Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24

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Asia Pacific Management Review

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apmrv

Engaging customers through online participation in social networking sites

Fedric Kujur*, Saumya Singh
Department of Management Studies, Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Dhanbad, Jharkhand, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Social networking is currently the most popular online activity among consumers worldwide. Today in
Received 14 October 2015 business context, Social media is achieving increasing importance as a channel for consumer's online
Received in revised form participation and engagement. Brands are developing its presence in social networking sites to meet
25 February 2016
engagement, brand awareness and word of mouth. In this context, the analysis of the factors that are
Accepted 27 October 2016
conditioning consumer interaction with branded content becomes a matter of interest. To explore factors
Available online 21 December 2016
influencing consumer's online engagement in social networking sites (SNS), this study applies use and
gratification (U&G) theory to explain why people are actively involved in media usage and interact highly
Keywords:
Social media
with the communication media i.e., SNS. This study used an online as well as offline questionnaire to
Social networking site (SNS) conduct empirical research, and collected and analyzed data of 394 samples by structural equation
Social Networking Ad (SNA) modeling (SEM) approach. The findings show that the U&G theory significantly explains consumers'
Consumers' online participation and attitude toward social networking ad (SNA). The result shows that the content characteristics of SNA i.e.,
engagement behavior vividness, interactivity, entertainment and information have direct influence on the consumers' online
Consumer's positive attitude participation and engagement behavior whereas incentive doesn’t show any impact. On the other hand,
when mediated by consumer's positive attitude toward SNA, vividness, interactivity, information and
entertainment show partial mediation effect on the consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior whereas incentive show full mediation effect. In addition, this study found that the social media
users who have a positive attitude toward SNA are more likely to surf the Net and feel more engaged.
This study empirically contributes to the existing literature on the management of marketing strategies
for consumer engagement in social networking sites.
© 2016 College of Management, National Cheng Kung University. Production and hosting by Elsevier
Taiwan LLC. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction applications, the concept of customer engagement has become

Social networking is gaining its importance as one of the most
popular online activity among consumers worldwide. Not sur-
prisingly, the industry has followed the consumers and almost 94%
of all businesses with a marketing department have established
their presence and continuously pursued engaging their customer
base on at least one of the “Big Four” social media platforms:
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Googleþ.
Today in business context, Social media is achieving increasing
importance as a channel for online consumer engagement.
Although the term engagement still lacks clear definitions and
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: fedrickujur@gmail.com (F. Kujur), saumya.ism@gmail.com
(S. Singh).
Peer review under responsibility of College of Management, National Cheng
Kung University.
commonplace among marketers. More and more resources are
being invested in social media and brands from all over the world to
continue to grow their online fan base. Moreover, having social
media presence on the web facilitates number of advantageous
platform for the brand owners relating to advertisement, product
development and market intelligence by observation and analysis
of the user generated content (UGC) (Richter, Riemer, & vom
Brocke, 2011). At present the use of social media is a need for all
the businesses because it is popular, encourages two-way
communication, reaches all ages and demographics, and pro-
motes e-word of mouth (Divya & Regi, 2004). Social media mar-
keting includes the Word of Mouth (WOM) marketing which is also
known as viral marketing, buzz, and guerilla marketing and in-
volves intentional influencing of consumer-to-consumer commu-
nication through professional marketing techniques (Kozinets, De
Valck, Wojnicki, & Wilner, 2010). The advantage of this new elec-
tronic channel is that it can be used to communicate globally and to

