Facebook advertisingrsquos influenceon intention-to-purchase andpurchase amongst Millennials

Rodney Graeme DuffettDepartment of Marketing Cape Peninsula University of Technology

Cape Town South Africa

AbstractPurpose ndash The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of behavioural attitudestowards the most popular social medium in the world Facebook amongst Millennials in South Africa(SA) and to determine whether various usage and demographic variables have an impact on intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsDesignmethodologyapproach ndash Quantitative research was conducted by means of a surveyamong a sample of over 3500 respondents via self-administered structured questionnaires in SAA generalised linear model was used to analyse the dataFindings ndash The results confirm that advertising on Facebook has a positive influence on thebehavioural attitudes (intention-to-purchase and purchase) of Millennials who reside in SA The usagecharacteristics log on duration and profile update incidence as well as the demographic influence ofethnic orientation also resulted in more favourable perceptions of Facebook advertisingResearch limitationsimplications ndash Research on Facebook advertising was only conducted inSA whereas other emerging countries warrant further investigation to establish if they share theslight positive sentiment towards intention-to-purchase and purchase This inquiry only provides aldquosnap shotrdquo of behavioural attitudes usage and demographic factors towards social media advertisingwhereas future research could consider the development of cognitive affective and behaviouralattitudes towards Facebook advertising by employing longitudinal and qualitative research designsPractical implications ndash Organisations and managers should consider that their existing Facebookadvertising strategies may only have a limited effect on intention-to-purchase and purchase in SAHowever certain usage characteristics namely the more time spent logged on to Facebook and thegreater frequency of profile update incidence as well as the demographic variable namely black andcoloured Millennials resulted in more favourable behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingHence organisations and managers should be prepared to alter or adapt their Facebook advertisingtactics accordingly when targeting the notoriously fickle MillennialsOriginalityvalue ndash This investigation found that Facebook advertising has a nominal positiveinfluence on behavioural attitudes among Millennials which is in congruence with the communicationsof the effect pyramid model that was established through traditional advertising research This paperalso makes a noteworthy contribution to attitudinal research in emerging countries where there is adearth of research in social media advertisingKeywords Social media South Africa Millennials Behavioural attitudes Facebook advertisingIntention-to-purchasePaper type Research paper

Internet ResearchVol 25 No 4 2015pp 498-526Emerald Group Publishing Limited1066-2243DOI 101108IntR-01-2014-0020

Received 22 January 2014Revised 24 April 201410 July 201413 August 20141 September 2014Accepted 5 November 2014

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight atwwwemeraldinsightcom1066-2243htm

copy Cape Peninsula University of Technology Published by Emerald Group Publishing LimitedThis article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 30) licence Anyone mayreproduce distribute translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial ampnon-commercial purposes) subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors The fullterms of this licence may be seen at httpcreativecommonsorglicencesby30legalcode

The author would like to thank the editor and reviewers for their assistance feedback andsuggestions to improve the paper during the review process

498

INTR254

1 IntroductionTechnological innovation has grown at an unprecedented rate over the past couple ofdecades especially in terms of online social media platforms Accordingly Millennials(born between 1982 and 1994) have been exposed to an explosion of onlinetechnological applications since their advent as these have been incorporated intonearly every facet of their daily existence In fact this cohort has not experienced theworld without digital interactive technology Moreover technology diversificationdrives universal homogeneity among Millennials resulting in a hypothetical globalcohort that purportedly displays analogous attitudes and behaviour (Lingelbach et al2012 Moore 2012) Yet many articles have characteristically concentrated on thesocial media attitudes and usage of Millennials who reside in developed countries withunhindered access to social media and information technology Hence Bolton et al(2013) maintain that social media attitudes and usage may differ among Millennialsfrom emerging countries when compared to their wealthier counterparts owingto technological infrastructure and different cultures Nonetheless Millennialsrsquo socialmedia usage are of particular interest to organisations and managersrsquo since it mayprovide an indication of how these consumers will behave in the future as well aswhat their perceptions are towards their brands (Bolton et al 2013) Consequentlythis study aims to establish if Facebook advertising is effective at realising the topcommunication of effects pyramid objectives intention-to-purchase and purchase(the behavioural attitude) among the Millennial cohort

Social media has become an imperative conduit for global marketing communicationsand is commanding a larger share of advertising budgets especially to reach the youngergeneration Therefore the value of advertising on social media such as FacebookYoutube LinkedIn Twitter and others is of great interest to organisations managers andacademics (Saxena and Khanna 2013) Much academic research has explored theattitudes and perceptions of online advertising (Shu and Chuang 2011 Jalilvand andSamiei 2012 Blasco-Arcas et al 2014 Hsu et al 2014) and more recently social media(Maxwell 2013 Persuad 2013 Tham et al 2013 He and Zha 2014 McCarthy et al 2014)There is also consensus that online advertising can be appraised via elements suchas brand awareness product recall and attitudinal and behavioural changes (Bannisteret al 2013 Barreto 2013 Hudson and Thal 2013)

However Bolton et al (2013) believes that previous research on social mediaamong Millennial users results in more questions than answers Bolton et al (2013)suggest that prior research predominantly focused on US social media usersdisregarding other emerging regions with rapidly growing Millennial populationswhere the use of social media and its determinants might differ considerablyAccordingly this study focused on social media users in South Africa (SA) wherenearly 25 per cent of the population are deemed to be Millennials (Statistics SouthAfrica (SA) 2012) Furthermore Bolton et al (2013) noted that a majority of studiesfocused on student populations whose behaviour may change as they progress thoughthe different stages of their life cycle A broad spectrum of the Millennial cohort wassurveyed which comprised of young working adults and individuals who were stillseeking employment from both rural and urban regions Moreover participantsfrom both advantaged (suburbs) and disadvantaged (townships) communities werealso included instead of only utilising a student population Bolton et al (2013) alsoquestioned whether there were noticeable differences among Millennial subgroups intheir use of social media Thus the influence of a range of usage characteristics anddemographic factors within the Millennial subgroups were also investigated in this

499

Facebookadvertising

study Furthermore Facebook revenue from advertising has grown by 59 per centduring the past year to over $54 billion in 2014 (Facebook 2014a) which is testamentto the shift from traditional media advertising to digital interactive media advertisingby organisations It is estimated that Millennials will have a combined purchasingpower of $245 trillion world wide by 2015 It can be assumed that socialcommunications in the form on online reviews posts and word-of-mouth (WOM)will play a large part in driving purchase decisions (Priyanka 2013) Therefore it isimperative that organisations have a complete understanding of the behaviouralattitudes of this target market especially in terms of usage characteristics anddemographic factors that can be identified by Facebook Insight metrics (Facebook2014b) so that they can use their marketing communications budgets effectively bytargeting those Millennials that yield the greatest behavioural response

2 Literature review21 Social media backgroundThe rapid growth of social media platforms has permanently altered the way thatnumerous consumers interact with each other and organisations Hence this haschanged the way that organisations attract and retain prospective consumers (Leunget al 2015) Previously marketers would create captivating advertising messages andpurchase space in the mass media in the hope that consumers would become aware ofand develop a preference to and purchase the brand Social media has irrevocablyaltered marketing communications by shifting ways in which consumers selectshare and appraise information With the advent of social media traditional mediasuch as television and newspapers have lost uninterrupted viewership and readershipand their influence as advertising channels may have been weakened The speed ofonline communication and numerous information sources make advertising ontraditional sources less relevant Furthermore marketers quickly realised the influenceof social community in terms of interactivity that comprises of personalised sectionsshopping experiences greater convenience and widespread information search(Chandra et al 2012 Patino et al 2012 He and Zha 2014)

Consequently marketers are increasing their social media budgets with digitalinteractive advertising forecasted to reach $138 billion in 2014 a growth rate of nearly15 per cent in comparison to 2013 (eMarketer 2014a) Furthermore the Middle Eastand Africa are predicted to have the highest social media advertising spend growth(64 per cent) in 2014 (eMarketer 2014c) Business-to-consumer (B2C) ecommercerevenue is expected to reach $15 trillion in 2014 (an increase of 20 per cent) withgrowth primarily coming from emerging markets (eMarketer 2014b) Current figuresreveal that the largest online social medium in the world is Facebook with 132 billionactive members and it is also the largest social commerce site that accounts for85 per cent of all orders from social media (Facebook 2014a Shopify 2014)The aforementioned evidence necessitates research into behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook in an emerging country namely SA which will be of interest to managersand their organisations

22 Facebook marketing communication efficacyThe world wide adoption of mobile phones has driven Facebookrsquos mobile impetus asthe number of consumers that access the internet via mobile is closing the gap oncomputer-based online users World Wide Worx indicated that there are 94 million

500

INTR254

active Facebook users in SA (making it the largest social medium in the country) with87 per cent accessing Facebook via mobile devices such as cell phones andsmartphones (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) Additionally 93 per cent of companies inSA use Facebook with two-thirds using this platform as a core part of their marketingcampaigns and 47 per cent for customer lead generation (Wronski and Goldstruck2013) Few studies have determined whether social media advertising is effective whenaccessed via mobile devices which is examined in this paper A review of Facebookrsquosglobal advertising performance indicated that click-through rates had improved by20 per cent from 2011 to 2012 (AYTM 2012) Furthermore the cost per click had risenby over a quarter and the cost per thousand increased by more than half HoweverGreenlight (2012) found that 44 per cent of consumers did not ever click on Facebookadvertisements 31 per cent rarely did 10 per cent often did and 3 per cent clickedregularly While Associated Press and CNBC (2012) reported that over eight out of tenFacebook users never or seldom viewed Facebook advertisements or their sponsoredcontent However Reuters and Ipsos (2012) revealed that one in five Facebook usershad purchased products as a result of advertisements andor comments that theyviewed on Facebook This rate increased to nearly 30 per cent who were aged 18-34Facebook and ComScore (2012) disclosed that 4 per cent of consumers boughtsomething within a month after being exposed to earned brand impressions from aretailer The exposure also increased consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase RichRelevance(2013) revealed that consumers who made purchases owing to Facebook advertisingwere double in comparison to Pinterest and Twitter Facebook also had the greatestincome per session Bannister et al (2013) found that the attitudes of US collegestudents towards Facebook advertising were largely negative or indifferent Respondentsdisclosed that Facebook advertisements were predominantly uninformative irrelevantuninteresting and would therefore not generally click on them Moreover a majority ofcollege students stated that they would not make a purchase owing to Facebookadvertising Persuad (2013) used a controlled experiment among 96 young adults toexplore the impact of interactivity and product involvement on respondentsrsquo attitudestowards brands on Facebook and their intention-to-purchase No significant results werefound for interactivity product involvement or intention-to-purchase However the studyrevealed that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand The divergent resultsof Facebookrsquos marketing communication efficacy warrant additional investigation

23 Millennials cohortMillennial (Echo boomers Generation Y hip-hop kwaito or Facebook generation) consumersare the children of the Baby Boomers or Generation X (Dotson and Hyatt 2005 Berndt2007) Most of the discussion is based on international studies with some commentary onMillennial consumers in SA although cohort research is deemed to be transnationalMillennial consumers enjoy communication since they are self-expressive and supportfreedom of speech as well as accept change and are even deemed to be trendsetters(Lingelbach et al 2012 Moore 2012 Bolton et al 2013) Millennials are always connectedand connect with one another via the latest technologies (Goldenberg 2007) The blackMillennials cohort encompasses a significant portion of the South African market especiallythose who are studying at tertiary institutions as they represent a particularly lucrativetarget market owing to the fact that higher education is correlated with increased earningpotential (Bevan-Dye et al 2012) Most Millennial members would have first encounteredcomputers as toddlers and embraced the interconnectedness of the internet mobile devices

501

Facebookadvertising

and social media social network sites (SNS) as part of their interactive world The duoof interconnectivity and being tech savvy reveals the huge influence of Millennialsrsquopredisposition to connect continuously and easily to multiple social network channels thatare embraced for purchase decisions and to initiate electronic WOM (Noble et al 2009)

Africa has experienced exponential internet growth over the past decade with only45 million internet users at the start of 2001 that grew to over 167 million in June 2012(Internet World Stats 2012) A primary reason for this massive expansion in internetusage is owing to the increasing number of internet-enabled mobile and smart phoneusers as mentioned in prior text This new found connectivity has permitted moreAfricans to join the online world while many are also joining SNS that allow them tointeract with people around them and across the globe SNS is the most popularonline activity with nearly 60 per cent of African users favouring it above all other onlineactivities Facebook is the dominant SNS however owing to the proliferation ofsmartphones it is probable that Twitter will also gain favour as its usage has directlybegun to increase exponentially (Digital Fire 2012) Two-thirds of South Africansare 30 years old or younger and a little under 25 per cent (over 13 million individuals) aredeemed to constitute the Millennials cohort (Statistics SA 2012) However less than 20 percent of advertising budgets are directed at these young consumers in SA yet Millennialsspend over R100 billion per annum which makes them a lucrative target market(Levin 2013) JWT Intelligence (2012) revealed that Millennials display a high propensityfor SNS shopping-related activities 63 per cent of Millennial online users have requestedadvice from friends about brands on Facebook six out of ten were more probable tobuy a brand based on recommendations received via Facebook and 57 per cent haddisplayed a status update on their Facebook page about a brand Barreto (2013) employedeye-tracking experiments among 20 undergraduates to establish whether they perceivedadvertisements on Facebook The research confirmed that Facebook advertisementsresulted in lower attention levels in comparison to the recommendations of friendsYaakop et al (2013) examined the cognitive interactivity (awareness and knowledge) andadvertising avoidance (negative sentiment towards social network advertising (SNA))influence on attitudes towards Facebook among 357 undergraduate students The studyrevealed that both cognitive interactivity and advertising had significant influence onattitudes towards Facebook advertising thereby revealing both negative and positiveattitudes towards Facebook advertising Hence owing to these conflicting findings it isnecessary to further explore Millennialsrsquo attitudes towards Facebook advertising

