The Effects of the FTC Policy and Affiliation Disclosures on Product Review Video Engagement: Evidence from YouTube

References

• Abendroth LJ, Heyman JE (2013) Honesty is the best policy: The effects of disclosure in word-of-mouth marketing. J. Marketing Comm. 19(4):245–257.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Agarwal S, Sen A (2022) Antiracist curriculum and digital platforms: Evidence from Black Lives Matter. Management Sci. 68(4):2932–2948.Link, Google Scholar
• Al Balawi R, Hu Y, Qiu L (2023) Brand crisis and customer relationship management on social media: Evidence from a natural experiment from the airline industry. Inform. Systems Res. 34(2):442–462.Link, Google Scholar
• Angrist JD, Pischke JS (2009) Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist’s Companion (Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ).Crossref, Google Scholar
• Astute Analytica (2023) Affiliate marketing platform market—Industry dynamics, market size, and opportunity forecast to 2031. Market research report, Astute Analytica, Chicago.Google Scholar
• Audrezet A, de Kerviler G, Moulard JG (2020) Authenticity under threat: When social media influencers need to go beyond self-presentation. J. Bus. Res. 117:557–569.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Austin PC (2009) Balance diagnostics for comparing the distribution of baseline covariates between treatment groups in propensity-score matched samples. Statist. Medicine 28(25):3083–3107.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Autor DH (2003) Outsourcing at will: The contribution of unjust dismissal doctrine to the growth of employment outsourcing. J. Labor Econom. 21(1):1–42.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Balakrishnan BK, Dahnil MI, Yi WJ (2014) The impact of social media marketing medium toward purchase intention and brand loyalty among generation Y. Procedia Soc. Behav. Sci. 148:177–185.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Bannigan MK, Shane B (2019) Towards truth in influencing: Risks and rewards of disclosing influencer marketing in the fashion industry. NY Law School Law Rev. 64(3):247–263.Google Scholar
• Batista R (2024) Sponsored posts vs affiliate marketing guide. Accessed December 9, 2024, https://web.archive.org/web/20241204095217/https://docs.getaiblogarticles.com/blog/spons ored_posts_vs_affiliate_marketing/.Google Scholar
• Bellet CS, Dubois D, Godart F (2024) Do consumers respond to social movements? Evidence from gender-stereotypical purchases after #MeToo. Management Sci. 71(6):4915–4941.Link, Google Scholar
• Bertrand M, Duflo E, Mullainathan S (2004) How much should we trust differences-in-differences estimates? Quart. J. Econom. 119(1):249–275.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Bladow LE (2017) Worth the click: Why greater FTC enforcement is needed to curtail deceptive practices in influencer marketing. William Mary Law Rev. 59(3):1123–1164.Google Scholar
• Boerman SC, Van Reijmersdal EA, Neijens PC (2012) Sponsorship disclosure: Effects of duration on persuasion knowledge and brand responses. J. Comm. 62(6):1047–1064.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Bosman DJ, Boshoff C, Van Rooyen GJ (2013) The review credibility of electronic word-of-mouth communication on e-commerce platforms. Management Dynamics 22(3):29–44.Google Scholar
• Campbell MC, Mohr GS, Verlegh PW (2013) Can disclosures lead consumers to resist covert persuasion? The important roles of disclosure timing and type of response. J. Consumer Psych. 23(4):483–495.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Cao Z, Belo R (2023) Effects of explicit sponsorship disclosure on user engagement in social media influencer marketing. MIS Quart. 48(1):375–392.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Cao Z, Zhu Y, Li G, Qiu L (2024) Consequences of information feed integration on user engagement and contribution: A natural experiment in an online knowledge-sharing community. Inform. Systems Res. 35(3):1114–1136.Link, Google Scholar
• Chen Y, Xie J (2005) Third-party product review and firm marketing strategy. Marketing Sci. 24(2):218–240.Link, Google Scholar
• Cheng M, Zhang S (2025) Reputation burning: Analyzing the impact of brand sponsorship on social influencers. Management Sci. 71(7):5910–5932.Google Scholar
• Cheung MY, Luo C, Sia CL, Chen H (2009) Credibility of electronic word-of-mouth: Informational and normative determinants of on-line consumer recommendations. Internat. J. Electronic Commerce 13(4):9–38.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Cialdini RB, Goldstein NJ (2004) Social influence: Compliance and conformity. Annual Rev. Psych. 55:591–621.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Clogg CC, Petkova E, Haritou A (1995) Statistical methods for comparing regression coefficients between models. Amer. J. Sociol. 100(5):1261–1293.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Correia S, Guimarães P, Zylkin T (2020) Fast Poisson estimation with high-dimensional fixed effects. Stata J. 20(1):95–115.Crossref, Google Scholar