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apmrv.2016.10.006
1029-3132/© 2016 College of Management, National Cheng Kung University. Production and hosting by Elsevier Taiwan LLC. All rights reserved.
 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24
enrich marketing toward consumers at the personal level (Mangold
& Faulds 2009). Through users' feedback or by observing conver-
sations on social media, a company can learn about customers'
needs, potentially leading to involvement of members of the
community in the co-creation of value through the generation of
ideas (Palmer & Koenig-Lewis, 2009).
Social media marketing is not a replacement of the traditional
marketing but is an additional marketing channel that could be
integrated with the traditional ones as a part of the marketing mix
(Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013). From the previous studies it has been
found that the attitude of the customers with regard to the brand
could be studied or analyzed in terms of transactional and non-
transactional behavior of the customers (Garcia-Murillo &
Annabi, 2002). We argue that non-transactional behavior or in
other word we can say personal interactions with customers lead to
richer content and can help explain why customers do what they
do. While transactional data is useful to identify problems and
preferences, it is difficult to determine the reasons for customer
decisions. With personal interactions firms can ask customers
directly and have an idea of the source of problems, preferences,
and needs through engagement marketing principles. Thus the
terms engagement and participation became the central non-
transactional constructs, used to describe the nature of partici-
pants' specific interactions and/or interactive experiences (Cvijikj &
Michahelles, 2013). Today engagement has become the main pur-
pose of the social media in business context as it implies level of
involvement, interaction, intimacy, and customer influence with a
brand over time (Safko & Brake, 2009). Many studies also reveal
that when consumers are highly engaged with a social networking
sites they can be more responsive to brand advertisements
(Bronner & Neijens, 2006; Cunningham, Hall, & Young, 2006;
Calder, Malthouse, & Schaedel, 2009; Wang, 2006).
Hence this study calls for a rigorous research on the influencing
factors in terms of characteristics of the content communicated by
the company for consumers' participation in online brand related
activities which ultimately lead to higher level of online engage-
ment on Social Networking Sites (SNS). Further we also discuss how
these factors are mediated by consumers' positive attitude towards
Social Networking Advertising (SNA).
2. Literature review
2.1. Social media as consumers' online engagement tool
A central element of online social media is the extent to which it
enables brands and consumers to connect, communicate, and
engage. Consumer engagement has been defined by the Adver-
tising Research Foundation as the process of “turning on a pro-
spective customer to a brand idea enhanced by the surrounding
context” (Burns, 2006), and both academic as well as industry re-
searchers increasingly view engagement as an important construct
in the study of brand-consumer relationships (e.g., Gambetti &
Graffigna, 2010; Haven, 2007). The main purpose of the social
media in business context is to engage people. Engagement is the
level of involvement, interaction, intimacy, and influence cus-
tomers have with a brand over time (Safko & Brake, 2009). Many
studies reveal that when consumers are highly engaged with a
media vehicle, they can be more responsive to brand advertise-
ments (Bronner & Neijens, 2006; Coulter, 1998; Cunningham et al.,
2006; Wang, 2006). Therefore as online user's browse time in-
crease, SNS become more powerful marketing channels since the
moderator posts only touching and persuasive messages which in
turn changes users' attitudes and induce enthusiastic interactions
(Bhattacherjee & Premkumar, 2004; Coulter & Punj, 2004; Chang,
Yu, & Lu, 2015). Literature review shows that the attitude of
17
internet users changes due to two factors: Usefulness and Prefer-
ences. Usefulness refers to user perceptions deriving from personal
or professional judgment about content that may benefit their
performance in browsing posts (Bhattacherjee & Sanford, 2006),
while preferences comprise favorable feelings and interests (Kim &
Son, 2009; Chang et al., 2015). Strong and relevant content of the
brand posts generate favorable cognitive responses regarding posts,
which ultimately leads to positive attitude toward posts and in-
fluences purchasing decision on the basis of information gathered
from the posts (Akar & Topçu, 2011; Miller & Lammas, 2010).
Compared to traditional views of brand-consumer engagement,
online brand interactions are viewed as consisting of greater
cognitive processing, heightened relevance and emotional experi-
ences (Mollen & Wilson, 2010), and greater advertising effective-
ness (Calder et al., 2009). Driven by the growth of online media,
consumers are increasingly seeking, even expecting, and a more
involved role in the consumption process (Calder & Malthouse,
2005a, 2005b). Brand-consumer engagement specific to social
media has, more directly, been conceptualized as consisting of
several elements, including 1) creating and posting online content
that is relevant to consumers; 2) brands relinquishing some degree
of control over content so that it becomes sharable, and even
modifiable, among friends; 3) engendering a sense of online com-
munity among customers; 4) and facilitating conversation rather
than delivering one-way marketing communications (Parent,
Plangger, & Bal, 2011). Overall, this online engagement perspec-
tive led to the development of our research instrument (a social
media diary assessing individuals' engagement with brands using
social media), the data collection, and the analysis illustrated next.
2.2. Content characteristics of SNA and consumer's online
engagement over SNS
In the present market scenario, interest in customer engage-
ment is mushrooming as the development of the Internet is at
boom which creates an interaction between consumers and the
brands. Hollebeek (2011), defined consumer engagement (CE) with
a specific brand as “the level of a customer's cognitive, emotional
and behavioral investment in specific brand interactions,” and
identified the three consumer engagement dimensions of immer-
sion (cognitive), passion (emotional) and activation (behavioral).
Further, Brodie, Hollebeek, Juric, and Ilic (2011) defined CE as “a
psychological state that occurs by virtue of interactive, co-creative
customer experiences with a particular agent/object (e.g., a
brand)”. The idea behind these assertions is that engaged cus-
tomers play a crucial role in viral marketing activity by providing
referrals and/or recommendations for specific products, services,
and/or brands to others. Engaged customers can also play an
important role in new product/service development (Hoyer,