24 Attitudes and hierarchy response modelBelch and Belch (2012) assert that there are three attitudinal stages or componentswhich are encapsulated in the tricomponent attitude model cognitive component(an individualrsquos beliefs regarding an object) affective component (an individualrsquosfeelings towards the object that may be positive or negative) and the behaviouralcomponent (an individualrsquos readiness to respond to the object in the form of behaviour)

Lavidge and Steiner (1961) diverged from prior early hierarchy response modeldevelopment since they believed that immediate sales was an insufficient factor ofadvertising effectiveness even if it was measurable They posited that advertisingwas an enduring investment which was mainly owing to the long-term nature ofadvertising effects that resulted in the development of the hierarchy-of-effects modelHence it was inconceivable that consumers moved from a stage of total disinterestto eager purchasers but instead moved through a sequence of steps until purchaseThese steps are as follows unawareness of the brandrsquos existence awareness

502

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

1 IntroductionTechnological innovation has grown at an unprecedented rate over the past couple ofdecades especially in terms of online social media platforms Accordingly Millennials(born between 1982 and 1994) have been exposed to an explosion of onlinetechnological applications since their advent as these have been incorporated intonearly every facet of their daily existence In fact this cohort has not experienced theworld without digital interactive technology Moreover technology diversificationdrives universal homogeneity among Millennials resulting in a hypothetical globalcohort that purportedly displays analogous attitudes and behaviour (Lingelbach et al2012 Moore 2012) Yet many articles have characteristically concentrated on thesocial media attitudes and usage of Millennials who reside in developed countries withunhindered access to social media and information technology Hence Bolton et al(2013) maintain that social media attitudes and usage may differ among Millennialsfrom emerging countries when compared to their wealthier counterparts owingto technological infrastructure and different cultures Nonetheless Millennialsrsquo socialmedia usage are of particular interest to organisations and managersrsquo since it mayprovide an indication of how these consumers will behave in the future as well aswhat their perceptions are towards their brands (Bolton et al 2013) Consequentlythis study aims to establish if Facebook advertising is effective at realising the topcommunication of effects pyramid objectives intention-to-purchase and purchase(the behavioural attitude) among the Millennial cohort

Social media has become an imperative conduit for global marketing communicationsand is commanding a larger share of advertising budgets especially to reach the youngergeneration Therefore the value of advertising on social media such as FacebookYoutube LinkedIn Twitter and others is of great interest to organisations managers andacademics (Saxena and Khanna 2013) Much academic research has explored theattitudes and perceptions of online advertising (Shu and Chuang 2011 Jalilvand andSamiei 2012 Blasco-Arcas et al 2014 Hsu et al 2014) and more recently social media(Maxwell 2013 Persuad 2013 Tham et al 2013 He and Zha 2014 McCarthy et al 2014)There is also consensus that online advertising can be appraised via elements suchas brand awareness product recall and attitudinal and behavioural changes (Bannisteret al 2013 Barreto 2013 Hudson and Thal 2013)

However Bolton et al (2013) believes that previous research on social mediaamong Millennial users results in more questions than answers Bolton et al (2013)suggest that prior research predominantly focused on US social media usersdisregarding other emerging regions with rapidly growing Millennial populationswhere the use of social media and its determinants might differ considerablyAccordingly this study focused on social media users in South Africa (SA) wherenearly 25 per cent of the population are deemed to be Millennials (Statistics SouthAfrica (SA) 2012) Furthermore Bolton et al (2013) noted that a majority of studiesfocused on student populations whose behaviour may change as they progress thoughthe different stages of their life cycle A broad spectrum of the Millennial cohort wassurveyed which comprised of young working adults and individuals who were stillseeking employment from both rural and urban regions Moreover participantsfrom both advantaged (suburbs) and disadvantaged (townships) communities werealso included instead of only utilising a student population Bolton et al (2013) alsoquestioned whether there were noticeable differences among Millennial subgroups intheir use of social media Thus the influence of a range of usage characteristics anddemographic factors within the Millennial subgroups were also investigated in this

499

Facebookadvertising

study Furthermore Facebook revenue from advertising has grown by 59 per centduring the past year to over $54 billion in 2014 (Facebook 2014a) which is testamentto the shift from traditional media advertising to digital interactive media advertisingby organisations It is estimated that Millennials will have a combined purchasingpower of $245 trillion world wide by 2015 It can be assumed that socialcommunications in the form on online reviews posts and word-of-mouth (WOM)will play a large part in driving purchase decisions (Priyanka 2013) Therefore it isimperative that organisations have a complete understanding of the behaviouralattitudes of this target market especially in terms of usage characteristics anddemographic factors that can be identified by Facebook Insight metrics (Facebook2014b) so that they can use their marketing communications budgets effectively bytargeting those Millennials that yield the greatest behavioural response

2 Literature review21 Social media backgroundThe rapid growth of social media platforms has permanently altered the way thatnumerous consumers interact with each other and organisations Hence this haschanged the way that organisations attract and retain prospective consumers (Leunget al 2015) Previously marketers would create captivating advertising messages andpurchase space in the mass media in the hope that consumers would become aware ofand develop a preference to and purchase the brand Social media has irrevocablyaltered marketing communications by shifting ways in which consumers selectshare and appraise information With the advent of social media traditional mediasuch as television and newspapers have lost uninterrupted viewership and readershipand their influence as advertising channels may have been weakened The speed ofonline communication and numerous information sources make advertising ontraditional sources less relevant Furthermore marketers quickly realised the influenceof social community in terms of interactivity that comprises of personalised sectionsshopping experiences greater convenience and widespread information search(Chandra et al 2012 Patino et al 2012 He and Zha 2014)

Consequently marketers are increasing their social media budgets with digitalinteractive advertising forecasted to reach $138 billion in 2014 a growth rate of nearly15 per cent in comparison to 2013 (eMarketer 2014a) Furthermore the Middle Eastand Africa are predicted to have the highest social media advertising spend growth(64 per cent) in 2014 (eMarketer 2014c) Business-to-consumer (B2C) ecommercerevenue is expected to reach $15 trillion in 2014 (an increase of 20 per cent) withgrowth primarily coming from emerging markets (eMarketer 2014b) Current figuresreveal that the largest online social medium in the world is Facebook with 132 billionactive members and it is also the largest social commerce site that accounts for85 per cent of all orders from social media (Facebook 2014a Shopify 2014)The aforementioned evidence necessitates research into behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook in an emerging country namely SA which will be of interest to managersand their organisations

22 Facebook marketing communication efficacyThe world wide adoption of mobile phones has driven Facebookrsquos mobile impetus asthe number of consumers that access the internet via mobile is closing the gap oncomputer-based online users World Wide Worx indicated that there are 94 million

500

INTR254

active Facebook users in SA (making it the largest social medium in the country) with87 per cent accessing Facebook via mobile devices such as cell phones andsmartphones (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) Additionally 93 per cent of companies inSA use Facebook with two-thirds using this platform as a core part of their marketingcampaigns and 47 per cent for customer lead generation (Wronski and Goldstruck2013) Few studies have determined whether social media advertising is effective whenaccessed via mobile devices which is examined in this paper A review of Facebookrsquosglobal advertising performance indicated that click-through rates had improved by20 per cent from 2011 to 2012 (AYTM 2012) Furthermore the cost per click had risenby over a quarter and the cost per thousand increased by more than half HoweverGreenlight (2012) found that 44 per cent of consumers did not ever click on Facebookadvertisements 31 per cent rarely did 10 per cent often did and 3 per cent clickedregularly While Associated Press and CNBC (2012) reported that over eight out of tenFacebook users never or seldom viewed Facebook advertisements or their sponsoredcontent However Reuters and Ipsos (2012) revealed that one in five Facebook usershad purchased products as a result of advertisements andor comments that theyviewed on Facebook This rate increased to nearly 30 per cent who were aged 18-34Facebook and ComScore (2012) disclosed that 4 per cent of consumers boughtsomething within a month after being exposed to earned brand impressions from aretailer The exposure also increased consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase RichRelevance(2013) revealed that consumers who made purchases owing to Facebook advertisingwere double in comparison to Pinterest and Twitter Facebook also had the greatestincome per session Bannister et al (2013) found that the attitudes of US collegestudents towards Facebook advertising were largely negative or indifferent Respondentsdisclosed that Facebook advertisements were predominantly uninformative irrelevantuninteresting and would therefore not generally click on them Moreover a majority ofcollege students stated that they would not make a purchase owing to Facebookadvertising Persuad (2013) used a controlled experiment among 96 young adults toexplore the impact of interactivity and product involvement on respondentsrsquo attitudestowards brands on Facebook and their intention-to-purchase No significant results werefound for interactivity product involvement or intention-to-purchase However the studyrevealed that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand The divergent resultsof Facebookrsquos marketing communication efficacy warrant additional investigation

23 Millennials cohortMillennial (Echo boomers Generation Y hip-hop kwaito or Facebook generation) consumersare the children of the Baby Boomers or Generation X (Dotson and Hyatt 2005 Berndt2007) Most of the discussion is based on international studies with some commentary onMillennial consumers in SA although cohort research is deemed to be transnationalMillennial consumers enjoy communication since they are self-expressive and supportfreedom of speech as well as accept change and are even deemed to be trendsetters(Lingelbach et al 2012 Moore 2012 Bolton et al 2013) Millennials are always connectedand connect with one another via the latest technologies (Goldenberg 2007) The blackMillennials cohort encompasses a significant portion of the South African market especiallythose who are studying at tertiary institutions as they represent a particularly lucrativetarget market owing to the fact that higher education is correlated with increased earningpotential (Bevan-Dye et al 2012) Most Millennial members would have first encounteredcomputers as toddlers and embraced the interconnectedness of the internet mobile devices

501

Facebookadvertising

and social media social network sites (SNS) as part of their interactive world The duoof interconnectivity and being tech savvy reveals the huge influence of Millennialsrsquopredisposition to connect continuously and easily to multiple social network channels thatare embraced for purchase decisions and to initiate electronic WOM (Noble et al 2009)

Africa has experienced exponential internet growth over the past decade with only45 million internet users at the start of 2001 that grew to over 167 million in June 2012(Internet World Stats 2012) A primary reason for this massive expansion in internetusage is owing to the increasing number of internet-enabled mobile and smart phoneusers as mentioned in prior text This new found connectivity has permitted moreAfricans to join the online world while many are also joining SNS that allow them tointeract with people around them and across the globe SNS is the most popularonline activity with nearly 60 per cent of African users favouring it above all other onlineactivities Facebook is the dominant SNS however owing to the proliferation ofsmartphones it is probable that Twitter will also gain favour as its usage has directlybegun to increase exponentially (Digital Fire 2012) Two-thirds of South Africansare 30 years old or younger and a little under 25 per cent (over 13 million individuals) aredeemed to constitute the Millennials cohort (Statistics SA 2012) However less than 20 percent of advertising budgets are directed at these young consumers in SA yet Millennialsspend over R100 billion per annum which makes them a lucrative target market(Levin 2013) JWT Intelligence (2012) revealed that Millennials display a high propensityfor SNS shopping-related activities 63 per cent of Millennial online users have requestedadvice from friends about brands on Facebook six out of ten were more probable tobuy a brand based on recommendations received via Facebook and 57 per cent haddisplayed a status update on their Facebook page about a brand Barreto (2013) employedeye-tracking experiments among 20 undergraduates to establish whether they perceivedadvertisements on Facebook The research confirmed that Facebook advertisementsresulted in lower attention levels in comparison to the recommendations of friendsYaakop et al (2013) examined the cognitive interactivity (awareness and knowledge) andadvertising avoidance (negative sentiment towards social network advertising (SNA))influence on attitudes towards Facebook among 357 undergraduate students The studyrevealed that both cognitive interactivity and advertising had significant influence onattitudes towards Facebook advertising thereby revealing both negative and positiveattitudes towards Facebook advertising Hence owing to these conflicting findings it isnecessary to further explore Millennialsrsquo attitudes towards Facebook advertising

24 Attitudes and hierarchy response modelBelch and Belch (2012) assert that there are three attitudinal stages or componentswhich are encapsulated in the tricomponent attitude model cognitive component(an individualrsquos beliefs regarding an object) affective component (an individualrsquosfeelings towards the object that may be positive or negative) and the behaviouralcomponent (an individualrsquos readiness to respond to the object in the form of behaviour)

Lavidge and Steiner (1961) diverged from prior early hierarchy response modeldevelopment since they believed that immediate sales was an insufficient factor ofadvertising effectiveness even if it was measurable They posited that advertisingwas an enduring investment which was mainly owing to the long-term nature ofadvertising effects that resulted in the development of the hierarchy-of-effects modelHence it was inconceivable that consumers moved from a stage of total disinterestto eager purchasers but instead moved through a sequence of steps until purchaseThese steps are as follows unawareness of the brandrsquos existence awareness

