a least once during TI (13 months). It is widely known
‘that machine generated Instagram accounts that ariielally augment the
size of Followers are abound on Instagram (called “ghosts") (Cotte,
2019), To prevent these ghost accounts from affecting our data analyses,
we selected only those with a history of interactions with their tn
fencers in the 13:month period in TI. We looked into our data to see
‘whether these nomlikers had the characteristics of “ghost” accounts
(Cable 8). Te do so, we randomly selected 30 non likers per Influencer
(to hod never engaged with the Inuencers in 13 months). kn fact,
non-likers follows Fivetimes more accounts than do likers and receive 20
times fewer likes and comments from other users than do likes. These
dlferences support the suspicion in the prior literature regarding
‘on-likers, and thus, we chose lkers only. Jn summary, our inal sample
consisted of 30 Influencers and 900 Followers (30 Infuncers * 30
Followers/Influencer).
6.1.1. Dataset for image classification and training validation
rom each selected Instagram account, we randomly downloaded 50
Images. As such, we obtained a total of 1500 images of influencers and
45,000 imeges of Followers in TI. To analyze this massive number of
Images, we adopted a machine learning approach a follows.
6.1.2. Dataset for training validation
For training and validation, we separately downloaded 1000 images of
physical ctvty from Influencers, Followers, and benchmark Instagram
‘pags; thus, 9 total of 3000 images were used. We annotated these im
ages asthe next step to train the algorithms in physical activity, Lalu-
lemon style, and pets, as shown in Fs. #. In each eategory, the taining
set contains 500 positive samples (Le, presence of the visual theme of
Interest) and 500 negative samples (Le, absence thereo). For model
training, in each category, we randomly selected 800 images (400 pos
itive and 400 negative image) to train our models, and the emaining
200 images were used as validation ses. To prevent an averfitting issue,
we employed data augmentation to inrease the numbers of available
tialning images tenfold. Specifically, the augmentation operations
inchided image rotation, translation, nd rescaling, sehich means that
foreach original image, the deep earning framework rotates and/or
translates and/or resales this image to generate 10 copies of it. There
fore, when developing the raining meses, there were 8000 training images
foreach category, with a total of 24,000 image.
6.2. Automatic image classification
6.2.1. Human annotation ofthe training st
We hired thre coders per image category, for a total of nine coders, to
‘manually annotate the images in te raining st. They had demographic
factors similar to those of Lululemon’s target consumers (Females in
their 203) and were active Instagram users. They were thoroughly
tuained to label images in two 60-min training sessions. During the
taining sessions, we clearly defied each eategory, gave them practice
‘questions, and corracted thelr answers if there were any errors, We dd
rot inform them of our hypotheses in order to prevent our expectations
‘om affecting their labeling. Each coder worked on her own to ensure
Independent coding. We selected the final labels based on the majority:
vote rule (2 v. 1) Inthe absence of unanimous coding results,
6.2.2. Fne-uning ofthe three CNN models
‘The next etep wae to fine-tune three deep learning models to serve
cour research purposes. We chose to use transfer learning, a type of
‘machine leaming that transfers prior knowledge (ie, leaned informa-
tion) about trained images to anew set of unlabeled images (L2Cun &
[engio, 1995). Specifically, we fine-tuned three powerful dep-larning
models - VGG 19 (Yosinsk, Chune, Beng, & Lipson, 2014), ResNet 50 Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
(1) Physical activity (for hypothesis testing)
‘Conceptual definition
a train or dog waking does not.
Any intentional workout activites to promote health and fitness. By this denon, yoga,
{eycling, biking, competitive sports, running, boxing, weightlifting, etc. fal into this category, but running fo catch
Positive sample) = Ph
(@) Lululemon Style (for the
in their posts)
‘Conceptual definition: Any
urpose of confirming that the Lululemon ambassadors featured the brand
Lululemon-style outs, such as those with the signature Lululemon style (@..,form-
fiting workout pants, hoodies, Vine back, and anything else with the Lululemon logo)
Positive sample) = Lululemon-syie Clothin
‘0 (Negative sample) = No Lululemon style Gothing
Bs
(3) Pets (for the purpose of a robustness check)
‘Conceptual defintion: Any domesticated animals for companionship. By definition, dogs, cas, hamsters, ish,
{atc fal into the category, but livestock and wild animals do not.