Chandy, Dorotic, Krafft, & Singh, 2010; Kothandaraman & Wilson,
2001; Nambisan & Nambisan, 2008), and in co-creating experi-
ence and value (Brakus, Schmitt, & Zarantello, 2009; Prahalad &
Ramaswamy, 2004).
Amidst Scholarly endeavors, it has been found that by utilizing
social networking platform, companies can create online brand
communities. Perhaps the best-known example of this is Facebook
Brand Pages (FBP) found on the Facebook platform (Cvijikj &
Michahelles, 2013). In practice, the FBP is followed by media
users by clicking the ‘like button’, which indicates that the media
users like the brand in their social network. This process then en-
ables new contents to be automatically sent from the brand to be
posted to their personal Facebook newsfeed, where media users
can interact with a brand by means of anecdotes, status, photos,
videos or other brand-related contents that users can like, share or
comment on with other followers of the brand or their own friends
18 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24
and relatives (De Vries, Gensler, & Leeflang, 2012; Jahn & Kunz,
2012; Labrecque, vor dem Esche, Mathwick, Novak, & Hofacker,
2013). Interestingly, the social media technology has been suc-
cessful in enabling brands to be popular with, and among, active
social media users through higher levels of customer-brand inter-
action by the dynamic marketing agencies (Gensler, Vo € lckner, Liu-
Thompkins, & Wiertz, 2013). Such interactive communications can
act as mechanisms for value co-creation and for allowing possi-
bilities such as improved brand meaning (Gensler et al., 2013;
Hatch & Schultz, 2010) and collaborative product innovation op-
portunities (Kozinets et al., 2010; Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004;
Sawhney, Verona, & Prandelli, 2005), thereby enhancing percep-
tion of consumers' online engagement with FBP. Based on this
rationale, the analysis of the content characteristics that makes SNA
popular as well as the study of those factors that are conditioning
consumer interaction become a matter of interest for firms in order
to address their marketing efforts in social media in the right di-
rections. From the intensive literature review, five content charac-
teristics in the SNA have been identified namely vividness,
interactivity, information, entertainment and incentive that help in
achieving consumers' online engagement over social media
through customer-brand interaction. So far in the study, we have
seen the benefit of the customer-brand interaction which keeps the
social media users engaged over SNS and the content characteris-
tics of the ad which are likely to cause consumers' online engage-
ment. But a question here arises that how these content
characteristics of the ad influence consumers' online engagement?
To answer this question, the consumers' attitude toward ad plays
very pivotal role in mediating the relationship between content
characteristics of the ad and consumers' online engagement
behavior.
2.3. Role of attitude toward SNA as mediator
Based upon studies of traditional mass media advertising liter-
ature, Chen and Wells (1999) are among the first to propose a
seminal scale - Web users' attitude toward the site. Attitude toward
the Web is considered as a key determinant of both consumer
adoption and usage of the Web, and Web marketing effectiveness
(Chen & Wells, 1999), just as attitude toward ad is a key predictor of
ad effectiveness in advertising literature (Luo, 2002).
Previous advertising research has shown that the attitude to-
ward ad is the most noteworthy indicator of advertising effective-
ness and outcomes (Aaker & Stayman, 1990; Haley & Baldinger,
1991; MacKenzie, Lutz, & Belch, 1986). For example, MacKenzie
et al. (1986) found support that the attitude toward the ad in-
fluences brand loyalty and purchase intentions. In addition, Haley
and Baldinger (1991) found that the degree to which audiences
like an advertisement is the foremost predictor of sales. In the same
manner, it is believed that consumers who hold a positive attitude
toward SNA would spend more time browsing the websites for fun
or information, and feel engaged with the convenient and
resourceful SNA.
Further, the attitude towards brand post has been proposed as
the antecedents of consumers' online participation and engage-
ment. The previous studies reveal that the attitude towards the
behavior (i.e., attitude towards brand post) mediates the effect of
each antecedent (i.e., content characteristics of the SNA) of con-
sumers' online participation and engagement, and has a positive
impact on it. The proposed hypothesis has been supported by
behavioral attitude theories such as the Theory of Reasoned Action
(Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975), the Theory of Trying (Bagozzi & Warshaw,
1990), and the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991), which
suggest that positive attitudes lead to stronger intention to perform
the actual behavior (i.e., online participation and engagement).
Moreover Wang (2006) reveals in his research that message
involvement and positive attitude formation mainly depend on
contextual relevance that is the content related factors in adver-
tising message and the media environment which increases
attention to advertisements and advertising awareness. Con-
sumers' online engagement is mainly the result of contextual
relevance and the media they experience. The contextual relevance
that is content characteristics of the ad increases consumer's
attention and ad awareness. Because the urge of consumers
drawing attention toward the ad is shaped by the degree of con-
sumers brand perception (Burnkrant & Sawyer, 1983). Higher
consumers' online engagement initiated by context relevance is
strongly mediated by positive attitude toward the advertising
message (Wang, 2006). Therefore the consumers' positive attitude
towards SNA has stronger mediation effect on each antecedent of
consumers' online participation and engagement behavior.
2.4. Uses and gratifications theory
The Uses and Gratifications (U&G) theory started from the
functionalist point of view on mass communications correspon-
dence. Basically, it concentrated on the explanations for mass in-
dividuals' motivations and associated behaviors. Psychologist
Herzog (1944) coined the term gratifications to depict the specific
dimensions of usage satisfaction of radio audiences. Following this,
mass communication theorists applied the U&G perspective in the
context of various mass media such as television and electronic
bulletins. For example, Rubin (1994) found that certain kinds of
television programs have been shown to be related to various hu-
man needs, including information acquisition, escape, emotional
release, companionship, reality exploration, and value reinforce-
ment. The U&G theory has been quite fruitful in explaining con-
sumers' motivations and concerns for continuing use of various
media such as radio, TV, and electronic bulletins (Eighmey &
McCord, 1998). This theory assumes that firstly, the media users