502

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

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INTR254

study Furthermore Facebook revenue from advertising has grown by 59 per centduring the past year to over $54 billion in 2014 (Facebook 2014a) which is testamentto the shift from traditional media advertising to digital interactive media advertisingby organisations It is estimated that Millennials will have a combined purchasingpower of $245 trillion world wide by 2015 It can be assumed that socialcommunications in the form on online reviews posts and word-of-mouth (WOM)will play a large part in driving purchase decisions (Priyanka 2013) Therefore it isimperative that organisations have a complete understanding of the behaviouralattitudes of this target market especially in terms of usage characteristics anddemographic factors that can be identified by Facebook Insight metrics (Facebook2014b) so that they can use their marketing communications budgets effectively bytargeting those Millennials that yield the greatest behavioural response

2 Literature review21 Social media backgroundThe rapid growth of social media platforms has permanently altered the way thatnumerous consumers interact with each other and organisations Hence this haschanged the way that organisations attract and retain prospective consumers (Leunget al 2015) Previously marketers would create captivating advertising messages andpurchase space in the mass media in the hope that consumers would become aware ofand develop a preference to and purchase the brand Social media has irrevocablyaltered marketing communications by shifting ways in which consumers selectshare and appraise information With the advent of social media traditional mediasuch as television and newspapers have lost uninterrupted viewership and readershipand their influence as advertising channels may have been weakened The speed ofonline communication and numerous information sources make advertising ontraditional sources less relevant Furthermore marketers quickly realised the influenceof social community in terms of interactivity that comprises of personalised sectionsshopping experiences greater convenience and widespread information search(Chandra et al 2012 Patino et al 2012 He and Zha 2014)

Consequently marketers are increasing their social media budgets with digitalinteractive advertising forecasted to reach $138 billion in 2014 a growth rate of nearly15 per cent in comparison to 2013 (eMarketer 2014a) Furthermore the Middle Eastand Africa are predicted to have the highest social media advertising spend growth(64 per cent) in 2014 (eMarketer 2014c) Business-to-consumer (B2C) ecommercerevenue is expected to reach $15 trillion in 2014 (an increase of 20 per cent) withgrowth primarily coming from emerging markets (eMarketer 2014b) Current figuresreveal that the largest online social medium in the world is Facebook with 132 billionactive members and it is also the largest social commerce site that accounts for85 per cent of all orders from social media (Facebook 2014a Shopify 2014)The aforementioned evidence necessitates research into behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook in an emerging country namely SA which will be of interest to managersand their organisations

22 Facebook marketing communication efficacyThe world wide adoption of mobile phones has driven Facebookrsquos mobile impetus asthe number of consumers that access the internet via mobile is closing the gap oncomputer-based online users World Wide Worx indicated that there are 94 million

500

INTR254

active Facebook users in SA (making it the largest social medium in the country) with87 per cent accessing Facebook via mobile devices such as cell phones andsmartphones (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) Additionally 93 per cent of companies inSA use Facebook with two-thirds using this platform as a core part of their marketingcampaigns and 47 per cent for customer lead generation (Wronski and Goldstruck2013) Few studies have determined whether social media advertising is effective whenaccessed via mobile devices which is examined in this paper A review of Facebookrsquosglobal advertising performance indicated that click-through rates had improved by20 per cent from 2011 to 2012 (AYTM 2012) Furthermore the cost per click had risenby over a quarter and the cost per thousand increased by more than half HoweverGreenlight (2012) found that 44 per cent of consumers did not ever click on Facebookadvertisements 31 per cent rarely did 10 per cent often did and 3 per cent clickedregularly While Associated Press and CNBC (2012) reported that over eight out of tenFacebook users never or seldom viewed Facebook advertisements or their sponsoredcontent However Reuters and Ipsos (2012) revealed that one in five Facebook usershad purchased products as a result of advertisements andor comments that theyviewed on Facebook This rate increased to nearly 30 per cent who were aged 18-34Facebook and ComScore (2012) disclosed that 4 per cent of consumers boughtsomething within a month after being exposed to earned brand impressions from aretailer The exposure also increased consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase RichRelevance(2013) revealed that consumers who made purchases owing to Facebook advertisingwere double in comparison to Pinterest and Twitter Facebook also had the greatestincome per session Bannister et al (2013) found that the attitudes of US collegestudents towards Facebook advertising were largely negative or indifferent Respondentsdisclosed that Facebook advertisements were predominantly uninformative irrelevantuninteresting and would therefore not generally click on them Moreover a majority ofcollege students stated that they would not make a purchase owing to Facebookadvertising Persuad (2013) used a controlled experiment among 96 young adults toexplore the impact of interactivity and product involvement on respondentsrsquo attitudestowards brands on Facebook and their intention-to-purchase No significant results werefound for interactivity product involvement or intention-to-purchase However the studyrevealed that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand The divergent resultsof Facebookrsquos marketing communication efficacy warrant additional investigation

23 Millennials cohortMillennial (Echo boomers Generation Y hip-hop kwaito or Facebook generation) consumersare the children of the Baby Boomers or Generation X (Dotson and Hyatt 2005 Berndt2007) Most of the discussion is based on international studies with some commentary onMillennial consumers in SA although cohort research is deemed to be transnationalMillennial consumers enjoy communication since they are self-expressive and supportfreedom of speech as well as accept change and are even deemed to be trendsetters(Lingelbach et al 2012 Moore 2012 Bolton et al 2013) Millennials are always connectedand connect with one another via the latest technologies (Goldenberg 2007) The blackMillennials cohort encompasses a significant portion of the South African market especiallythose who are studying at tertiary institutions as they represent a particularly lucrativetarget market owing to the fact that higher education is correlated with increased earningpotential (Bevan-Dye et al 2012) Most Millennial members would have first encounteredcomputers as toddlers and embraced the interconnectedness of the internet mobile devices

501

Facebookadvertising

and social media social network sites (SNS) as part of their interactive world The duoof interconnectivity and being tech savvy reveals the huge influence of Millennialsrsquopredisposition to connect continuously and easily to multiple social network channels thatare embraced for purchase decisions and to initiate electronic WOM (Noble et al 2009)

Africa has experienced exponential internet growth over the past decade with only45 million internet users at the start of 2001 that grew to over 167 million in June 2012(Internet World Stats 2012) A primary reason for this massive expansion in internetusage is owing to the increasing number of internet-enabled mobile and smart phoneusers as mentioned in prior text This new found connectivity has permitted moreAfricans to join the online world while many are also joining SNS that allow them tointeract with people around them and across the globe SNS is the most popularonline activity with nearly 60 per cent of African users favouring it above all other onlineactivities Facebook is the dominant SNS however owing to the proliferation ofsmartphones it is probable that Twitter will also gain favour as its usage has directlybegun to increase exponentially (Digital Fire 2012) Two-thirds of South Africansare 30 years old or younger and a little under 25 per cent (over 13 million individuals) aredeemed to constitute the Millennials cohort (Statistics SA 2012) However less than 20 percent of advertising budgets are directed at these young consumers in SA yet Millennialsspend over R100 billion per annum which makes them a lucrative target market(Levin 2013) JWT Intelligence (2012) revealed that Millennials display a high propensityfor SNS shopping-related activities 63 per cent of Millennial online users have requestedadvice from friends about brands on Facebook six out of ten were more probable tobuy a brand based on recommendations received via Facebook and 57 per cent haddisplayed a status update on their Facebook page about a brand Barreto (2013) employedeye-tracking experiments among 20 undergraduates to establish whether they perceivedadvertisements on Facebook The research confirmed that Facebook advertisementsresulted in lower attention levels in comparison to the recommendations of friendsYaakop et al (2013) examined the cognitive interactivity (awareness and knowledge) andadvertising avoidance (negative sentiment towards social network advertising (SNA))influence on attitudes towards Facebook among 357 undergraduate students The studyrevealed that both cognitive interactivity and advertising had significant influence onattitudes towards Facebook advertising thereby revealing both negative and positiveattitudes towards Facebook advertising Hence owing to these conflicting findings it isnecessary to further explore Millennialsrsquo attitudes towards Facebook advertising

24 Attitudes and hierarchy response modelBelch and Belch (2012) assert that there are three attitudinal stages or componentswhich are encapsulated in the tricomponent attitude model cognitive component(an individualrsquos beliefs regarding an object) affective component (an individualrsquosfeelings towards the object that may be positive or negative) and the behaviouralcomponent (an individualrsquos readiness to respond to the object in the form of behaviour)

Lavidge and Steiner (1961) diverged from prior early hierarchy response modeldevelopment since they believed that immediate sales was an insufficient factor ofadvertising effectiveness even if it was measurable They posited that advertisingwas an enduring investment which was mainly owing to the long-term nature ofadvertising effects that resulted in the development of the hierarchy-of-effects modelHence it was inconceivable that consumers moved from a stage of total disinterestto eager purchasers but instead moved through a sequence of steps until purchaseThese steps are as follows unawareness of the brandrsquos existence awareness

502

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

active Facebook users in SA (making it the largest social medium in the country) with87 per cent accessing Facebook via mobile devices such as cell phones andsmartphones (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) Additionally 93 per cent of companies inSA use Facebook with two-thirds using this platform as a core part of their marketingcampaigns and 47 per cent for customer lead generation (Wronski and Goldstruck2013) Few studies have determined whether social media advertising is effective whenaccessed via mobile devices which is examined in this paper A review of Facebookrsquosglobal advertising performance indicated that click-through rates had improved by20 per cent from 2011 to 2012 (AYTM 2012) Furthermore the cost per click had risenby over a quarter and the cost per thousand increased by more than half HoweverGreenlight (2012) found that 44 per cent of consumers did not ever click on Facebookadvertisements 31 per cent rarely did 10 per cent often did and 3 per cent clickedregularly While Associated Press and CNBC (2012) reported that over eight out of tenFacebook users never or seldom viewed Facebook advertisements or their sponsoredcontent However Reuters and Ipsos (2012) revealed that one in five Facebook usershad purchased products as a result of advertisements andor comments that theyviewed on Facebook This rate increased to nearly 30 per cent who were aged 18-34Facebook and ComScore (2012) disclosed that 4 per cent of consumers boughtsomething within a month after being exposed to earned brand impressions from aretailer The exposure also increased consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase RichRelevance(2013) revealed that consumers who made purchases owing to Facebook advertisingwere double in comparison to Pinterest and Twitter Facebook also had the greatestincome per session Bannister et al (2013) found that the attitudes of US collegestudents towards Facebook advertising were largely negative or indifferent Respondentsdisclosed that Facebook advertisements were predominantly uninformative irrelevantuninteresting and would therefore not generally click on them Moreover a majority ofcollege students stated that they would not make a purchase owing to Facebookadvertising Persuad (2013) used a controlled experiment among 96 young adults toexplore the impact of interactivity and product involvement on respondentsrsquo attitudestowards brands on Facebook and their intention-to-purchase No significant results werefound for interactivity product involvement or intention-to-purchase However the studyrevealed that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand The divergent resultsof Facebookrsquos marketing communication efficacy warrant additional investigation

23 Millennials cohortMillennial (Echo boomers Generation Y hip-hop kwaito or Facebook generation) consumersare the children of the Baby Boomers or Generation X (Dotson and Hyatt 2005 Berndt2007) Most of the discussion is based on international studies with some commentary onMillennial consumers in SA although cohort research is deemed to be transnationalMillennial consumers enjoy communication since they are self-expressive and supportfreedom of speech as well as accept change and are even deemed to be trendsetters(Lingelbach et al 2012 Moore 2012 Bolton et al 2013) Millennials are always connectedand connect with one another via the latest technologies (Goldenberg 2007) The blackMillennials cohort encompasses a significant portion of the South African market especiallythose who are studying at tertiary institutions as they represent a particularly lucrativetarget market owing to the fact that higher education is correlated with increased earningpotential (Bevan-Dye et al 2012) Most Millennial members would have first encounteredcomputers as toddlers and embraced the interconnectedness of the internet mobile devices

501

Facebookadvertising

and social media social network sites (SNS) as part of their interactive world The duoof interconnectivity and being tech savvy reveals the huge influence of Millennialsrsquopredisposition to connect continuously and easily to multiple social network channels thatare embraced for purchase decisions and to initiate electronic WOM (Noble et al 2009)

Africa has experienced exponential internet growth over the past decade with only45 million internet users at the start of 2001 that grew to over 167 million in June 2012(Internet World Stats 2012) A primary reason for this massive expansion in internetusage is owing to the increasing number of internet-enabled mobile and smart phoneusers as mentioned in prior text This new found connectivity has permitted moreAfricans to join the online world while many are also joining SNS that allow them tointeract with people around them and across the globe SNS is the most popularonline activity with nearly 60 per cent of African users favouring it above all other onlineactivities Facebook is the dominant SNS however owing to the proliferation ofsmartphones it is probable that Twitter will also gain favour as its usage has directlybegun to increase exponentially (Digital Fire 2012) Two-thirds of South Africansare 30 years old or younger and a little under 25 per cent (over 13 million individuals) aredeemed to constitute the Millennials cohort (Statistics SA 2012) However less than 20 percent of advertising budgets are directed at these young consumers in SA yet Millennialsspend over R100 billion per annum which makes them a lucrative target market(Levin 2013) JWT Intelligence (2012) revealed that Millennials display a high propensityfor SNS shopping-related activities 63 per cent of Millennial online users have requestedadvice from friends about brands on Facebook six out of ten were more probable tobuy a brand based on recommendations received via Facebook and 57 per cent haddisplayed a status update on their Facebook page about a brand Barreto (2013) employedeye-tracking experiments among 20 undergraduates to establish whether they perceivedadvertisements on Facebook The research confirmed that Facebook advertisementsresulted in lower attention levels in comparison to the recommendations of friendsYaakop et al (2013) examined the cognitive interactivity (awareness and knowledge) andadvertising avoidance (negative sentiment towards social network advertising (SNA))influence on attitudes towards Facebook among 357 undergraduate students The studyrevealed that both cognitive interactivity and advertising had significant influence onattitudes towards Facebook advertising thereby revealing both negative and positiveattitudes towards Facebook advertising Hence owing to these conflicting findings it isnecessary to further explore Millennialsrsquo attitudes towards Facebook advertising