1 (Positive sample) = Pets shown
At
‘0 (Negative sample) = No pet shown
=
(Raeavinn, Aziepour, Sullivan, & Carlsson, 2014) and Inception V3
(Simonyan & Ziseaman,2014). The VGG19 model won first and second
place in the localization and claeification tasks in the 2014 ImageNet
Large Seale Visual Recognition Competition (ILSVRC) (He tal, 2016)
FResNetSO won first place in the clasification task in LSVRC 2015
(Szegedy etal, 2016). The InceptionV’3 model demonstrated the lowest
error rate in the classification task at ILSVRC 2012 (Szegedy et al,
2016). The three CNN models have shown robust performance for the pes
of image clasifcation necesary for our study.
These thtee pre-trained models on the ImageNet data were fine
‘tuned separately with our training set. To obtain the best results, we
varied the leaning at from 1e 6 0 Te-4 and chose a taining optimizer,
Stochastic Gradient Descent (Robbins & Monro, 1951), RMSprop
Graves, 2013), and Adam (Kingma & Ba, 2014), Only the set of
hyperparameters that gave the best accuracy rate wae ured in the model
‘The final prediction task was conducted as 2 multlabe classification,
‘with each eategory (either physical activities or pets) being a binary
lass. For the thee selected model, besides adding one fully connected
layer, all of the models were modified fe have only one neuron in the
final output layer to make predictions. Specifically, in the final output
layer, we employed a sigmoid function as shown below (Ha & Mose,
1995):
Definitions of ch ime festre and examples of nage annotation.
w=
where isthe output values of previous layers, and (xis the final model
‘output value that ranges from 0 to 1. When the model completes
tuaining sx)s close to 1 fr postive samples, and O for negative sm
ples. Thus, s(x) > 0.5, indicates that an image has the target visual
feature; s)<0.5 suggest the lack thereof
6.3. Validation
We used the accuracy rate and cross entropy to measure model
performance. The accuraey rate reflects the percentage of accurate
predictions by the mode ealcwate harmonic funetion of precision
and recall). Cross entropy, whose value ranges from 0 to 1, 6 a loss
funetionthe lower the number i, the better the model perform. For
the training sts, all models perform at almost 100% training accuracy
and obtain no more than 0.05% traning loss values. Table shows the
accuracy testing results for the validation set. The validation results
Indicate tha the clases are accurate and reliable and can provide eile
classfeatons on our dataset YA Argrivet a
64, Ensemble method
ach Image was classified by the above three models individually
nd produced predition results. To obtain the most reliable elasifis:
tion results, we applied the majority-voe rule. Specialy, the three
‘models produced unanimous predictions, we aceepted them. Otherwise,
the values of the two models that produced the same results were
averaged to generate the final prediction score (s(x), and thus, the
classification result.
7. Social media analyties
7.1. Operationalizaion ofthe variables
7.4. Pollower's engagement
‘We counted the number of times the Follower tked or commented on
the lnuencer's postin TI asa measure for F-I engagement, Rca that
Instagram does not provide shating or reposting features. In the same
vein, ve counted the numberof times the Follower liked or commented
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
self reported measures (eg, surveys and interviews) which our in-vivo
observation of social media behaviors does not involve. Thus, we
focused on the observable social media behaviors on Instagram--Le,
liking and commenting to conceptualize followers" engagement.
7.2. Visual congruence
‘We counted the number of images Inbeled as physical activity for
cach Follower and Influencer to caleulate the visual congruence valve
for each Influencer-Follower pair existing in our dataset, Then, we
adopted Jaffe's (1996) proximity measure, which was originally
designed to caleulate the degree of overlap among two actors’ research
portfolios. The index ranges from zero when there is no overlap (eg,
‘either Influencer ‘and Follower jhasa post pertinent toa target theme)
to 1 when there isa complete overlap (Le, all of Influencer i and
Follower; posts contain the same target heme). The visual congruence
between Influencer {and Follower j with respect to theme in T! vas
caletlated as follows:
(# of Fs Themed images)" (fof js Themed images)
(dof 5 Tamed images) (Hof (5 non Themed maps)" of fs Themed innges) + af non — Themed nape
‘on the brand’ porte in T2. asa measure for F-B engagement. The reason
‘we observed F- engagement in TT and F-Bengagement in 2 that we
wanted to see how F-l induces F-B engagement, while preventing
reverse causality.