are very active and make motivated choices on the basis of previous
experiences with the media. Secondly, the selection and the use of
media are purposive and motivated and people take initiative in
selecting and using the communication vehicles to satisfy felt needs
and desires (Lim & Ting, 2012). Based on this rationale, the core
objective of the U&G theory becomes very legitimate to explain and
understand the psychological needs which shape people's reason
for using the media and the reasons which influence them to
actively engage in certain media use behaviors for gratifications
that fulfil their inherent needs, including the identification of the
positive and negative attitude of individual media use (Rubin,
1994). Thus the process of building positive attitude leads to
continual use of that media, as a result consumers' online
engagement behavior is developed. On the context of this study, the
content characteristics of the SNA motivate the social media users
to click on the content to interact with the brand which leads in
building positive attitude toward the brand and this positive atti-
tude toward SNA helps in influencing long term consumers' online
engagement behaviors. In advertising literature, it has been found
that the content related factors in SNA(the content characteristics)
influences users to actively interact with the brand in SNS and this
process of interaction is referred to as consumers' online engage-
ment (Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013; De Vries et al., 2012; Sabate,
Berbegal-Mirabent, Can ~ abate, & Lebherz, 2014). The positive atti-
tude toward content characteristics of SNA not only engages the
consumers but also influences forwarding of the content to their
friends, families, and colleagues and so on. In the literature, the
most important and robust dimensions of online consumer
engagement includes factors relating to content characteristics of
the SNA i.e., vividness, interactivity, information, entertainment,
 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24
Fig. 1. Conceptual model for the research study; Source e Author's Compilation.
and incentive (Chen & Wells, 1999; Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013; De
Vries et al., 2012; Eighmey & McCord, 1998; Rubin, 1994; Sabate
et al., 2014).
3. Conceptual framework of the study
Consumers' online engagement is proposed to be influenced by
brand related activities in terms of the content characteristics of
SNA. Based on an extensive literature review, five important char-
acteristics of the brand post content are identified and proposed as
the main antecedents of consumers' online engagement, including
vividness, interactivity, information, entertainment, and incentive.
Fig. 1 depicts the conceptual model. We argue that vividness,
interactivity, information, entertainment, and incentive are related
to the online engagement.
Further we also argue that when these factors are mediated by
the consumers' positive attitude, then there is a higher level of
consumers' online engagement in SNS. Each of these five factors is
discussed in the following sections.
3.1. Vividness
Vividness can be defined as “the representational richness of a
mediated environment as defined by its formal features; that is, the
way in which an environment presents information to the senses.”
Vividness consists of two sub dimensions, breadth and depth i.e.,
the richness of the message. Breadth is the number of different
senses that a medium can engage, and depth is how closely a me-
dium can replicate parts of the human sensory system (Steuer,
1992). The richness of the message generally termed as vividness
of the online content includes videos, images, statuses, and links
(Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013; De Vries et al., 2012; Sabate et al.,
2014). Vividness can be achieved by incorporating dynamic ani-
mation, contrasting colors or pictures (Cho, 1999; Dreze &
Hussherr, 2003; Fortin & Dholakia, 2005; Goldfarb & Tucker,
2011; Goodrich, 2011; Lohtia, Donthu, & Hershberger, 2003).
These mechanisms are found to stimulate different senses that
increase the user's propensity to look at the content of the message
and thus influence consumers' online participation. The increased
level of vividness tends to lead to more positive and enduring at-
titudes toward the web site, stronger feelings of telepresence, and
greater attitudedbehavior consistency (Coyle & Thorson, 2001).
More over the previous studies reveal that in the low involvement
situation or the situation like the favorability of peripheral cues
(attention getting/curiosity generating visual cues in SNA) people
are more likely to click the post. Thus the preceding discussion
suggests the following hypothesis:
H1a. SNA having vivid features in the content significantly
19
influences consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
H1b. Attitude toward SNA partially mediates the effect of vivid-
ness on consumers' online participation and engagement behavior.
3.2. Interactivity
Steuer (1992) defines interactivity as “the extent to which users
can participate in modifying the form and content of a mediated
environment in real time”. Hoffman and Novak (1996) distinguish
two levels of interactivity: person interactivity that occurs between
humans through a medium and machine interactivity that occurs
between humans and machines access hypermedia content.
Interactivity in online environment is a stimulus driven variable
which influences consumer participation and engagement via
computer-mediated communication channels (Bucy, 2004). From
the context of this paper, interactivity refers to the extent of two-
way communication between business and customers, as well as
among customers. This study also suggests that the prime rela-
tionship is not between the sender and the receiver, but rather with
the mediated environment with which they interact. And it is that
mediated environment which is also known as Telepresence, which
increases the level of both type of interactivity.
Previous studies reveal that the effect of various levels of
interactivity of a message on attitudes and behavioral intentions
within a web-based advertisement is influenced by social presence,
involvement and arousal (Fortin & Dholakia, 2005). The moderate
effects of interactivity have direct effects on social presence, which
in turn have strong effect on involvement and arousal and ulti-
mately advertising effectiveness measures. The increased level of
interactivity tends to lead to more positive and enduring attitudes
toward the web site, stronger feelings of telepresence, and greater
attitudedbehavior consistency (Cho, 1999; Coyle & Thorson, 2001).
Thus the preceding discussion suggests the following hypothesis:
H2a. SNA having interactive features in the content significantly
influences consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
H2b. Attitude toward SNA partially mediates the effect of inter-
activity on consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
3.3. Information
