To engage consumers and yield results, social media posts need to go beyond either motivating consumers to believe that a product is the “right” choice (e.g., this razor gives the best shave), or to “act” (e.g., get the razor to start the day). Rather, consumers need to be motivated to “be right and act” (e.g., get the best razor to start the day). But how can marketers ensure that calls to “be right and act” are effectively shared on social media? This research draws upon regulatory mode and construal-level theory to determine how marketing messages can increase consumer engagement, resulting in social media sharing.
Regulatory mode theory suggests that consumers can either have an assessment orientation – a motivation to “be right” by critically evaluating – or a locomotion orientation – a motivation to “act” by moving toward a goal, or exhibit complementarity – a combination of both. These orientations can be a chronic background factor for consumers, or can also be activated as a state, for example, through simultaneous exposure to both assessment words and locomotion words in social media posts. Previous research has demonstrated the unique effects of regulatory mode complementarity, for example, consumers with a high assessment and high locomotion orientation can complete tasks accurately and in a timely manner. However, assessment and locomotion can have conflicting implications when working together as they direct attentional resources towards different goals: making the best decision vs. getting things done).
Construal-level theory posits that information, such as a social media post, can be represented abstractly – in a psychologically distant manner – or concretely – in a psychologically close manner. Individuals who process information at an abstract (vs. concrete) construal level emphasise on “why” rather than “how” an action is carried out and are more likely to have an open mind to integrate conflicting advertising messages. Therefore, an abstract construal level supports regulatory mode complementarity by integrating the different attentional resource demands of high assessment and high locomotion. Based on this, this study proposes the concept of construal-regulatory mode fit, which occurs when an individual’s regulatory mode complementarity is supported by an abstract construal, and that this fit could lead to increased consumer engagement and social media sharing.
Method and sample
To test the model, six studies were conducted. The first three were text analysis field studies on large-scale Facebook and Twitter posts that were marketer- (Studies 1a and 1b) and consumer-generated (Study 2) to examine the effect of construal–regulatory mode fit on social media sharing. Studies 1a and 1b had a final sample of 210,963 Facebook posts and 311,365 tweets the top 100 international brands (e.g., Amazon, Coca- Cola, Nike) across a range of industry sectors (e.g., retail, technology, FMCG). The final sample for Study 2 was 377,086 consumer-generated tweets in reply to the 100 specified brands in Study 1.
The next were follow-up studies (Study 3: N=399; Study 4: N=798; and Study 5: N=794) to show generalisability, establish causality, and demonstrate the role of engagement as the underlying mechanism driving the fit effect. Participants of these three studies are in the US and recruited from Prolific.
Key findings
- Construal-regulatory mode fit – the combination of complementarity (high assessment and high locomotion) and abstract construal – leads to higher sharing of social media posts.
- This fit effect is explained by increased engagement, whereby construal-regulatory mode fit leads to higher consumer engagement, which then leads to more social media sharing.
Recommendations
These findings prompt the need for firms to adjust the language they use on social media to induce regulatory mode complementarity and convey the message abstractly. Common words such as “right,” “correct,” “truth” (assessment), and “act,” “get,” and “go” (locomotion) should be employed. Moreover, the extensive size of the construal level dictionary gives managers a wide range of choices for abstract language use, allowing them to assess posts before publishing. This enables construal–regulatory mode fit effects to be created in a simple manner, ultimately increasing the number of shares.
Second, marketers can use textual data from consumer social media posts to determine consumers’ regulatory mode and construal level in an unobtrusive manner. They can then use this information to identify influential consumers whose brand-related posts are likely to be shared by other consumers. This would be more cost-efficient and effective than recruiting influencers solely based on their number of followers.
Third, segmentation can also be used to tailor messages to align with consumers’ propensity to share abstract versus concrete messages and their regulatory mode complementarity. For instance, in the case of consumers who use assessment and locomotion words in a review, a home improvement brand like Black & Decker can present them with an advertisement highlighting desirable, abstract benefits. The ad could emphasize that “this tool will make your bathroom look fantastic.” The likelihood of this ad being shared by these consumers should be higher, compared to an ad that focuses on feasible, concrete benefits, such as “anybody can fix their bathroom with this easy-to-use tool.” Therefore, marketers should segment consumers to enhance engagement and sharing.
Researcher
More information
The research article is also available on eprints.