‘We ought to note that our conceptulization of followers’ engage:
ment refers othe behavioral dimension of consumer brand engagement
(CBE) by Brole, Hollebee, Juri, and Lie (2011), Brodie etal. provided
1 systematic conceptualization of customer engagement—wshich entails
cognitive, emotional, and behavioral aspects. Cognitive processing
‘concerne a consumers level of brand-telated thought processing and
laboration; emotional dimension (ie, affection) corresponds to 2
positive brand-elated affect; behavioral dimension (Le, activation)
‘refers toa consumer's level of energy, effort and time spent ona brand
(Bollebeek, Glynn, & Brodie, 2014), The frst two dimensions require
‘able
Model sccuraey testing ress
Minis Detar Acyl Spey Rol
osie.so Physik REN
se :
aceon Pye eS
Tasemen 96 ROH RHI
© ecson (aka, postive precive ale) isthe ability the lsaer nota
Inbe a simplex positive hen i negative. Ris the percentage of rev
instance ofl erieved instances.
speci (aka sleet, rae negative rat) measure the propeton of
rye negative sample tht are correctly lied.
eal (leases, rte postive rte) is the ability of the easier to
find all positive samples t describes the percentage of reese relevant
snnces over the total evant Instances.
718. Conrots
‘We controled for several factors that ae likely to affect F-t and F-8
engagement, as shown in Table 5. Note that, at this stage, we did not
include tnfluencer specific contols such a the Influencers posting ae
tivity level, engagement with Lululemon’s posts, mentions of Lallemon
(gs hashtag), network centrality (based on the number of Followers
and Followees), and the time elapsed since the Influencer became an
ambassador. These heterogeneities may exist among Influences, but
they are contiolled by Poisson regression estimation with Influencer
fixed effects, which we employed for the subsequent analysis (ood
bridge, 2010),
7.2. Model specication and final sample
‘The nitof analysis at the Influencer Follower dyadic level For the
analysis, we employed Poison regression with Influencer fixed effect
estimation, We chose Polsson regression because the dependent var
ables, F-land F-B engagement, are count variables. Wechose Influencer
fixed effet estimation to contol forthe cotrelaions among Followers of|
the same Influencer, which could interfere with our hypothesis testing.
Specifically, some may argue that the Followers of an Influencer are
‘more similar to one another (and thus, are more highly inter correlated)
than the Followers of another Influencer. Fixed-effec estimation
‘ables
Description of cote variable.
rib pertain
Poller Pig The nme fying Hx el consents els
"acy sett Th
Followers Ox epee The of tenn esto wh the Faller
TI = 1, N00
Flowing (72) Wher the ler bret Ll acon
‘he bute with gue of tiene ih
{hetaene poe YA Argrivet a
controls for such potential similarity (Willan, Pesos, Hernandes, &
Page, 2011). Another advantage Is that the estination is not biased by
‘unobserved Influencer specifi (time-invariant) heterogeneities, suchas
gender, age, ethnicity, tenure as a Lululemon ambassador, posting se-
tivity, and network positon, co name a few (Williams eta, 2011). Due
to these advantages, we chose the fixed effect Poisson regression model.
Specifically the fxed-ffect Poisson regression of Follower i's engage
‘meat with Influencer jin 1 is as follows
Follower — Influencer Engagement
a+ Visual Congrueneryss +rXin +a;+
‘whese denotes the control variables specific to Follower (described
in Toble 5) and represents Influencer j fixed effets. This model ex
amines the atsoration between visual congruence and F-I engagement
intl
‘The fxed-eflect Poisson regression model of Follower 's engagement
‘withthe brand endorsed by Influencer jin T2 is as follows:
where 2, denotes the contol variables and represents tafluencetj
fixed effects. This model s designe to examine (1) the postive effect of
Follower — Brand Engogementsrs
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
Table?
ran deseritve statins in 72).
TadegeOwtdegee Falafel
cy (of Comey of poy ein? ones
Follower) fillings) ant) reece pot
Influence on Followers, and not the other way around (Hssnesmian &
[Ridlle, 2005). The descriptive statistes of the brand, Lululemon, are
presented i Table 7,
‘As expected, the brand actively engages with consumers on Inst
gam, it has more than 3 million Followers but follows only 170 se
‘counts. It produces roughly 1 post per business day (28.7 posts/month),
receives more than 240 likes/post and more than 23,000 eomments/
post. Given tha the comments indicate higher levels of engagement than
likes in social media campaigns (Soltsiasks, 2017), these data show
that Lululemon has a large and active customer base on Instagran
“Toble © shows the descriptive statics of the variables, including
correlations. Before the analysis, a naturablog transformation was
applied to highly skewed variable, euch asthe numberof postings, the
a+ fFollomer~ Infuencer Engagements, + PVsual Congruence yr
srXinn +065
5.1 engagement (In T1) on F-B engagement (in T2), and (2) the medi
ation effect of F-I engagement on the relationship between visual
‘ongrusnee and F-B engagement.