Information seeking in the social networking sites is the key
construct among the peers as they perceive or experience the
product or the brand or the company useful and enjoyable (Lin &
20 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24
Lu, 2011). The previous studies reveal that the pleasure-oriented
information system makes social effects and motivates to partici-
pate and to contribute to brand communities in the social
networking sites (Dholakia, Bagozzi, & Pearo, 2004; Park, Kee, &
Valenzuela, 2009). When the brand post posted on brand fan
pages that provided informational value or offered social value,
consumers appeared more likely to respond favorably toward the
ad stimuli themselves. Hence the brand post containing informa-
tion also works as the key motivational factors to create interaction
and engagement with consumers as it provides information about
brand or product. Further research shows that since the consumers
are provided with useful information, they tend to have positive
attitudes toward informative ads on social networking sites (De
Vries et al., 2012). Thus the preceding discussion suggests the
following hypothesis:
H3a. SNA having information in the content significantly in-
fluences consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
H3b. Attitude toward SNA partially mediates the effect of infor-
mation on consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
3.4. Entertainment
The important motivational factors for the consumer partici-
pation in social networking sites depend upon consumers' interest
to experience entertaining content in the brand post. Enginkaya
and Yilmaz (2014) point out that entrainment factor is novel
characteristics for social media brand engagement literature. The
entertaining content in the brand post creates online consumer
involvement with the brand and also buzz among consumers
which in turn helps in seeking brand awareness, image building
and leverage. Moreover the entertaining value was found to be
among the main motivations for online engagement over brand-
related content in the form of consumption, contribution and cre-
ation (Muntinga, Moorman, & Smit, 2011). The content-driven
characteristics of advertising message that is entertaining content
has been identified as determinant influences on consumers' atti-
tudes toward the brand post on brand fan pages (De Vries et al.,
2012; Taylor, Lewin, & Strutton, 2011). Thus the preceding discus-
sion suggests the following hypothesis:
H4a. SNA having entertaining features in the content significantly
influences consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
H4b. Attitude toward SNA partially mediates the effect of enter-
tainment on consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
3.5. Incentive
In economics one can say that an incentive is a benefit, reward,
or cost that motivates an economic action. Shawn Grimsley in his
lecture describes that there are two types of incentives namely
intrinsic incentive and extrinsic incentive (Economic Incentives).
Intrinsic incentives are psychological incentives and are internal to
the person. Getting satisfaction from work is an intrinsic incentive.
On the other hand, extrinsic incentives include cash rewards, pri-
zes, offers, discounts etc. (Wang & Fesenmaier, 2003).
From the context of this paper, the term incentive has been used
for consumers for the purpose of contribution and creation of the
brand related content in SNS. Contributing to brand related content
actively involves both user-to-content and user-to-user in-
teractions about brands. People who are influenced by the remu-
neration tend to make contributions to brand forums, and
comment on blogs, pictures, videos and any other brand-related
content that others have created (Muntinga et al., 2011). While
creating brand related content actively involves writing brand-
related weblogs, posting product reviews, producing and upload-
ing branded videos, music and pictures, or writing articles on
brands (Muntinga et al., 2011). Thus the provision of incentives
denotes that SNS users would expect some remuneration in return
for engaging in liking, commenting and sharing activities towards
brand posts. Prior studies have found various types of incentives for
promoting engagement and participate in modifying the brand
related content. The content driven by remunerative characteristics
also influences the attitude of the consumers towards the brand
post (Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013). Thus the preceding discussion
suggests the following hypothesis:
H5a. SNA having incentive features in the content significantly
influences consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
H5b. Attitude toward SNA partially mediates the effect of incen-
tivity on consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior.
4. Research methodology
4.1. Sample selection and data collection
The sample frame consisted of respondents of different educa-
tional level such as undergraduate, post graduate and Ph.D. stu-
dents from various location of India as internet adoption and usage
rate still varies across age groups with the highest penetration
among young adults aged between 18 and 29 (Cheung, Chiu, & Lee,
2011; Taylor et al., 2011). The potential respondents of this study are
users who have followed at least one electronic accessories com-
pany especially mobile and laptop brand pages on Facebook. Each
of them were asked to provide contact information of 10e20 in-
dividuals and encouraged to include individuals from all range of
age groups. These individuals then were contacted and prescreened
by being asked the following question: “Do you use Facebook? The
respondents who answered “no” were thanked and removed from
the respondent list. The respondents who answered “Yes” were
asked again the following question: “Do you follow the Facebook
brand page of any one of the electronic accessories company
especially mobile and laptop?” The respondents who answered
“no” were thanked and removed from the respondent list. The re-
spondents who answered “Yes” were provided with the study
questionnaire and asked to complete the questionnaire over two
week period and return it to their respective contact person.
Once the data were collected, the lead researcher screened the
information for miscoded and suspicious-looking data entries. The
total effort yielded a usable sample size of 394 survey question-
naires. The average age of respondents was 23.5 years, with 20.6
percent at 15 to 20 age group; 36.4 percent at 21 to 25 age group;
29.1 percent at 26 to 30 age group; and 13.9 percent 30 þ age group.
Sixty five percent of respondents were male, and 35 percent were
female. The respondents indicated that they spent an average of
2e3 hours daily on Facebook activities.
Questionnaires use previous valuable material, slightly modi-
fying items to suit the context of the mobile fan pages. Question-
naire classifies items on five-point Likert scale, ranging from
“strongly disagree” to “strongly agree.”
 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24 21

