A Sponsorship Disclosure is Not Enough? How Advertising Literacy Intervention Affects Consumer Reactions to Sponsored Influencer Posts

Abstract

In view of the burgeoning innovation in marketing practices on social media, the need to understand how consumers react to these practices is also on the rise. Drawing on the persuasion knowledge model and literature of sponsorship disclosure and advertising literacy, this study explicates the interaction effect of sponsorship disclosure and advertising literacy intervention on the activation of consumer persuasion knowledge. The results suggest that, among the participants who have viewed the advertising literacy intervention, sponsored influencer posts with a sponsorship disclosure (vs. no disclosure) are more likely to activate participants’ conceptual persuasion knowledge, which in turn, leads to serial reactions, including greater attitudinal persuasion knowledge, decreased electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM), and attenuated purchase intentions toward the promoted product. Conversely, among participants who did not view the advertising literacy intervention, sponsorship disclosures did not trigger these serial responses.