24 Attitudes and hierarchy response modelBelch and Belch (2012) assert that there are three attitudinal stages or componentswhich are encapsulated in the tricomponent attitude model cognitive component(an individualrsquos beliefs regarding an object) affective component (an individualrsquosfeelings towards the object that may be positive or negative) and the behaviouralcomponent (an individualrsquos readiness to respond to the object in the form of behaviour)

Lavidge and Steiner (1961) diverged from prior early hierarchy response modeldevelopment since they believed that immediate sales was an insufficient factor ofadvertising effectiveness even if it was measurable They posited that advertisingwas an enduring investment which was mainly owing to the long-term nature ofadvertising effects that resulted in the development of the hierarchy-of-effects modelHence it was inconceivable that consumers moved from a stage of total disinterestto eager purchasers but instead moved through a sequence of steps until purchaseThese steps are as follows unawareness of the brandrsquos existence awareness

502

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

and social media social network sites (SNS) as part of their interactive world The duoof interconnectivity and being tech savvy reveals the huge influence of Millennialsrsquopredisposition to connect continuously and easily to multiple social network channels thatare embraced for purchase decisions and to initiate electronic WOM (Noble et al 2009)

Africa has experienced exponential internet growth over the past decade with only45 million internet users at the start of 2001 that grew to over 167 million in June 2012(Internet World Stats 2012) A primary reason for this massive expansion in internetusage is owing to the increasing number of internet-enabled mobile and smart phoneusers as mentioned in prior text This new found connectivity has permitted moreAfricans to join the online world while many are also joining SNS that allow them tointeract with people around them and across the globe SNS is the most popularonline activity with nearly 60 per cent of African users favouring it above all other onlineactivities Facebook is the dominant SNS however owing to the proliferation ofsmartphones it is probable that Twitter will also gain favour as its usage has directlybegun to increase exponentially (Digital Fire 2012) Two-thirds of South Africansare 30 years old or younger and a little under 25 per cent (over 13 million individuals) aredeemed to constitute the Millennials cohort (Statistics SA 2012) However less than 20 percent of advertising budgets are directed at these young consumers in SA yet Millennialsspend over R100 billion per annum which makes them a lucrative target market(Levin 2013) JWT Intelligence (2012) revealed that Millennials display a high propensityfor SNS shopping-related activities 63 per cent of Millennial online users have requestedadvice from friends about brands on Facebook six out of ten were more probable tobuy a brand based on recommendations received via Facebook and 57 per cent haddisplayed a status update on their Facebook page about a brand Barreto (2013) employedeye-tracking experiments among 20 undergraduates to establish whether they perceivedadvertisements on Facebook The research confirmed that Facebook advertisementsresulted in lower attention levels in comparison to the recommendations of friendsYaakop et al (2013) examined the cognitive interactivity (awareness and knowledge) andadvertising avoidance (negative sentiment towards social network advertising (SNA))influence on attitudes towards Facebook among 357 undergraduate students The studyrevealed that both cognitive interactivity and advertising had significant influence onattitudes towards Facebook advertising thereby revealing both negative and positiveattitudes towards Facebook advertising Hence owing to these conflicting findings it isnecessary to further explore Millennialsrsquo attitudes towards Facebook advertising

24 Attitudes and hierarchy response modelBelch and Belch (2012) assert that there are three attitudinal stages or componentswhich are encapsulated in the tricomponent attitude model cognitive component(an individualrsquos beliefs regarding an object) affective component (an individualrsquosfeelings towards the object that may be positive or negative) and the behaviouralcomponent (an individualrsquos readiness to respond to the object in the form of behaviour)

Lavidge and Steiner (1961) diverged from prior early hierarchy response modeldevelopment since they believed that immediate sales was an insufficient factor ofadvertising effectiveness even if it was measurable They posited that advertisingwas an enduring investment which was mainly owing to the long-term nature ofadvertising effects that resulted in the development of the hierarchy-of-effects modelHence it was inconceivable that consumers moved from a stage of total disinterestto eager purchasers but instead moved through a sequence of steps until purchaseThese steps are as follows unawareness of the brandrsquos existence awareness

502

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

knowledge of what the brand offers (awareness and knowledge form the cognitiveattitude component) consumers like the brand (a favourable affective attitude) consumersprefer the brand over others (a favourable affective predisposition) and have a desire topurchase the brand and conviction that it would be a wise purchase that leads to purchaseintent and finally culminating in the actual purchase (behavioural attitude component)The steps of the hierarchy-of-effects model are analogous to the communications of effectpyramid (also known as the purchase funnel) that was mentioned in prior text It becomesprogressively more difficult to achieve the upper level stages and hence the number ofprospective consumers decreases as they progress through the latter stages of thepyramid (Safko 2010 Belch and Belch 2012)

Chandra et al (2012) conducted research into attitudes towards SNA amongundergraduate and postgraduate students The study found that social mediaadvertising aided the purchase decision and resulted in more competitive prices butheld unfavourable attitudes in terms of various cognitive (information) and affective(enjoyment entertainment value and authenticity) components (lower level pyramidactivities) Powers et al (2012) agreed with the aforementioned sentiments anddisclosed that over 20 per cent of consumers believed that social media was importantfor their final purchase decision while another 20 per cent stated that it helped them todecide what to purchase Hudson and Hudson (2013) used a case study research designto explore the influence of social media (Facebook and Twitter) on music festivalconsumer decisions The research confirmed that consumers were actively engagedwith the companies after purchase (the top purchase funnel echelon) therebyfacilitating brand development Smith (2013) determined that Facebook users whoindicated having favourable experiences with an organisationrsquos brand content led to anincreased probability of executing a higher level communications of effect pyramidaction whereas Yadav et al (2013) surmised that products which require a high effortand strong social component have a strong influence on purchase decisions in terms ofcomputer-mediated social environments Edwards (2011) found that companies whichemployed social media enhanced the elements of the purchase funnel such asawareness consideration and purchase while Carrillat et al (2014) suggested thatFacebook messages must be entertaining to have a positive impact on attitudes Hencethis study seeks to confirm whether Facebook advertising has a positive effect on thetop two levels of the communications of effect model Table I provides an overview ofrecent Facebook marketing communications studies which investigated the uppercommunications of effect pyramid levels namely intention-to-purchase and purchase

In summary there have been a number of recent studies that assessed behaviouralattitudes towards SNA but these were predominantly conducted in more developednations utilised students as the research population used relatively small sample sizesand few explored the effect of usage characteristics and demographic factors onFacebook advertising

3 Research objectivesConsequently this empirical investigation seeks to expound upon the followingresearch objectives first to determine whether advertising on Facebook has aninfluence on the behavioural attitudinal component of Millennials in an emergingcountry such as SA As discussed in prior text advertising achieves communicationactivities in a similar manner to a pyramid by initially attaining lower hierarchyresponse marketing communication objectives such as awareness and knowledgeThereafter companies seek to attain and move consumers to higher hierarchical level

503

Facebookadvertising

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ham

idizadeh

etal(2012)

The

aim

oftheresearch

was

toestablishwhether

e-advertising

(forexam

pleweb

sitesandsocial

mediandashinclud

ingFa

cebook)had

aninflu

ence

onconsum

ersrsquocogn

itive

affectivebehaviouralresponses

Surveyq

uantita

tive

267consum

ersand

Tehran(Iran)

The

stud

yrevealed

that

e-advertisinghadapositiv

einflu

ence

oncogn

itiveaffectiv

eandbehavioural

responses

Smallsam

plesizeonly

focusedon

Refah

chain

storeconsum

ersno

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Mir(2012)

The

objectives

ofthestud

ywereto

establishwhether

favourable

attitud

estowards

social

media

(Facebook)

advertisingresultedin

greaterlevelsof

clicking

onthe

social

media

advertisem

ents

and

consequentlyh

igherincidences

ofpu

rchase

Surveyq

uantita

tive

210college

stud

ents

andPa

kistan

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

inform

ation(cognitiv

e)lead

topositiv

econsum

erattitud

estowards

social

media

advertising

which

sign

ificantly

influ

encedad

clicking

and

consequentlyh

adafavourable

influ

ence

onbu

ying

behaviour

Smallsam

plesize

stud

entsn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Yang(2012)

Agoal

oftheinvestigationwas

totest

theim

pact

ofFa

cebook

advertisingon

consum

erdecision-

makingbehaviourandattitud

es

Surveyq

uantita

tive

256respondentsand

Taiwan

The

enqu

iryrevealed

that

advertisingmessages

provided

byFa

cebook

enhances

consum

ersrsquo

attitud

estowards

thebrandandpu

rchase

intentions

Smallsam

plestud

ents

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Haigh

etal

(2013)

The

stud

yinvestigated

organisatio

nsrsquoFa

cebook

pagesin

term

softheim

pacton

stakeholdersrsquo

attitud

esand

purchase

intent

Controlled

experiment

quantitative275

participantsand

USA

The

research

disclosedthat

Facebook

pageshada

positiv

einflu

ence

onstakeholdersrsquoattitud

esand

purchase

intention

Smallsam

plestud

ents

USA

nousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Leun

getal

(2015)

Thisstud

yinvestigated

the

effectivenessof

socialmediasitesin

term

sof

theattitud

e-towards-th

e-ad

modelin

thehotelind

ustry

Onlinesurvey

quantitative408

respondentsand

USA

The

survey

foun

dthat

socialmediaexperiences

affect

attitud

estowards

Facebook

andTwitterand

influ

encedattitud

estowards

theorganisationwhich

inturn

impacted

onpurchase

intentionsFurthermoreno

sign

ificant

difference

was

foun

dbetweenthe

effectivenessof

Facebook

andTwitter

advertising

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

(con

tinued)

Table ISummary of recentFacebook medialiterature thatinvestigatedbehaviouralattitudinal research

504

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Authors

Objectiv

esconcerning

the

behaviourallevelsof

the

commun

ications

ofeffect

pyramid

model

Methodology

andorigin

Mainfin

ding

srelatin

gto

Facebook

behavioural

attitud

inal

research

Limita

tions

disadv

antages

Ruane

and

Wallace

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toun

derstand

relatio

nshipsw

hich

GenerationYfemales

have

with

fashionbrands

onlin

e(socialm

edia

andinternet)

Indu

ctivethem

atic

analysisq

ualitative

14participantsand

Ireland

The

stud

yfoun

dthat

social

media

(Facebookand

Twitter)created

anaw

arenessofneedsandwas

used

asan

inform

ationsource

(cognitiv

e)w

hileitalso

droveconsum

ption(behavioural)a

mongGeneration

Ywom

en

Smallsam

plestud

ents

andworking

professionalsIreland

nousagevariableanalysis

Kodjamanis

and

Ang

elopoulos

(2013)

The

objectiveof

theresearch

was

toestablishto

whatextent

Facebook

advertisinggeneratedpu

rchasing

intentionsand

toinflu

ence

buying

habits

Surveyq

uantita

tive

364respondentsand

UK

The

results

ofthesurvey

disclosedthat

over

half

(53

)oftherespondentsbelievedthat

Facebook

advertisinghadno

impact

ontheirpu

rchasing

intentions

andbu

ying

habitsw

hereas

34

feltthat

ithadalow

influ

ence11

averageandonly

3high

orvery

high

Smallsam

plestud

ents

UKn

ousageor

demograph

ical

variable

analysis

Rohm

etal

(2013)

The

goal

oftheresearch

was

toanalysetheroleof

social

media

amongGenerationYrsquosinteractions

with

brands

Mixed-m

ethod

qualita

tive(diary)and

latent

cross-analysis

58respondentsand

USA

The

finding

sdisclosedthat

consum

ermotives

via

social

media

(FacebookandTwitter)m

arketin

ginclud

edp

rodu

ctinform

ation(cognitiv

e)

entertainm

ent(affectiv

e)and

incentives

and

prom

otions

toencouragepu

rchase

(behavioural)

Smallsam

pleUSA

no

usageor

demograph

ical

variableanalysis

Table I

505

Facebookadvertising

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

objectives such as liking preference and intention-to-purchase until the ultimate purchaseHowever this model was based on traditional advertising whereas this research focuseson new digital interactive media to determine consumersrsquo behavioural attitudes as theypass the upper echelons of the aforementioned model Consequently this research isimportant for managers since a majority of organisations have invested significantportions of their promotion budgets on Facebook marketing communications and need toestablish if advertising on Facebook has a positive impact on the aforementionedbehavioural attitudes This empirical study is also important for academics andresearchers since as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) and Okazaki and Taylor (2013) thereis a dearth of social media advertising usage and attitude research among Millennials inemerging countries and accordingly this will contribute to attitude theory AdditionallyFacebookrsquos growth has begun to reach saturation in many first-world countries whereas itis steadily growing at an incremental rate in many emerging countries Facebook use hasgrown by almost 40 per cent over the past year in SA (Wronski and Goldstruck 2013)Furthermore a number of studies have yielded divergent behavioural attitudinalresponses Bannister et al (2013) Kodjamanis and Angelopoulos (2013) Maxwell (2013)and Persuad (2013) suggest that attitudes towards Facebook marketing communicationswere mainly negative or indifferent whereas Chandra et al (2012) Mir (2012) Leung et al(2015) and Rohm et al (2013) found a largely positive behavioural predispositionAccordingly the research questions (RQ) for the first objective are