Table 1 latent construct to one. The confirmatory factor analysis supported

Factor analysis results for model constructs. the exploratory factor analysis. The fit of the measurement model
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 was acceptable (c2 ¼ 876.675, CFI ¼ 0.969, RMSEA ¼ 0.047, and
vididness1 0.879
RMR ¼ 0.027). Therefore, the measurement model was retained
vividness2 0.777 without any modifications.
vividness3 0.826 According to Hair, Black, Babin, and Anderson (2010), it is
vididness4 0.832 absolutely necessary to establish convergent and discriminant
Interactivity1 0.899
validity, as well as reliability, when doing a CFA. There are a few
Interactivity2 0.823
Interactivity3 0.86 measures that are useful for establishing validity and reliability:
Interactivity4 0.864 Composite Reliability (CR), Average Variance Extracted (AVE),
Information1 0.856 Maximum Shared Variance (MSV), and Average Shared Variance
Information2 0.793
(ASV). The thresholds for these values are as follows:
Information3 0.828
Information4 0.842
Entertainment1 0.868 Reliability ¼ CR > 0.7; Convergent Validity ¼ AVE > 0.5;
Entertainment2 0.871 Discriminant Validity ¼ MSV < AVE, ASV < AVE; and Square root
Entertainment3 0.843 of AVE greater than inter-construct correlations.
Incentive1 0.875
Incentive2 0.887
Incentive3 0.896 The results of the analysis are in Table 2. Each research construct
Attitude1 0.946 conforms to the above four criteria. Thus all necessary indices are
Attitude2 0.931 acceptable. The convergent validity was assessed by average vari-
Attitude3 0.941 ance extracted (AVE) which was greater than 0.50 for all constructs.
Engagement1 0.945
Engagement2 0.945
Finally, discriminant validity was assessed by Square root of AVE
Cronbach's Alpha 0.913 0.857 0.849 0.868 0.935 0.869 0.884 which were greater than inter-construct correlations. This means
the indicators have more in common with the construct they are
associated with than they do with other constructs. Therefore, the
4.2. Measurement model constructs for the model demonstrate discriminant validity.

AMOS version 18 performs a two-step analysis. First, AMOS
examines measurement model. Then, AMOS examines structural
model. This study uses confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to eval-
uate measurement model. CFA is more appropriate than alternative
statistical techniques are for exploratory factor analysis (Bagozzi &
Phillips, 1982). The four-step approach recommended by Mulaik
and Millsap (2000) was used as SEM. Fit statistics including chi-
square, comparative fit index (CFI), Standardized Root Mean
Squared Residual (SRMR), and root mean square error of approxi-
mation (RMSEA) assessed model fit. A chi-square test assesses the
adequacy of a hypothesized model to reflect variance and covari-
ance of the data. For the statistical significance of parameter esti-
mates, t values were used. Generally, fit statistics greater than or
equal to .90 for CFI indicate a good model fit (Bentler & Bonnet,
1980). Similarly, RMSEA values lower than 0.05 and SRMR values
lower than 0.08 indicate adequate model fit. The first step identi-
fied latent variables in the model using SPSS as an exploratory
factor analysis and a principal component with varimax rotation. A
minimum eigenvalue of one was used as the criterion to control the
number of factors extracted.
An exploratory factor analysis revealed seven factors, vividness,
interactivity, information, entertainment, incentives, attitude to-
wards SNA, and consumers' online engagement in social
networking sites which explained 78% of the variance. See Table 1.
The second step was to test the fit of the measurement model by
constraining or referencing the factor loading of one variable per
4.3. Hypothesis testing
The third step tested the fit of the structural model by adding
hypothesized relationships between latent variables. The final
model reveal over all acceptable fit (c2 ¼ 876.675, CFI ¼ 0.969,
RMSEA ¼ 0.047, and RMR ¼ 0.027). As the model being tested is less
complex, the current studies meets the criteria of adequate sample
size (i.e., n > 200) (MacCallum, Browne, & Sugawara, 1996).
Since few advertising literatures support the direct relationship
between content characteristics and consumers, online engage-
ment behavior, the study followed the Baron and Kenny's (1986) 3
steps measurement model for mediation. The first step includes
whether the independent variable is a significant predictor of the
dependent variable. The second step includes whether indepen-
dent variable is a significant predictor of the mediator. The third
step includes whether the mediator is a significant predictor of the
dependent variable, while controlling for the independent variable.
From the analysis, it has been found that the first step of Baron
and Kenny's (1986) i.e., after removing the direct link from the
content characteristics of SNA and consumers' online participation
and engagement behavior, the model fit was still acceptable:
c2 ¼ 1058.21, CFI ¼ 0.932, RMSEA ¼ 0.088, and RMR ¼ 0.036. This
suggests that the positive attitude toward SNA partially mediated
the impact of content characteristics on the consumers' online
participation and engagement behavior. Further the result signifi-
cantly supports the relationship between content characteristics of

Table 2
Convergent and discriminant validity and inter-construct correlations.