• De Langhe B, Fernbach PM, Lichtenstein DR (2016) Navigating by the stars: Investigating the actual and perceived validity of online user ratings. J. Consumer Res. 42(6):817–833.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Diehl M, Jacobs LM, Hastings CT (2006) Temporal stability and authenticity of self-representations in adulthood. J. Adult Development 13(1):10–22.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Erdoğmuş İE, Cicek M (2012) The impact of social media marketing on brand loyalty. Procedia Soc. Behav. Sci. 58:1353–1360.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Ershov D, Mitchell M (2020) The effects of influencer advertising disclosure regulations: Evidence from Instagram. Proc. 21st ACM Conf. Econom. Comput. (Association for Computing Machinery, New York), 73–74.Google Scholar
• Evans AT, Clark JK (2012) Source characteristics and persuasion: The role of self-monitoring in self-validation. J. Experiment. Soc. Psych. 48(1):383–386.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Evans NJ, Phua J, Lim J, Jun H (2017) Disclosing Instagram influencer advertising: The effects of disclosure language on advertising recognition, attitudes, and behavioral intent. J. Interactive Advertising 17(2):138–149.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Farook FS, Abeysekara N (2016) Influence of social media marketing on customer engagement. Internat. J. Bus. Management Invention 5(12):115–125.Google Scholar
• Feldman S (1966) Motivational aspects of attitudinal elements and their place in cognitive interaction. Feldman S, ed. Cognitive Consistency, 1st ed. (Academic Press, New York), 75–108.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Friestad M, Wright P (1994) The persuasion knowledge model: How people cope with persuasion attempts. J. Consumer Res. 21(1):1–31.Crossref, Google Scholar
• FTC (2017) CSGO Lotto owners settle FTC’s first-ever complaint against individual social media influencers. Federal Trade Commission (September 7), https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2017/09/csgo-lotto-owners-settle-ftcs-first-ever-complaint-against-individual-social-media-influencers.Google Scholar
• FTC (2018) FTC publishes inflation-adjusted civil penalty amounts. Federal Trade Commission (January 23), https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2018/01/ftc-publishes-inflation-adjusted-civil-penalty-amounts.Google Scholar
• Geyser W (2022) Affiliate marketing benchmark report 2022. Accessed December 9, 2024, https://influencermarketinghub.com/affiliate-marketing-report/.Google Scholar
• Goes PB, Lin M, Au Yeung C (2014) “Popularity effect” in user-generated content: Evidence from online product reviews. Inform. Systems Res. 25(2):222–238.Link, Google Scholar
• Gourieroux C, Monfort A, Trognon A (1984) Pseudo maximum likelihood methods: Applications to Poisson models. Econometrica 52(3):701–720.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Gross J, Simon S, Everett JA (2022) Inferring and enforcing cooperativeness and dishonesty through rule abidance and partner choice. Preprint, submitted March 24, https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/ex4h3_v1.Google Scholar
• Han X, Wang L, Fan W (2023) Cost-effective social media influencer marketing. INFORMS J. Comput. 35(1):138–157.Link, Google Scholar
• Harris L (2018) Too little, too late: FTC guidelines on deceptive and misleading endorsements by social media influencers. Howard Law J. 62(3):947–988.Google Scholar
• Ho DE, Imai K, King G, Stuart EA (2007) Matching as nonparametric preprocessing for reducing model dependence in parametric causal inference. Political Anal. 15(3):199–236.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Hovland CI, Janis IL, Kelley HH (1953) Communication and Persuasion (Yale University Press, New Haven, CT).Google Scholar
• Hughes C, Swaminathan V, Brooks G (2019) Driving brand engagement through online social influencers: An empirical investigation of sponsored blogging campaigns. J. Marketing 83(5):78–96.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Iacus SM, King G, Porro G (2011) Multivariate matching methods that are monotonic imbalance bounding. J. Amer. Statist. Assoc. 106(493):345–361.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Iacus SM, King G, Porro G (2012) Causal inference without balance checking: Coarsened exact matching. Political Anal. 20(1):1–24.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Ji YG, Li C, North M, Liu J (2017) Staking reputation on stakeholders: How does stakeholders’ Facebook engagement help or ruin a company’s reputation? Public Relations Rev. 43(1):201–210.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jin SAA, Phua J (2014) Following celebrities’ tweets about brands: The impact of Twitter-based electronic word-of-mouth on consumers’ source credibility perception, buying intention, and social identification with celebrities. J. Advertising 43(2):181–195.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jones EE, Davis KE (1965) From acts to dispositions the attribution process in person perception. Berkowitz L, ed. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, vol. 2 (Academic Press, New York), 219–266.Google Scholar