‘Our intial dataset consisted of 900 observations (30 Inluencers and
30 Followers/influencer). We later found that three Influencers” ae
‘counts were closed down in T2, so we decided to eliminate those three
Tafluencers and thet Followers fom our analysis. For the same reason,
‘we temoved three Followers whose accounts were closed in T2. In the
‘end, our final dataset consisted of 807 observations (27 Influencers and 807
oftheir Followers).
7. Rests
7.3.1. Desriptive sais
“Tale © provides the descriptive statistics ofthe 27 Influencers and
thle Followers in 72.
Influencers and Followers are clearly contrasted in terms of in-degree
and outdegree centrality. Influencers have much higher in-legree
‘centrality (13,763 ve. 4085, which means that chey have a lot more
Followers), but much lower out degree centrality (1664 vs. 4113, whieh
‘means that they follow a lot fever people) than their Followers. Third,
Influencers’ posts included more images, received nearly twice as many
likes (endorsements), and 42 times more comment (responses) than their
Followers. These difrences suggest that the ambassadors are likely to exer
‘Table
Inflaecer follower descriptive statis (in Ts of Apel 2019)
tafe allover
Tw depo Gaia oF) 137080 1085.5 (5
anis0s2)
ude County #effoowins) aeK CERES) — aaa. A604)
Inge tings 8 T2 s2a0s0) 2x0 (5059
ks reed pst zara 20168)
ommend st agua) esas)
‘Note: Mean (Standard Deviation).
‘number of Followers (out-degree centalty), and the number of Fol
wees (in-depree centrality), as indicated by “(ln)” in the regression
result tables (Fables 9-11. The variance iafltion factors (VIFs) fr ll
varlables were below 20, in both of the models explained above,
demonstrating that multicollinearty was not a concern in any of the
correlations among the variables,
7.3.2. tiypothets | testing results
“Toble 9 reports the result of the Poisson Influencer Fixed-ffect
regression model of the Followers engagement with the Influencer in T1
‘Model 1 presents the bate model with the control variables only, Model
2 add visval congruence to the base model. In aition to log kel
hhood, we report Akaike's information criterion (AIC), which is a mes-
site of goodness of fit based on the tradeoff between the complexity and
precision of a model (Wie, 1974). The smaller the AIC value, the
better the model is. Model 2 has a better result a shows tht the co-
ficient for visual congruence is positive and significant (0.735, p <
(001), supporting the notion that visual congruence ie pasiively aes0-
lated with FA engagement. Thus, Hi, which states that visual
congruence is positively associated with Followers’ engagement in the
Influencers posts, is supported
7.3.3. Hypotvets 2 & Hypothesis 3 esting results
‘Next, we tested both H2 and H3. H2 states that FI engagement (in
‘71 will inrease F-B engagement (inT2) (ie, M-Y in ig.) HS states
that visual congruence will increase F-B engagement, snd thie rela
tionship is fly mediated by F-1 engagement (i, X-eM-rY), There are
four steps that need to be met in establishing mediation (Sa:0n Kenny,
1986),
Step 1X affects Y in the absence of M.