CR AVE MSV ASV Attitude Vividness Interactivity Information Entertainment Incentive Engagement

Attitude 0.936 0.831 0.005 0.003 0.912

Vividness 0.947 0.819 0.053 0.013 0.066 0.905
Interactivity 0.906 0.707 0.22 0.048 0.012 0.231 0.841
Information 0.86 0.606 0.006 0.003 0.055 0.045 0.045 0.778
Entertainment 0.871 0.692 0.22 0.04 0.073 0.002 0.469 0.079 0.832
Incentive 0.869 0.689 0.017 0.007 0.03 0.131 0.097 0.065 0.085 0.83
Engagement 0.891 0.805 0.004 0.002 0.067 0.039 0.059 0.006 0.031 0.045 0.897
22 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24

Table 3
Test Results: path coefficients.

Hypothesis Regression Weights Standard Coefficient Estimates P value Results

H1a Engagement ) Vividness 0.941 0.001 Supported

H2a Engagement ) Interactivity 0.682 0.001 Supported
H3a Engagement ) Information 0.707 0.001 Supported
H4a Engagement ) Entertainment 0.004 0.001 Supported
H5a Engagement ) Incentive 0.535 0.096 Not Supported

Table 4
Test Results: path coefficients.

Regression weights Standard coefficient estimates P value Results

Attitude ) Vividness 0.382 *** Supported

Attitude ) Interactivity 0.110 0.049 Supported
Attitude ) Information 0.271 *** Supported
Attitude ) Entertainment 0.265 *** Supported
Attitude ) Incentive 0.139 0.024 Supported

Table 5
Test results: path coefficients.

Hypothesis-1b, 2b, 3b, 4b, 5b DV ) IVþM Direct effect without mediator Direct effect with mediator Mediation effect

Standard estimate P value Standard estimate P value

Engagement ) vividness (H1b) 0.941 0.001 0.644 0.001 Partial

Engagement ) interactivity (H2b) 0.682 0.001 0.596 0.001 Partial
Engagement ) information (H3b) 0.707 0.001 0.496 0.001 Partial
Engagement ) entertainment (H4b) 0.004 0.001 0.202 0.007 Partial
Engagement ) incentive (H5b) 0.535 0.096 (NS) 0.444 0.001 Full