RQ1 Does Facebook advertising have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials

RQ2 What impact does advertising on Facebook have on purchase amidMillennials in SA

Second to establish if usage factors which include how Facebook is accessed (asmentioned previously 87 per cent of Facebook users in SA access this social mediumvia mobile phones Wronski and Goldstruck 2013) length of usage log on durationlog on frequency and profile update incidence have an influence on Millennialsrsquointention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of advertising on Facebook Thisresearch objective is of interest to both managers and academics since it will provideinsight into Millennialsrsquo social media usage characteristics and whether these affect theirbehavioural attitudes Ultimately this objective will provide a greater understandingof Millennialsrsquo future consumer behaviour Moreover little research has been conductedto determine if the various usage characteristics have an influence on the impact ofFacebook advertising behavioural attitudes among Millennial users which will add tothe conceptual framework of attitudinal research in social media Chandra et al (2012)determined that more frequent social media users exhibited a favourable attitudetowards SNA as it assisted with buying decisions Punj (2011) found that internet usagelevels influenced belief-behavioural responses and Taylor et al (2011) established thatmany social media users utilise SNS as part of their everyday routine which may resultin an elevated prospect of consumers perceiving SNA more favourably Therefore theRQ for the second objective are as follows

RQ3 What influence do South African Millennial usage variables have on intention-to-purchase owing to Facebook advertising

RQ4 Do usage characteristics of Millennials in SA have an impact on purchase asa result of Facebook advertising

506

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Third to determine if demographic factors (gender age and ethnic orientation) havean impact on Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising This objective will reveal whether there are noticeable differences withinMillennial subgroups as mandated by Bolton et al (2013) with regard to theirattitudes towards Facebook advertising Additionally the ethic orientation analysisis of particular interest to managers and academics owing to the well-known injusticesof the past that took place in SA which resulted in a substantial economic divideFurthermore few studies have investigated the effect of demographic factorsespecially age (within a particular cohort) and ethnic orientation on attitudinalresearch Ruane and Wallace (2013) established that Facebook yielded favourablebehavioural attitudinal responses among Millennial women while Punj (2011)determined that different demographic characteristics influenced behaviouralactivities and Wang and Sun (2010) revealed that ethnic factors had an impact onbehavioural responses Hence the RQ for the third objective include the following

RQ5 Do demographic factors have an effect on intention-to-purchase amongSouth African Millennials owing to Facebook advertising

RQ6 What effect do demographic variables have on purchases that are attributableto advertising on Facebook amongst Millennials in SA

4 Methodology41 Research designA research design is a plan structure and strategy of investigation which is conceivedto obtain answers to RQ or problems A research design is a procedural plan thatis adopted by the researcher to answer questions validly objectively accurately andeconomically (Kumar 2011) Descriptive research is concerned with the currentstatus of the phenomena to acquire a better understanding of the existing situationbut disregards the cause of the research problem (Tustin et al 2005) As implied byits name this research method describes the characteristics of groups and people(Zikmund and Babin 2007) Descriptive research typically takes a cross-section ofa population in this instance Millennials who reside in the Western Cape andreveals their predisposition at a given point in time (behavioural attitudes towardsFacebook advertising) on which the research can be built Survey methods aretypically associated with descriptive research (Hair et al 2009) A measurementinstrument (typically a questionnaire) is employed to take a snap shot (cross-section)of independent (usage characteristics and demographic factors) and dependent(intention-to-purchase and purchase) variables of a given research population bymeans of a sample at a given point in time The main advantage of a survey is itscapability of collecting a large quantity of data (Bhattacherjee 2012) whereas themain disadvantages are its high cost and that fieldworkers should be well trained(Maree 2007) Hence structured self-administered questionnaires were distributed ona face-to-face basis to collect the required data for this study

42 SamplingYoung adults (Millennials) are the predominant users of online digital applicationssuch as SNS (Du Chenne 2011 Smith 2012 Bolton et al 2013 Wronski andGoldstruck 2013) Students were selected to investigate attitudes towards SNAand attitudes by a majority studies (Molnaacuter 2011 Orpana and Tera 2011 VandenBergh et al 2011 Bannister et al 2013 Persuad 2013) Yet the researcher believed that

507

Facebookadvertising

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

it was imperative to select a sample that included a broader spectrum of Millennialsas mandated by Bolton et al (2013) owing to the consumer behavioural changes thatoccur as young adults pass though the phases of their natural life cycle Hence theresearch population comprised of young employed individuals students and youngadults who were still seeking employment The unemployment rate in SA is in theregion of 30 per cent and is much higher among young adults (up to 50 per cent)(Statistics SA 2012) Furthermore young adults were surveyed in both rural and urbanareas which encompassed wealthy suburbs and disadvantaged township communitiesto ensure a representative sample

A sample frame is a record of all the sample units that are available for selection ata given stage in the sampling process (Martins et al 1996 Zikmund 2003 Aaker et al2004) The Western Cape was selected to collect data which represents a little over11 per cent of the South African population (Statistics SA 2012) The study utiliseda quasi-probability sample in the form of a multi-stage sampling technique wherebyas mentioned in prior text the Western Cape was selected from the nine provinces inSA Various geographic areas (clusters) which included suburban (characteristicallywealthier areas) and townships (which includes informal settlements) in both urbanand rural locations were identified by means of a map Thereafter commercial andcommunity organisations (sports clubs youth groups churches and other localgroups) as well as tertiary education institutions were randomly selected via listingsin a regional telephone directory Next these organisations were telephoned to obtainapproval to carry out the empirical research and to ascertain whether there were anadequate number of Millennials to survey Systematic sampling is a process wherebya random starting place is determined followed by every kth element being selectedby moving through the sample frame (Maree 2007 Bhattacherjee 2012) This samplingtechnique was used to survey participants in the aforementioned organisationswith every third participant invited to voluntarily partake in the research

43 Design of research instrument and data collectionA self-administered survey allows respondents to complete a survey instrument on theirown which has the benefits of eliminating interviewer bias the ability to reach largeresearch populations and attain an acceptable response rate (Denscombe 2010 Burnsand Bush 2012 Haydam andMostert 2013) The main disadvantage of self-administeredquestionnaires is the low-response rate if disseminated via mail e-mail or online(Bhattacherjee 2012) however to counteract this drawback the researcher administeredthe questionnaires on a face-to-face basis Another disadvantage is that it may be difficultto obtain large quantities of information from respondents if the research instrument wastoo long or complex (Blumberg et al 2011) However the researcher assured respondentsthat the questionnaire took no longer than ten minutes to complete and the face-to-faceadministration once again ensured a high-survey participation rate in spite of noincentive being offered Two pre-screening questions were asked in order to identifypossible respondents hence only respondents who used Facebook and had noticedadvertising on Facebook qualified to participate in the study However respondentsdid not need to identify or list any of the companies and their brands that were featuredin the advertisements and no distinction was made between the different forms ofFacebook advertising since the main object of the research was only to evaluate thebehavioural impact of Facebook advertising on Millennialsrsquo attitudes

The first section of the research instrument comprised of five multiple-choicequestions that asked respondents about their Facebook usage characteristics in

508

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

terms of access period of usage usage frequency log-in duration and profileupdate The second section focused on the two dimensions of the behaviouralattitudes namely intention-to-purchase and purchase owing to exposure to Facebookadvertising The nine-item scale that was used to measure intention-to-purchasewas largely adapted from Putrevu and Lord (1994) Taylor and Hunter (2002) andWu et al (2008) and was employed to measure this construct using a five-pointLikert scale that ranged from strongly disagree to strongly agree The nine-itemscale that was used to assess purchase was mainly adapted from Martinez-Lopezet al (2005) Patwardhan and Ramaprasad (2005) and Hamidizadeh et al (2012) witha five-point Likert scale also being utilised The last section of the questionnaireconsisted of three multiple-choice questions on the demographic physiognomies thatincluded gender age and population group Pre-test and pilot studies are used tosurvey a small subset of the population to determine whether the research instrumentand method to collect data are relevant reliable and valid (Du Plooy 2009Bhattacherjee 2012) The questionnaire was pre-tested among 100 respondents tocheck the reliability of the scales wording and question order and the ability ofrespondents to understand the meaning of the questions Some of the questions werereworded and a couple of the Likert scale statements were tweaked Subsequentlya pilot study of an additional 100 respondents was conducted to check that otherresearch elements were well-organised and also to double check that the researchquestionnaire was optimal especially in terms of scale reliability The primaryresearch was conducted by 22 students (reading for their bachelor marketing degreeat the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and who received six months ofrigorous training and practical application by the head of research of the marketingdepartment) who were sent to the various locations to conduct the empirical surveyon a face-to-face basis A total of 3521 useable questionnaires were collected over athree-month period from April to June 2013

44 Data analysisData analysis typically entails the editing and reduction of data into more manageableportions in order to create summaries detect patterns and apply statistical methods withthe express purpose of interpreted data to answer the RQ at hand (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) The data were captured and examined via statistical softwareknown as SPSS (version 21) However all of the questionnaires were first meticulouslyexamined in terms of correctness and completeness to establish whether they should beincorporated in the statistical analysis ndash the Likert scale statements were organised insuch a manner that alternated positive and negative statements so as to circumventparticipants from choosing a single column These questions were reversed via SPSSbefore the reliability of the responses was established for the measurement scalesReliability signifies the internal consistency of the items that were developed to measurea specific construct with a high level of reliability in other words the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales The coefficient mechanism that was used todetermine reliability is known as Cronbachrsquos α and reliability estimates of 07 and aboveare deemed to be acceptable (George and Mallery 2003 Hair et al 2009 Maree 2007)Hence items that are negatively worded in the scales must have their scores reversedotherwise they would have an adverse effect on Cronbachrsquos α result (Field 2009) Simpledescriptive statistical analysis measures (means standard deviations frequencies andnon-parametric standardised tests) were employed to provide a basic description of theresults (Tables II III and IV) Validity refers to the extent to which an instrument

509

Facebookadvertising

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

measures the construct that it is supposed to measure (Blumberg et al 2011Bhattacherjee 2012) To ensure validity existing measurement scales as mentioned inprior text were adapted and then tested before being utilised to assess the constructsFurthermore Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) was used toexamine and measure the linear strength of relationships between quantitative variables(Maree 2007 Field 2009) Analysis of variance (ANOVA) is utilised when twoindependent variables or more need to be compared to an individual quantitative score(Maree 2007) ANOVA used Waldrsquos χ2 and was conceptualised as a Generalised LinearModel (GLM) to establish if there were significant differences between the usage

Facebook usage characteristics n AccessMobile device 732 208PC 518 147Mobile device and PC 2271 645

Length of usage⩽1 year 463 1312 years 780 2223 years 849 2414 years 710 202⩾5 years 719 204

Log on frequencyDaily 2132 6052-4 a week 814 231Once a week 390 1112-4 a month 116 33Once a month 69 20

Log on duration⩽1 hour 2059 5852 hours 804 2283 hours 332 944 hours 151 43⩾5 hours 175 50

Profile update incidenceDaily 1044 2962-4 a week 837 238Once a week 662 1882-4 a month 372 106Once a month 606 172

DemographicsGenderMale 1593 452Female 1928 548

Age18-20 1322 37521-24 1441 40925-30 758 216

Ethnic groupWhite 807 229Black 1238 352Coloured 1283 364IndianAsian 193 55

Table IIFacebook usagecharacteristicsand demographics

510

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

12

34

56

78

9

Iwill

buyproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

inthenear

future

(1)

282

1317

0000

7644

1Id

esireto

buyproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(2)

282

1299

0000

9071

0733

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

donotincrease

purchase

intent

offeatured

brands

a(3)

305

1317

0061

1872

0298

0288

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

apositiv

einflu

ence

onmypu

rchase

decisions(4)

287

1173

0000

5889

0765

0602

0273

1Iwould

buytheproducts

that

areadvertised

onFB

ifIhadthemoney

(5)

295

1233

0031

2156

0607

0819

0247

0639

1Ido

notintend

toacqu

ireproducts

that

are

prom

oted

onFB

a(6)

312

1228

0000

6567

0333

0291

0683

0268

0295

1Iam

likelyto

buysomeof

theproducts

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(7)

287

1068

0000

4779

0750

0597

0278

0784

0632

0295

1Iplan

topu

rchase

theproducts

that

are

advertised

onFB

(8)

272

1107

0000

13136

0584

0773

0237

0548

0756

0275

0592

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

have

anegativ

einflu

ence

onbu

ying

decisionsa

(9)

326

1122

0000

14791

0324

0232

0653

0332

0291

0750

0302

0158

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe001

levels(tw

o-tailed)

Table IIIFacebook (FB)

advertisingintention-to-purchase

scale

511

Facebookadvertising

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Mean

SDp

Standardised

test

statistic

1011

1213

1415

1617

18

Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

makemeless

loyalto

brands

a(10)

357

1185

0000

27182

1Ib

uyproductsthat

areadvertised

onFB

(11)

255

1202

0000

21604

0069

1Iu

semanyof

theproductsthat

areprom

oted

onFB

(12)

276

1274

0000

11918

0006

0527

1Ido

notpu

rchase

products

that

arefeatured

onFB

a(13)

334

1194

0000

16783

0553

0098

0104

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviourpositiv

ely(14)

268

1143

0000

16078

0015

0708

0441

0014

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

help

makemeloyal

totheprom

oted

products

(15)

281

1137

0000

10212

0051

0525

0701

0066

0542

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mypu

rchase

behaviournegativ

elya

(16)