# Step 2X is asociated with M (Ht).
# Step & M affects Yin the presence of X (H2).
1 Step 4: 1X no longer affects Y in the presence of M, and the three
conditions above are all met, the X-Y relationship i fully mediated
by M (HS). YA Argrivet a
Comper on ee 112 2020 106883
‘able
Deserve Sit of he Vans (ea, S, nd orton cof)
Yee on) OOOO
()raksachiomwr myn at——a
praumwertaaetgyenes” Oo 1
Coempware Piyesiacivies Ore 4
(rmingnity Sana Shae mas
(marge eye tan in os aoe hae
Chonda xy ston? tne = ww aimee ame
(Smt Bong (7) ae er coo tes owe taste
(yt cane fae oes ete een
Fe p< 008, p< 001, p< 0001
Table 9 able
1 ting ret ess et ee fo HY
YAR © @ vaRARLES @ ® @
ose Aci oo" on Semon Rowe On) ed
Inde Cty) ‘ont me Se
ion cm Pag aay rr oa
edge Cry) ay ame w iam oan)
‘tom ison twatgre “ont ie Se ae
owning) ‘or me rarity (om) tanya)
ian ian oo
wo) ‘ory Gan) aan) Gn) cm)
Inner Pan os te se o
tytn Swan Sicnzs at 120 sme as sim
we wumae mos Totowing am) ua amy)
Note DV Falowersenpaement with beltorncers pest — Ge gy = as
Ceumarcawoninparniberesine Lagttnsomedseypcam.s"pcoon, mimes fame" gts a
able 10 conance an
TE Ht testing ress icy
ttre Yes Ye te ‘e
YAR o @ ed es
RaEe ETO eed a Lugiliond stone -mman
You might also like
- The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good LifeFrom EverandThe Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good LifeRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (5806)
- The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You AreFrom EverandThe Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You AreRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (1091)
- Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On ItFrom EverandNever Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On ItRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (842)
- Grit: The Power of Passion and PerseveranceFrom EverandGrit: The Power of Passion and PerseveranceRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (589)
- Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space RaceFrom EverandHidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space RaceRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (897)
- Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of NikeFrom EverandShoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of NikeRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (537)
- The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy AnswersFrom EverandThe Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy AnswersRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (345)
- Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic FutureFrom EverandElon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic FutureRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (474)
- Her Body and Other Parties: StoriesFrom EverandHer Body and Other Parties: StoriesRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (821)
- The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of CancerFrom EverandThe Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of CancerRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (271)
- The Sympathizer: A Novel (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction)From EverandThe Sympathizer: A Novel (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction)Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (122)
- The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy LivingFrom EverandThe Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy LivingRating: 3.5 out of 5 stars3.5/5 (401)
- The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first CenturyFrom EverandThe World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first CenturyRating: 3.5 out of 5 stars3.5/5 (2259)
- The Yellow House: A Memoir (2019 National Book Award Winner)From EverandThe Yellow House: A Memoir (2019 National Book Award Winner)Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (98)
- Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New AmericaFrom EverandDevil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New AmericaRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (266)
- A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius: A Memoir Based on a True StoryFrom EverandA Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius: A Memoir Based on a True StoryRating: 3.5 out of 5 stars3.5/5 (231)
- Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham LincolnFrom EverandTeam of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham LincolnRating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (234)
- On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New DealFrom EverandOn Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New DealRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (74)
- The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New AmericaFrom EverandThe Unwinding: An Inner History of the New AmericaRating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5 (45)
- Google Analytics of A Pilot Mass and Social Media Campaign TargetingDocument10 pagesGoogle Analytics of A Pilot Mass and Social Media Campaign TargetingibnuNo ratings yet
- Determining The Most Effective Promotion Strategy For ClothingDocument10 pagesDetermining The Most Effective Promotion Strategy For ClothingibnuNo ratings yet
- Reaching Consumers How The Tobacco Industry Uses Email MarketingDocument4 pagesReaching Consumers How The Tobacco Industry Uses Email MarketingibnuNo ratings yet
- Introduction To Meta-AnalysisDocument37 pagesIntroduction To Meta-AnalysisibnuNo ratings yet
- Going Digital The Impact of Social Media Marketing On Retail Website Traffic Orders and SalesDocument11 pagesGoing Digital The Impact of Social Media Marketing On Retail Website Traffic Orders and SalesibnuNo ratings yet
- 9.the Impact of Enterprise Risk Management On Competitive Advantage by Moderating Role of Information TechnologyDocument31 pages9.the Impact of Enterprise Risk Management On Competitive Advantage by Moderating Role of Information TechnologyibnuNo ratings yet
- Business Strategy and The Management ofDocument9 pagesBusiness Strategy and The Management ofibnuNo ratings yet
- 7.integrating Sustainability Reporting Into Enterprise Risk Management and Its Relationship With Business Performance A Conceptual FrameworkDocument29 pages7.integrating Sustainability Reporting Into Enterprise Risk Management and Its Relationship With Business Performance A Conceptual FrameworkibnuNo ratings yet
- Materials Today: Proceedings: P.M. Masuti, U.A. DabadeDocument5 pagesMaterials Today: Proceedings: P.M. Masuti, U.A. DabadeibnuNo ratings yet
- Journal of Manufacturing Systems: Technical PaperDocument12 pagesJournal of Manufacturing Systems: Technical PaperibnuNo ratings yet