SNA and the consumers' online participation and engagement
behavior, except that of interactivity and incentive. In other words,
the proposed study accepts H1a, H3a and H4a. Although H4a i.e.,
entertainment has very low standard coefficient estimate
(b ¼ 0.004; p < 0.001) but since the p value is significant we accept
this hypothesis. The possible explanation can be that SNA contains
content that is unrelated to the brand while social media users are
interested in the brand. Hence the findings of this study is generally
consistent with previous studies (Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013;
Goodrich, 2011; Muntinga et al., 2011; Steuer, J. 1992). Inter-
activity (b ¼ 0.682; p < 0.001) has negative impact on the con-
sumers' online engagement behavior, whereas Incentive
(b ¼ 0.535; p ¼ 0.096) shows no impact on the consumers' online
engagement behavior. The possible explanation for negative impact
of interactivity can be that when users click on the link of a
particular brand post then they are very less likely to return the Ad
page once again. This study conforms to the early studies (De Vries
et al., 2012; Sabate et al., 2014). On the other hand the possible
explanation for the no impact of incentive can be that the provision
of incentives made users suspicious about the trust worthiness of
SNA. See Table 3.
The second step of the Baron and Kenny (1986) also shows the
significant relationship between content characteristics of SNA and
the consumer's attitude toward SNA. Table 4 shows the result of
Baron and Kenny's (1986) second step for mediation, in which all
the elements of content characteristics support the relationship
with the consumers' attitude toward SNA. Thus the findings of this
study conform to the previous studies (Taylor et al., 2011; Muntinga
et al., 2011; Coyle & Thorson, 2001). See Table 4.
The third step measured the mediation effect of consumer's
attitude toward SNA. The results are shown in Table 5. The study
has compared the direct and mediation effect of the proposed
model. From the result it is clear that except interactivity and
incentive, all the content related factors of SNA (vividness,
information and entertainment) shows partial mediation effect as
the standard estimate value of mediating path is less than the direct
path. Even interactivity shows partial mediation effect on the
consumers' online engagement behavior though the standard es-
timate value is in negative form. On the other hand, incentive
shows the full mediation effect as its direct effect is not significant
whereas the mediation effect is significant (Baron & Kenny, 1986).
The possible explanation for this can be that when media users
develop positive attitude toward a particular brand post in SNS,
they begin to trust the incentive offered by the brand through SNA.
Thus the proposed study supports all hypothesis i.e. the consumers'
attitude toward SNA does play the role of mediation between the
content related factors of ad or the content characteristics of SNA
and the consumers' online engagement behavior. Moreover the
proposed conceptual model explained a substantial amount of
variance for consumers' attitude (R2 ¼ 0.837) and consumers' on-
line participation and engagement behavior (R2 ¼ 0.707) towards
SNA when mediated by consumers attitude whereas in the direct
effect without the mediator, the variance explained was very low
for consumers' online participation and engagement behavior
(R2 ¼ 0.180).
5. Discussion and conclusion
This study, drawing from uses and gratifications theory,
attempted to explore the influences of vividness, interactivity, in-
formation, entertainment, and incentive on various online con-
sumer behaviors such as attitude toward SNA, consumers' online
participation and engagement behavior in SNA. Particularly, con-
sumers' participation and engagement behaviors were explored as
the consequences of attitude toward the SNA, while vividness,
interactivity, information, entertainment, and incentive are the
antecedents of both attitude toward SNA and online participation
and engagement behaviors. Further, the research study lead to the
 F. Kujur, S. Singh / Asia Pacific Management Review 22 (2017) 16e24
exploration of stronger mediation effect of the consumers' positive
attitude towards SNA on each antecedent of consumers' online
participation and engagement behavior. This nomological model
was tested with a more rigid theory testing methodology–struc-
tural equation modeling (SEM) approach.
SEM results indicated that the U&G theory explains consumers'
attitude toward SNA. Social media users who perceive SNA as
vividness, interactivity, information, entertainment and incentive,
generally like SNA and show a positive attitude toward SNA. In
addition, this study found that the social media users who have a
positive attitude toward SNA are more likely to surf the Net and feel
more engaged.
We also tested direct paths from the motivational factors
relating to the content characteristics of SNA to consumers'
participation and engagement behavior. Social media users who
perceive SNA as vividness, information and entertainment gener-
ally have direct and significant influence on consumers' partici-
pating and engagement behavior. On the other hand, those who
perceive SNA as interactivity and incentive show negative and no
influence on the consumers' participation and engagement
behavior. Here a point can be noted that although interactivity and
incentive when mediated by attitude toward SNA then they show
negative influence on the consumers' online participation and
engagement behavior but as the p value is significant we accept the
hypothesis. Thus our proposed model is well supported and the
result indicated only the model with the directions hypothesized
fits the data the best. Since this study has been taken for the first
time, there is no ground for the other rival comparison. But this
study has tried to compare the result of direct effect without
mediator and the direct effect with mediator on the consumers'
online participation and engagement behavior in SNA.
The findings of this study offer several implications for social
media marketing. Firstly, social media markers should focus on
vividness which includes videos, images and status which draws
attention of social media users to view the SNA. Moreover it keeps
engaged both visual and audio of the human sensory in cyber
space. This is because vividness value was found to be the most
important determinant of users' attitude toward the SNA, which
may lead to more user engagement and repeated use of the SNA.
And then the important determinant of user's attitude toward the
SNA was followed by entertainment, information, incentive and
interactivity. Social media marketers should not only provide useful
information to social media users, but also go beyond this by
entertaining them in cyberspace. This is because consumers when
apparently derived utility from SNA that provided information that
addressed some functional or pressing user need, users' attitudes
toward SNA appeared likely to be more positive. In the same
manner hedonic value derived from entertaining ad message could
deliver to the media users more positive attitude toward SNA
(Taylor et al., 2011). Further, the incentive content category devi-
ated from the expected behavior. While positive effect was found to
exist only over the attitude toward SNA. A possible explanation for
this result could again be related to the loss of relevance of this type
of content outside the social networking sites. Finally interactivity
which includes navigational links, e-mail forms, etc., has very poor
relationship with the attitude toward SNA. To make interactive
features more effective in the ad, vividness and interactivity should
be addressed from the perspective of finding the ‘‘optimal mix’’, as
already proposed by Fortin and Dholakia (2005). This process ul-
timately influences repeated visits and click through rates by
creating positive attitude toward SNA, which results in online
consumer engagement and loyalty of the website which are the key
to success of social media business (Hoffman, Novak, & Peralta,
1999; Fukuyama, 1995). Secondly, social media marketers should
avoid confusing or irritating surfers by such practices as too flashy
23
and big size graphics, messy presentation of the information, or
even deceptive content or too many links and mails etc., on the
Web. By irritating social media users, social media businesses will
find it notoriously difficult to get consumers back to their websites
in the future.
5.1. Future research directions and study limitations
The present study of its kind contributed to the literature in
various ways. First, to the best of our knowledge, it is the first study
intended to measure the relationship between the factors relating
to the content characteristics of SNA and consumers' online
participation and engagement behavior by showing the mediating
effect of consumers' attitude toward SNA. Second, by using the
structural equation modeling method, this study supports the
convergent and discriminant validity of proposed scales in the
research. Further research efforts are called for to validate the
findings of this study. Further research efforts may survey the social
media users other than college students. The student sample was
one limitation of the present study possibly biasing the findings.
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