340

1021

0000

21864

0655

0012

0029

0575

0006

0008

1Ipu

rchase

products

that

areprom

oted

onFB

(17)

256

1083

0000

21032

0050

0806

0483

0101

0684

0523

0007

1Adv

ertisem

ents

onFB

affect

mybu

ying

actio

nspositiv

ely(18)

276

1069

0000

10998

0039

0515

0714

0075

0507

0778

0028

0530

1

Notes

Meansstand

arddeviationsone-sam

plebi-nom

inalstandardised

testandPearsonrsquoscorrelationcoefficientaNegativelyph

rasedstatem

entscoreswere

recoded

Co

rrelationissign

ificant

atthe005

and001

level(tw

o-tailed)respectively

Table IVFacebook (FB)advertisingpurchase scale

512

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

characteristics and demographic factors (predictor variables) and behavioural attitudecomponents (dependent variables) The post-ad-hoc Bonferroni pairwise comparison wasutilised to establish where the differences were so that the findings could be interpretedconclusively (Field 2009 Bhattacherjee 2012)

5 ResultsThe survey included 3521 members of the Millennials cohort in the WesternCape Facebook was accessed by a majority of respondents (645 per cent) via bothPC and mobile device over 60 per cent logged on to Facebook everyday spent one(585 per cent) to two (228 per cent) hours per log on and more than 72 per cent updatedtheir profile at least of once a week The sample included a slight majority of females(548 per cent) and the ethnic groups accurately portrayed the ethnicity of the WesternCape including primarily black (352 per cent) and coloured (364 per cent) ethnicgroups (Statistics SA 2012) Table II offers a full overview of the usage characteristicsand demographics of Millennials respondents that use Facebook

As previously mentioned the respondentsrsquo behavioural attitude towards Facebookadvertising was computed by nine-item scales for each of the hierarchy response levels(Tables III and IV)

Cronbachrsquos α was 0843 for the Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase scale(Table III) and 0742 for the Facebook advertising purchase scale (Table IV) whichindicated good internal consistencies A non-parametric one-sample bi-nominalstandardised test was utilised to determine if there was a significant difference Thetest showed that for both of the nine-item scales there was a significant difference atpo0001 and po005 with the exception of one item in the intention-to-purchasescale Pearsonrsquos correlation coefficient analysis (Tables III and IV) showed a positivemedium (rW03) to strong (rW05) relationship between a majority of the variablesfor the intention-to-purchase and purchase measurement scales but there was weakpositive correlation between a minority of the variables especially in terms of thenegatively reversed variables that were recoded

The GLM ANOVA as discussed in prior text was used since the data contains adifferent number of observations for certain independent variables which can be seenby the larger standard errors (an example of this is the low number of respondents thatlogged on to Facebook at least once a month) Van Schalkwyk (2012) discloses that theGLM takes this into consideration and ldquonormalisesrdquo the outcomes Tables V and VIshow the effect in terms of Wald χ2 test which is based on the Bonferroni correctionpairwise post hoc test among the estimated marginal means

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 1663 2 0435Length of usage 4422 4 0352Log on frequency 4699 4 0320Log on duration 28598 4 0000Profile update incidence 42095 4 0000Gender 0105 1 0746Age 0256 2 0880Ethnic group 34287 3 0000Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VEffect of usagecharacteristics

and demographicson Facebookadvertising

intention-to-purchase

513

Facebookadvertising

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

The Wald χ2 test revealed that there was a significant difference at po0001for intention-to-purchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0805) because of Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequencygender and age whereas Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means disclosed the significant difference between the next variablesLog on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for ⩽1 hour (Mfrac14 282SEfrac14 0033) resulted in lower intention-to-purchase levels in comparison to thosewho logged on for two hours (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0039)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0041) resulted in greater intention-to-purchase compared tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 293 SEfrac14 0044) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 298 SEfrac14 0043) showed anincrease in intention-to-purchase compared to those who updated it two to four timesa month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0050) and once a month (Mfrac14 281 SEfrac14 0042)

Ethnic group (po 0001) white respondents (Mfrac14 279 SEfrac14 0041) exhibited lowerintention-to-purchase levels than black (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) and coloured (Mfrac14 296SEfrac14 0037) respondents

The Wald χ2 test disclosed that there was a significant difference at po0001 forpurchase (Mfrac14 294 SDfrac14 0656) which was caused by Facebook advertisingNo significant differences were found for access length of usage log on frequency agegender and race however Bonferroni correction pairwise comparisons of estimatedmarginal means showed significant difference amongst the following variables

Log on duration (po0001) respondents who logged on for one hour (Mfrac14 285SEfrac14 0027) exhibited lower purchase levels compared to those who remained loggedon for two hours (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0032) and four hours (Mfrac14 306 SEfrac14 0056)

Profile update incidence (po0001) respondents who updated their Facebook statusdaily (Mfrac14 307 SEfrac14 0034) resulted in higher purchase incidence in comparison tothose who updated once a week (Mfrac14 297 SEfrac14 0036) two to four times a month(Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035) those who updatedtheir Facebook status two to four times a week (Mfrac14 301 SEfrac14 0035) showedincreased intention-to-purchase levels compared to those who updated two to fourtimes a month (Mfrac14 288 SEfrac14 0041) and once a month (Mfrac14 286 SEfrac14 0035)

In summary a comparison between the usage characteristics (Tables V and VI)reveals that log on duration and profile update incidence show the largest degree of

Type IIIIndependent variables Wald χ2 df p

Access 0838 2 0658Length of usage 0326 4 0988Log on frequency 3481 4 0481Log on duration 41845 4 0000Profile update incidence 42936 4 0000Gender 1771 1 0183Age 0550 2 0760Ethnic group 5465 3 0141Note Wald χ2 test showed a significant difference at po0001

Table VIEffect of usagecharacteristics anddemographics onFacebookadvertising purchase

514

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

influence on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchase and purchase whereas accesslength of usage and log on frequency had little effect on the behavioural attitudinalcomponent A comparison between the demographic factors (Tables V and VI) showsthat ethnicity displayed the greatest amount of influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and had some effect on purchase but not at a significant levelGender also had some impact on Facebook advertising purchase but again notat a significant level whereas gender had little effect on intention-to-purchaseThe demographical variable age had no influence on Facebook advertisingintention-to-purchase and purchase A more detailed discourse on the effect of usagecharacteristics and demographical factors on Facebook advertising intention-to-purchaseand purchase ensue in the following section

6 Discussion and implications61 Key findingsThe first objective of this study was to establish if Facebook advertising hada favourable impact on the behavioural attitudes of Millennials in SA The analysisindicates that Facebook advertising has a positive attitudinal influence on intention-to-purchase and purchase among Millennials although at a marginal level whichsupports the communications of the effect pyramid model These findings are inagreement with a number of authors Leung et al (2015) revealed that a positiveexperience with Facebook would lead to a favourable attitude towards the Facebookpage which increased the consumersrsquo intention-to-purchase Yang (2012) reportedthat advertising messages provided by Facebook enhances consumersrsquo attitudestowards brand and purchase intentions while advertising messages that wereprovided by organisations had a greater impact than those sent by friends andeMarketer (2012) found that consumers who were exposed to both paid and earned mediacould assist organisations with purchase consideration and brand likingpreferenceThese results could also be explained by the fact that Facebook has a diverse range ofinteractive and elements such as walls newsfeeds albums blogs discussion forumsand so forth which enable organisations to generate relations with consumersTherefore with the longstanding exposure of Facebook applications incentives andinteraction consumers tend to establish more favourable brand attitudes and greaterpurchase intentions pertaining to brand advertising on this platform (Rau et al 2008)Ha and Janda (2014) postulated that positive attitudes had an influence on onlinebehavioural intentions However Hudson and Thal (2013) disclosed that marketerswere not effectively interacting with consumers who used social media The researchsuggested that organisations focus on an array of consumer decision stages instead ofinformation and knowledge (cognitive) and purchase (behavioural) stages Maxwell(2013) also revealed that many online consumers conduct research on the internet andSNS but still favour purchasing products and brands at retailer stores

The second objective of the research was to determine if certain usage characteristicshad an effect on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising Theresearch revealed that advertising on Facebook was most effective when Millennialsspent two or more hours on Facebook per log-in session which is a logical perceptionas they would have more opportunity to interact with the advertising Young adultshave a high propensity towards multi-tasking and mobile devices which enable themto be continuously on the move while accessing the internet SNS television andcommunication via text graphics and verbally as well as searching for consumer-relatedinformation to make purchase decisions (Crosman 2008)

515

Facebookadvertising

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

This study confirmed that Millennial members who update their profile on Facebookmore prolifically facilitated increased positive behavioural attitudes This is a reasonablenotion since increased activity on Facebook should lead to greater activity with otherelements such as advertising This finding is also congruent with Chandra et al (2012)who found that regular users displayed a positive attitude towards SNA since it aidedpurchasing decisions

No significant differences were revealed in terms of length of usage log on frequencyand how Facebook was accessed This is an unexpected result since Wronski andGoldstruck (2013) disclosed that almost nine out of ten Facebook users access Facebookvia mobile phones Facebook mobile advertising was launched in 2012 and receivedclick-through rates of up to 13 times greater than other advertisements on Facebook(Bischoff 2012) Dynamic Logic (2012) indicated that intention-to-purchase was almostfour times higher for mobile advertising that resulted in higher average click-throughrates Hence it is apparent that Millennials in SA have divergent sentiments incomparison to their international counterparts

The third objective of this investigation was to examine whether particular demographicfactors had an impact on Millennials behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertisingThis investigation discovered that the white population group exhibited lower levels ofintention-to-purchase compared to the black and coloured ethnic groups Internet access hasgrown significantly among the coloured (357 per cent) and black (294 per cent) ethnicgroups in recent years but they are still catching up to the white (703 per cent) ethnic group(Statistics SA 2012) The proliferation of the black middle class categorised as the BlackDiamonds by TNS Research Surveys and the UCT Unilever Institute of Strategic Marketing(Olivier 2007) has resulted in greater spending power (R400 billion per annum) with themonthly income of black households increasing by 34 per cent since 2004 SArsquos blackmiddle class has risen by nearly 250 per cent from 17 million in 2004 to 42 million in 2012(Shevel 2013) Consequently a large proportion of black middle class young adults havegained internet access over the past decade whereas many white young adults grew upwith the internet and subsequently had more exposure and experience to SNS advertising

No significant differences were found in terms of age and gender having an impacton Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions of Facebookadvertising Bannister et al (2013) reported that women had a slightly more positiveattitude to Facebook advertising whereas Taylor et al (2011) found that youngadults (aged 19-24 years old) maintained the most positive attitudes to SNSadvertisements Hence it is apparent that there are not many noticeable differenceswithin the South African Millennial cohort besides ethnic orientation

62 Implications for theoryAttitudes towards advertising have been broadly researched over the past few decadesand it was found that consumersrsquo attitudes towards advertising have a direct influenceon attitudes towards the brand that impacts intention-to-purchase and purchaseAdditionally attitudes towards advertising have also been deemed to be an efficientmeasure of advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010) The appropriateness oftraditional advertising theories to online advertising has been an area of interest toacademics and advertising scholars since the arrival of online advertising Traditionalmethods continue to be applicable to the environment of online advertising as the basicobjectives of online advertising are inclined to be comparable to the objectives oftraditional advertising and theoretical models created for traditional advertising haveeffectively been transferred to online advertising (Rodgers and Thorson 2000) From

516

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

both an academic and marketing practitioner perspective the hierarchy-of-effectsmodel has received extensive attention as a detailed explanation of how advertisingworks and hence is a base for measuring advertising effectiveness (Yoo et al 2010)Although little research has been conducted concerning the effects of SNA in terms ofthis recognised theoretical framework Consequently this study attempted to assessthe effects of SNA within the framework of the hierarchy-of-effects model The resultsreveal that advertising on Facebook has a favourable impact on behavioural attitudesamong Millennials but at a minimal level which supports the communications of effectpyramid model that was developed via traditional advertising research This modelposits that it becomes increasingly more challenging to accomplish the higher levelhierarchical objectives namely intention-to-purchase and purchase consequently thenumber of potential consumers decline as they move up the pyramid A more positiveattitude towards advertising is correlated to more favourable advertising judgments interms of entertainment information and acceptance which result in greateradvertisement recall and higher purchase intention (Wang and Sun 2010) Stevensonet al (2000) disclosed that an unfavourable attitude towards online advertising wasrelated to low purchase intention whereas Wolin et al (2002) proposed thata favourable attitude towards online advertising usually resulted in more recurrentonline purchasing and greater online spending Mir (2012) revealed that a positiveattitude towards social media advertising influences consumersrsquo advertising clickingbehaviour and consequently has an impact on their online purchasing behaviourwhich is congruent with the findings of Wolin et al (2002) and Wang and Sun (2010)Furthermore Powers et al (2012) disclosed that over 20 per cent of consumersbelieved that social media was important for their final purchase decision andMoore (2012) found that Millennial consumers purchase brands online withgreater frequency in comparison to prior generations Hence it can be concludedthat advertising on Facebook adheres to the same notions of traditional advertisingin terms of the communications of effect pyramid model This study has madea valuable contribution to attitudinal research and theory development amongMillennials

This inquiry found that log on duration and profile update incidence had aninfluence on South African Millennialsrsquo intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptionsof advertising on Facebook whereas how Facebook was accessed length of usage andlog on frequency had no influence Punj (2011) established that internet usagefrequency affected behavioural activities and Taylor et al (2011) observed that manyconsumers use SNS to overcome boredom or to use up time between activities they alsofrequently use SNS as part of their everyday routine This habitual activity mayincrease the prospect that consumers would perceive would SNA positively since itmay provide an added diversion and an extra means of form of time structuring whichis in consensus with the results of this investigation Wang and Sun (2010) determinedthat ethnic variables had an influence on behavioural attitudinal responses andJordaan et al (2011) advocate that different ethnic groups in SA should be investigatedto establish whether there was a difference in terms of online intent and purchaseConsequently this study found that ethnic orientation had a positive impact on thebehavioural attitudes of black Millennials in SA but no effect on age and gender Theseresults make a noteworthy contribution to the theoretical framework of attitudinalresearch in SNS marketing communications since there is a dearth of research on theeffect of abovementioned usage and demographic factors on the upper levels ofcommunications of effect pyramid model

517

Facebookadvertising

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

63 Managerial implicationsIn terms of the first RQ this inquiry showed that Facebook advertising had amarginal but a significant positive attitudinal effect on intention-to-purchase amongstSouth African Millennials Maxwell (2013) also concluded that brands are needed tocreate stimulating content interaction and advocacy via their social conduits in orderto establish relationships that would instigate intention-to-purchase Persuad (2013)found that high levels of interactivity on Facebook were positively correlated tointention-to-purchase and favourable attitudes towards the brand Barreto (2013)determined that Facebook advertising resulted in lower purchase consideration levelsin comparison to the WOM by friends Hence marketers should attempt to stimulateinteractivity and WOM by proactively endorsing the sharing of marketingcommunication content between Facebook users by linking it to competitionsdiscounts giveaways and other sales promotions which would stimulate an increase inbehavioural activities Marketing should consider the use of the pre-roll video which isincorporated into flash banner advertisements that increased purchase intent by up tofour times in comparison to simple static banner rich and video advertisements(Millward Brown 2012) Hence South African organisations and managers should takethe aforementioned findings into consideration in an attempt to increase purchaseintent levels among Millennials

Vis-agrave-vis the second research this investigation revealed that advertising onFacebook resulted in a diminutive but noteworthy favourable attitudes towardspurchase among the Millenial cohort Marketers should take into considerationthat cheap costs fast service high quality and an ldquoexperiencerdquo are important factorsthat influence Millennialsrsquo purchase considerations Facebook advertisements thatare connected to a physical in store promotion may actively draw SA Millennials whoare not inclined to make online purchases to the actual store to purchase Facebookrsquoslocation point tracking systems can also be used to display local storesrsquo promotionsbased on the interests of the Millennialsrsquo location Chandra et al (2012) revealed thatSNS assists in making the final purchase decision and resulted in lowing pricesHowever it should be noted that Millennials have generally not yet establishedenduring consumer behaviour patterns and do spend freely since many are studentsor unemployed who have limited resources with 45 per cent agreeing that theypurchase brands on sale as opposed to their preferred brands which would dampentheir purchase sentiments (Symphony 2013) This finding vindicates the decision bySouth African organisations and managers to spend large percentages of theiradvertising budgets on Facebook marketing communications

In respect of the third and fourth research questions this study determined thatFacebook advertising had the greatest influence on behavioural attitudes on Millennialswho spent longer periods of time on the SNS However this survey confirmed that nearlysix out of ten Millennials spent one hour or less on Facebook per log on session whichis detrimental to marketing communication efforts Therefore organisations andmanagers should attempt to incorporate a selection of Facebookrsquos vast array of socialplugins and apps to keep the young consumer entertained on the SNS for a longer periodof time which will in turn lead to a positive influence on purchase decisionsAdvertisements on Facebook should be changed regularly to prevent advertising wearout especially those that are directed at Millennials who easily become bored with astatic digital environment that they frequent on a daily basis Also concerning the thirdand fourth research questions this investigation established that Millennials whoregularly updated their Facebook profile resulted in favourable behavioural attitudes

518

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

South African organisations and managers could use the metrics that are available onFacebook to target the most active users as well as Facebookrsquos apps and social plugins intheir marketing communications that could have an influence on their profile updatingincidence (Facebook 2014b) Marketers should also consider the use of Facebookapplications including contests games photo up-loaders virtual gifting and otherinteractive tools which permit organisations to create branded experiences and sharingamong Facebook friends that would increase behavioural activities (Stokes 2013) Theresearcher expected that Facebook advertising accessed by mobile devices would delivermore favourable behavioural attitudes than desktops However no difference was foundnevertheless organisations and managers still need to consider mobile marketing as anonline purchasing resource owing to the rapid adoption rate of mobile devicesFurthermore the more mobile friendly and the easier advertisements on Facebook are toaccess the greater the outcome will be when Millennials want to purchase products of aparticular brand With reference to the fifth research question this study revealed thatblack and coloured ethnic groups displayed more favourable purchase intent tendenciesthan their white counterparts however not in terms of the sixth research questionnamely purchase Nevertheless black young adults represent a potentially profitabletarget market because in recent years the black middle class consumers spend in SA hassurpassed their white counterparts (Petzer and De Meyer 2013) which has also receivedincreased exposure to Facebook advertising that should be exploited by savvyorganisations and managers Carrillat et al (2014) indicate that Facebook marketingcommunication messages must be entertaining to have a favourable effect on attitudesThe use of humorous and creative advertisements is more likely to stimulate interactionwith Millennials that may result in behavioural activities across different culturalgroups Facebook Insights provides data on usage and demographic information interms of how users have interacted with an organisationrsquos Facebook page and marketingcommunications (Facebook 2014b) Hence marketers could increase their efficiency intargeting Millennials by using the usage and demographic factors identified in thisstudy which resulted in the most favourable behavioural attitudes

SNS is a rapidly growing marketing communication tool but it is up to marketers torecognise that the expectations needs and wants of Millennial consumers arecontinually changing and hence this should be taken into consideration when usingSNA to favourably influence this cohortrsquos behavioural predisposition

64 ConclusionMany organisations hold the mistaken belief that they can simply establish a Facebookpage and post-content occasionally that will result in an incremental increase in salesHowever this is far from the truth as social media must become a fundamental part ofthe organisationrsquos overall marketing communication strategy and activities in order for itto yield full potential Furthermore Millennial consumers have tremendous purchasepower and influence on the other cohorts so their media usage and attitudes towardsvarious media are important to organisations and their brands A thorough knowledge ofthis cohort will allow marketers to increase their marketing communication efficiencyThis research has generated important new insights about a relatively new topicspecifically in terms of the African context which is of benefit to organisations thatutilise or intend to use Facebook social media as a marketing communication platformand to academics who are scholars of attitudinal theory development The studyspecifically provides valuable insights into the behavioural attitudes of South AfricanMillennials towards Facebook advertising as well as several usage characteristics

519

Facebookadvertising

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

and demographic variables that have a favourable influence on intention-to-purchaseand purchase perceptions which have received limited prior empirical investigationAdvertisements should be carefully created to be interactive and stimulating in order toappeal to Millennials who are notoriously fickle and difficult to reach FurthermoreHadija et al (2012) proposed that organisations and managers must also understandwhat consumers and prospective consumers are doing on SNS such as Facebook henceshould be prepared to alter or adapt their SNA strategies owing to changes that occurin the environment and as a result of consumer feedback and academic research in orderto increase the effectiveness This study has assisted to reduce the aforementionedmandated academic-practitioner gap

7 Limitations and directions for future researchThis investigation has some limitations and also lends itself to additional researchThe inquiry did not take the various types of Facebook advertising into considerationtherefore it is suggested that further research should be conducted to determinewhether there was a difference in attitudinal effectiveness between the variousadvertising forms Only the behavioural attitude and a single SNS was surveyedwhereas future studies could examine other attitude components as well as otherwidely used SNS such as YouTube Google+ LinkedIn and Twitter Cognitive andaffective attitudes warrant further research since consumersrsquo first need to becomeaware and be informed of an organisationrsquos products and develop favourable emotionalbonds before they can progress to behavioural activities Like this study surveyswhich constituted a cross-section of attitudes were previously used in cognitive andaffective attitudinal research Hence a longitudinal approach would yield morecomplete results as inferred by Kalampokis et al (2013) and Schoen et al (2013)This study utilised quantitative data as have past inquiries on cognitive and affectiveattitudinal components whereas qualitative research would provide greater insightinto Millennialsrsquo attitudes Future research could also take other countries intoconsideration since a developing country with a diverse and rich culture such as SAmay differ from other developing nations

ReferencesAaker DA Kumar V and Day GS (2004) Marketing Research 8th ed John Wiley

New York NY

Associated Press and CNBC (2012) ldquoIs there a problem with Facebook advertisingrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009065 (accessed 1 July 2013)

AYTM (2012) ldquoFacebook marketers find better payoff with sponsored storiesrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Marketers-Find-Better-Payoff-with-Sponsored-Stories1009109 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Bannister A Kiefer J and Nellums J (2013) ldquoCollege studentsrsquo perceptions of and behavioursregarding Facebook advertising an exploratory studyrdquo The Catalyst Vol 3 No 1 pp 1-20

Barreto AM (2013) ldquoDo users look at banner ads on Facebookrdquo Journal of Research inInteractive Marketing Vol 7 No 2 pp 119-139

Belch GE and Belch MA (2012) Advertising and Promotion An Integrated MarketingCommunication Perspective 9th ed McGraw-Hill New York NY

Berndt A (2007) ldquoMedia habits among generation Y consumersrdquo Proceedings of the 19thAnnual Conference of the Southern African Institute of Management ScientistsJohannesburg 19-21 September pp 3-16

520

INTR254

Bevan-Dye AL Garnett A and de Klerk N (2012) ldquoMaterialism status consumptionand consumer ethnocentrism amongst black generation Y students in South AfricardquoAfrican Journal of Business Management Vol 6 No 16 pp 5578-5586

Bhattacherjee A (2012) Social Science Research Principles Methods and Practices USF TampaBay Open Access Textbooks Tampa FL

Bischoff W (2012) ldquoMobile advertising now on Facebook in South Africardquo available at wwwbizcommunitycomArticle1961278197html (accessed 10 April 2014)

Blasco-Arcas L Hernandez-Ortega B and Jimenez-Martinez J (2014) ldquoThe online purchaseas a context for co-creating experiences Drivers of and consequences for customerbehaviourrdquo Internet Research Vol 24 No 3 pp 211-242

Blumberg B Cooper DR and Schindler PS (2011) Business Research Methods 3rd edMcGraw-Hill London

Bolton RN Parasuraman A Hoefnagels A Migchels N Kabadayi S Gruber T Loureiro YKand Solnet D (2013) ldquoUnderstanding Generation Y and their use of social media a review andresearch agendardquo Journal of Service Management Vol 24 No 3 pp 245-267

Burns AC and Bush FR (2012) Basic Marketing Research 3rd ed Pearson Education UpperSaddle River NJ

Carrillat AF drsquoAstous A and Greacutegoire EM (2014) ldquoLeveraging social media to enhancerecruitment effectiveness a Facebook experimentrdquo Internet Research Vol 24 No 4 pp 86-123

Chandra B Goswami S and Chouhan V (2012) ldquoInvestigating attitude towards onlineadvertising on social media ndash an empirical studyrdquo Management Insight Vol 8 No 1pp 1-14

Crosman P (2008) ldquoAttracting young investors ndash financial firms are embracing mobiletechnology Web 20 tools and social networking principles to reach Gen X and Gen YrdquoWall Street and Technology Vol 26 p 16

Denscombe M (2010) The Good Research Guide 3rd ed McGraw-Hill Berkshire

Digital Fire (2012) ldquoSocial media marketing in Africardquo available at wwwbizcommunitycomArticle1961673947html (accessed 3 July 2013)

Dotson MF and Hyatt EM (2005) ldquoMajor influence factors in childrenrsquos consumersocialisationrdquo Journal of Consumer Marketing Vol 22 No 3 pp 35-42

Du Chenne S (2011) ldquoHigh on aspiration but cynicalrdquo AdReview Vol 28 April pp 48-51

Du Plooy GM (2009) Communication research Techniques Methods and Applications JutaCape Town

Dynamic Logic (2012) ldquoMobile video bumps up health brand metricsrdquo available at wwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141009490ampecidfrac14a6506033675d47f881651943c21c5ed4(accessed 4 July 2013)

Edwards SM (2011) ldquoA social media mindsetrdquo Journal of Interactive Advertising Vol 12 No 1pp 1-3

eMarketer (2012) ldquoSocial media key influencer in multi-exposure purchase pathrdquo available atwwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141008845ampecidfrac14a6506033675d47f881651943c21c5ed4(accessed 4 July 2013)

eMarketer (2014a) ldquoDigital ad spending worldwide to hit $13753 billion in 2014rdquo available atwwwemarketercomArticleDigital-Ad-Spending-Worldwide-Hit-3613753-Billion-201410107368 (accessed 7 April 2014)

eMarketer (2014b) ldquoGlobal B2C ecommerce sales to hit $15 trillion this year driven by growthin emerging marketsrdquo available at wwwemarketercomArticleGlobal-B2C-Ecommerce-

521

Facebookadvertising

Sales-Hit-15-Trillion-This-Year-Driven-by-Growth-Emerging-Markets1010575 (accessed7 April 2014)

eMarketer (2014c) ldquoSocial ad spending per user remains highest in North Americardquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleSocial-Ad-Spending-per-User-Remains-Highest-North-America1010505 (accessed 7 April 2014)

Facebook (2014a) ldquoCompany infordquo available at httpsnewsroomfbcomcompany-info(accessed 6 August 2014)

Facebook (2014b) ldquoPlatformrdquo available at httpsnewsroomfbcomPlatform (accessed3 March 2014)

Facebook and ComScore (2012) ldquoCan Facebook go beyond earned media successrdquo availableat wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Go-Beyond-Earned-Media-Success1009127(accessed 30 June 2013)

Field A (2009) Discovering Statistics using SPSS 3rd ed Sage London

George D and Mallery P (2003) SPSS for Windows Step by Step A Simple Guide and Reference4th ed Allyn amp Bacon Boston MA

Goldenberg B (2007) ldquoThe rise of the digital clientrdquo Customer Relationship ManagementVol 11 p 12

Greenlight (2012) ldquoFacebook sponsored advertisements ndash 44 of people say they wouldlsquoneverrsquo click on themrdquo available at wwwbizcommunitycomArticle1961275429html(accessed 10 April 2014)

Ha H and Janda S (2014) ldquoThe effect of customized information on online purchase intentionsrdquoInternet Research Vol 24 No 4 pp 124-165

Hadija Z Barnes SB and Hair N (2012) ldquoWhy we ignore social networkingadvertisingrdquo Qualitative Market Research An International Journal Vol 15 No 1pp 19-32

Haigh MM Brubaker P and Whiteside E (2013) ldquoFacebook examining the informationpresented and its impact on stakeholdersrdquo Corporate Communications An InternationalJournal Vol 18 No 1 pp 52-69

Hair JF Bush RP and Ortinau DJ (2009) Marketing Research McGraw HillIrwinNew York NY

Hamidizadeh MR Yazdani N Tabriz AA and Latifi MM (2012) ldquoDesigning and validating asystematic model of e-advertisingrdquo International Journal of Marketing Studies Vol 4 No 2pp 130-149

Haydam N and Mostert T (2013) Marketing Research for Managers African ParadigmsMarketing Facilitators Cape Town

He W and Zha S (2014) ldquoInsights into the adoption of social media mashupsrdquo Internet ResearchVol 24 No 2 pp 21-42

Hsu M Chuang L and Hsu C (2014) ldquoUnderstanding online shopping intention theroles of four types of trust and their antecedentsrdquo Internet Research Vol 24 No 3pp 106-139

Hudson S and Hudson R (2013) ldquoEngaging with consumers using social media a case study ofmusic festivalsrdquo International Journal of Event and Festival Management Vol 4 No 3pp 206-223

Hudson S and Thal K (2013) ldquoThe impact of social media on the consumer decision processimplications for tourism marketingrdquo Journal of Travel amp Tourism Marketing Vol 30Nos 1-2 pp 156-160

522

INTR254

Internet World Stats (2012) ldquoInternet users and population statistics for Africardquo available atwwwinternetworldstatscomstats1htm (accessed 28 June 2013)

Jalilvand MR and Samiei N (2012) ldquoThe impact of electronic word-of-mouth on a tourismdestination choice testing the theory of planned behaviour (TPB)rdquo Internet ResearchVol 22 No 5 pp 591-612

Jordaan Y Ehlers L and Grove JM (2011) ldquoAdvertising credibility across media channelsperceptions of generation Y consumersrdquo Communicare Vol 30 No 1 pp 1-20

JWT Intelligence (2012) ldquoWomenrsquos influence on purchase decisions on the riserdquo available atwwwemarketercomArticleaspxRfrac141008807 (accessed 29 June 2013)

Kalampokis E Tambouris E and Tarabanis K (2013) ldquoUnderstanding the predictive powerof social mediardquo Internet Research Vol 23 No 5 pp 544-559

Kodjamanis A and Angelopoulos S (2013) ldquoConsumer perception and attitude towardsadvertising on social networking sites the case of Facebookrdquo Proceedings of InternationalConference on Communication Media Technology and Design Famagusta 2-4 Maypp 53-58

Kumar R (2011) Research Methodology Sage Pretoria

Lavidge RJ and Steiner GA (1961) ldquoA model of predictive measurement of advertisingeffectivenessrdquo Journal of Marketing Vol 25 No 6 pp 59-62

Leung XY Bai B and Stahura KA (2015) ldquoThe marketing effectiveness of social media in thehotel industry a comparison of Facebook and Twitterrdquo Journal of Hospitality amp TourismResearch Vol 39 No 2 pp 147-169

Levin J (2013) ldquoYouth marketingrdquo available at wwwbizcommunitycomArticle19634788005html (accessed 2 July 2013)

Lingelbach D Patino A and Pitta DA (2012) ldquoThe emergence of marketing in Millennialnew venturesrdquo Journal of Consumer Marketing Vol 29 No 2 pp 136-145

McCarthy J Rowley J Ashworth CJ and Pioch E (2014) ldquoManaging brand presence throughsocial media the case of UK football clubsrdquo Internet Research Vol 24 No 2 pp 43-75

Maree K (2007) First Steps in Research Van Schaik Pretoria

Martinez-Lopez FJ Luna P and Martinez FJ (2005) ldquoOnline shopping the standard learninghierarchy and consumersrsquo internet expertiserdquo Internet Research Vol 15 No 3 pp 312-334

Martins JH Loubser M and VanWyk H (1996)Marketing Research A South Africa ApproachUnisa Pretoria

Maxwell J (2013) ldquoDemystifying the online shopper 10 myths of multichannel retailingrdquo PWCrsquosMultichannel Retail Survey January pp 3-35

Millward Brown (2012) ldquoRich display and video ads boost purchase intentrdquo available at wwwmarketingmagcomaunewsrich-display-and-video-ads-boost-purchase-intent-14282U85FBBGKBMs (accessed 8 August 2014)

Mir IA (2012) ldquoConsumer attitudinal insights about social media advertising a South Asianperspectiverdquo The Romanian Economic Journal Vol 15 No 45 pp 265-288

Molnaacuter G (2011) ldquoSocial technographics profiles of students at University of Pecsrdquo masterdissertation University of Pecs Peacutecs

Moore M (2012) ldquoInteractive media usage among Millennial consumersrdquo Journal of ConsumerMarketing Vol 29 No 6 pp 436-444

Noble SM Haytko DL and Phillips J (2009) ldquoWhat drives college-age generation Y consumersrdquoJournal of Business Research Vol 62 No 6 pp 617-628

Okazaki S and Taylor RT (2013) ldquoSocial media and international advertising theoreticalchallenges and future directionsrdquo International Marketing Review Vol 30 No 1 pp 56-71

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Facebookadvertising

Olivier D (2007) ldquoSouth Africa poised to become a loyalty marketing gemrdquo Journal of ConsumerMarketing Vol 24 No 3 pp 180-181

Orpana J and Tera J (2011) ldquoFacebook marketing ndash what do users think of itrdquo bachelor thesisUniversity of Applied Sciences Turku

Patino A Pitta DA and Quinones R (2012) ldquoSocial mediarsquos emerging importance in marketresearchrdquo Journal of Consumer Marketing Vol 29 No 3 pp 233-237

Patwardhan P and Ramaprasad J (2005) ldquoRational integrative model of online consumerdecision makingrdquo Journal of Interactive Advertising Vol 6 No 1 pp 2-13

Persuad C (2013) ldquoThe effects of interactivity and involvement on usersrsquo attitude toward andperception of brands and purchase intent on Facebookrdquo master thesis Louisiana StateUniversity Baton Rouge LA

Petzer DJ and De Meyer CF (2013) ldquoTrials and tribulations marketing in modernSouth Africardquo European Business Review Vol 25 No 4 pp 382-390

Powers T Advincula D Austin MS Graiko S and Snyder J (2012) ldquoDigital and socialmedia in the purchase decision processrdquo Journal of Advertising Research Vol 52 No 4pp 479-489

Priyanka S (2013) ldquoA study of online advertising on consumer behaviourrdquo InternationalJournal of Engineering and Management Science Vol 3 No 4 pp 461-465

Punj G (2011) ldquoEffect of consumer beliefs on online purchase behaviour the influence ofdemographic characteristics and consumption valuesrdquo Journal of Interactive MarketingVol 25 No 3 pp 134-144

Putrevu S and Lord RK (1994) ldquoComparative and noncomparative advertising attitude effectsunder cognitive and affective involvement conditionsrdquo Journal of Advertising Vol 23 No 2pp 77-90

Rau PLP Gao Q and Ding Y (2008) ldquoRelationship between the level of intimacy andlurking in online social network servicesrdquo Computers in Human Behaviour Vol 24 No 6pp 2757-2770

Reuters and Ipsos (2012) ldquoCan Facebook go beyond earned media successrdquo available at wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-Go-Beyond-Earned-Media-Success1009127 (accessed1 July 2013)

RichRelevance (2013) ldquoOn Facebook retailers tackle how best to drive salesrdquo available at wwwemarketercomArticleOn-Facebook-Retailers-Tackle-How-Best-Drive-Sales1009793(accessed 2 July 2013)

Rodgers S and Thorson E (2000) ldquoThe interactive advertising model how users perceive andprocess online adsrdquo Journal of Interactive Advertising Vol 1 No 1 pp 26-49

Rohm A Kaltcheva VD and Milne GR (2013) ldquoA mixed-method approach to examiningbrand-consumer interactions driven by social mediardquo Journal of Research in InteractiveMarketing Vol 7 No 4 pp 295-311

Ruane L and Wallace E (2013) ldquoGeneration Y females online insights from brand narrativesrdquoQualitative Market Research An International Journal Vol 16 No 3 pp 315-335

Safko L (2010) The Social Media Bible Tactics Tools amp Strategies for Business Success 2nd edWiley Hoboken NJ

Saxena A and Khanna U (2013) ldquoAdvertising on social network sites a structural equationmodelling approachrdquo Vision Vol 17 No 1 pp 17-25

Schoen H Gayo-Avello D Metaxas PT Mustafaraj E Strohmaier M and Gloor P (2013)ldquoThe power of prediction with social mediardquo Internet Research Vol 23 No 5pp 528-543

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Shevel A (2013) ldquoBlack Diamonds outshine whitesrdquo available at wwwbdlivecozanational20130428black-diamonds-outshine-whites (accessed 20 November 2013)

Shopify (2014) ldquoFacebook is no 1 for social commercerdquo available at wwwemarketercomArticleFacebook-No-1-Social-Commerce1010721 (accessed 7 April 2014)

Shu W and Chuang Y (2011) ldquoThe perceived benefits of six-degree-separation social networksrdquoInternet Research Vol 21 No 1 pp 26-45

Smith KT (2012) ldquoLongitudinal study of digital marketing strategies targeting MillennialsrdquoJournal of Consumer Marketing Vol 29 No 2 pp 86-92

Smith S (2013) ldquoConceptualising and evaluating experiences with brands on Facebookinternationalrdquo Journal of Market Research Vol 55 No 3 pp 357-374

Statistics South Africa (SA) (2012) Census 2011 In Brief Statistics Statistics SA Pretoria

Stevenson J Bruner G and Kumar A (2000) ldquoWebpage background and viewer attitudesrdquoJournal of Advertising Research Vol 40 No 1 pp 29-34

Stokes R (2013) eMarketing The Essential Guide to Marketing in a Digital World 5th ed QuirkEducation Cape Town

Symphony (2013) ldquoDigital-first Millennials put a premium on value engagementrdquoavailable at wwwemarketercomArticleDigital-First-Millennials-Put-Premium-on-Value-Engagement1009946 (accessed 1 July 2013)

Taylor DG Lewin JE and Strutton D (2011) ldquoFriends fans and followers do ads work onsocial networksrdquo Journal of Advertising Research Vol 51 No 1 pp 258-275

Taylor SA and Hunter GL (2002) ldquoThe impact of loyalty with e-CRM software and e-servicesrdquoInternational Journal of Service Industry Management Vol 13 No 5 pp 452-478

Tham A Croy G and Mair J (2013) ldquoSocial media in destination choice distinctiveelectronic word-of-mouth dimensionsrdquo Journal of Travel amp Tourism Marketing Vol 30pp 144-155

Tustin DH Ligthelm AA Martins JH and Van Wyk H (2005) Marketing Research inPractice Unisa Pretoria

Van Schalkwyk D (2012) Quantitative Statistics CPUT Cape Town

Vanden Bergh BG Lee M Quilliam ET and Hove T (2011) ldquoThe multidimensional natureand brand impact of user-generated as parodies in social mediardquo Interactive Journal ofAdvertising Vol 30 No 1 pp 103-131

Wang Y and Sun S (2010) ldquoAssessing beliefs attitudes and behavioural responsestoward online advertising in three countriesrdquo International Business Review Vol 19 No 1pp 333-344

Wolin LD Korgaonkar P and Lund D (2002) ldquoBeliefs attitudes and behaviour towards webadvertisingrdquo International Journal of Advertising Vol 21 No 1 pp 87-113

Wronski M and Goldstruck A (2013) SA Social Media Landscape World Wide Worx ampFuseware Johannesburg

Wu SI Wei PL and Chen JH (2008) ldquoInfluential factors and relational structure ofinternet banner advertising in the tourism industryrdquo Tourism Management Vol 29 No 1pp 221-236

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About the authorDr Rodney Graeme Duffett is a Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Business Cape PeninsulaUniversity of Technology (CPUT) Cape Town South Africa He is currently reading for theDoctor Technologiae Degree in Marketing at CPUT He has published in African Journal ofBusiness Management Southern African Business Review and Journal of ContemporaryManagement His research interests focus on any form of e-advertising social media and blackeconomic empowerment in the advertising industry Dr Rodney Graeme Duffett can be contactedat duffetrcputacza

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