• Kim SJ, Maslowska E, Tamaddoni A (2019) The paradox of (dis) trust in sponsorship disclosure: The characteristics and effects of sponsored online consumer reviews. Decision Support Systems 116:114–124.Crossref, Google Scholar
• King G, Nielsen R, Coberley C, Pope JE, Wells A (2011) Comparative effectiveness of matching methods for causal inference. Working paper, Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA.Google Scholar
• Kluft D (2017) The FTC, like, revises its social media endorsement guides, bruh! Accessed December 9, 2024, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/ftc-like-revises-its-social-media-endorsement-guides-bruh-david-kluft/.Google Scholar
• Kumar A, Bezawada R, Rishika R, Janakiraman R, Kannan P (2016) From social to sale: The effects of firm-generated content in social media on customer behavior. J. Marketing 80(1):7–25.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lee D, Hosanagar K, Nair HS (2014) The Effect of Social Media Marketing Content on Consumer Engagement: Evidence from Facebook (Stanford Graduate School of Business, Stanford, CA).Google Scholar
• Lee D, Hosanagar K, Nair HS (2018) Advertising content and consumer engagement on social media: Evidence from Facebook. Management Sci. 64(11):5105–5131.Link, Google Scholar
• Leung FF, Gu FF, Li Y, Zhang JZ, Palmatier RW (2022) Influencer marketing effectiveness. J. Marketing 86(6):93–115.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Mathur A, Narayanan A, Chetty M (2018) Endorsements on social media: An empirical study of affiliate marketing disclosures on YouTube and Pinterest. Karahalios K, Monroy-Hernández A, Lampinen A, Fitzpatrick G, eds. Proc. ACM Human-Comput. Interaction, vol. 2 (Association for Computing Machinery, New York), 1–26.Google Scholar
• Mizerski RW (1982) An attribution explanation of the disproportionate influence of unfavorable information. J. Consumer Res. 9(3):301–310.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Moulard JG, Garrity CP, Rice DH (2015) What makes a human brand authentic? Identifying the antecedents of celebrity authenticity. Psych. Marketing 32(2):173–186.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Moulard JG, Raggio RD, Folse JAG (2016) Brand authenticity: Testing the antecedents and outcomes of brand management’s passion for its products. Psych. Marketing 33(6):421–436.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Musiyiwa R, Jacobson J (2023) Sponsorship disclosure in social media influencer marketing: The algorithmic and non-algorithmic barriers. Soc. Media Soc. 9(3):20563051231196870.Google Scholar
• Nian T, Sundararajan A (2022) Social media marketing, quality signaling, and the goldilocks principle. Inform. Systems Res. 33(2):540–556.Link, Google Scholar
• Olaisen JL (1990) Information Quality Factors and the Cognitive Authority of Electronic Information (Handelshøyskolen BI, Oslo, Norway).Google Scholar
• Park K, Lee S, Doosti S, Tan Y (2023) Provision of helpful review videos: Effects of video characteristics on perceived helpfulness. Production Oper. Management 32(7):2031–2048.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Paternoster R, Brame R, Mazerolle P, Piquero A (1998) Using the correct statistical test for the equality of regression coefficients. Criminology 36(4):859–866.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Pei A, Mayzlin D (2022) Influencing social media influencers through affiliation. Marketing Sci. 41(3):593–615.Link, Google Scholar
• Pfeuffer A, Huh J (2020) Effects of different sponsorship disclosure message types on consumers’ trust and attitudes. Internat. J. Advertising 40(1):49–80.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Reichelt J, Sievert J, Jacob F (2014) How credibility affects eWOM reading: The influences of expertise, trustworthiness, and similarity on utilitarian and social functions. J. Marketing Comm. 20(1–2):65–81.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Shahbaznezhad H, Dolan R, Rashidirad M (2021) The role of social media content format and platform in users’ engagement behavior. J. Interactive Marketing 53(1):47–65.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Silva JS, Tenreyro S (2006) The log of gravity. Rev. Econom. Statist. 88(4):641–658.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Silva JS, Tenreyro S (2011) Further simulation evidence on the performance of the Poisson pseudo-maximum likelihood estimator. Econom. Lett. 112(2):220–222.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Sternthal B, Dholakia R, Leavitt C (1978) The persuasive effect of source credibility: Tests of cognitive response. J. Consumer Res. 4(4):252–260.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Terry C, Silberberg EJ, Schmitz S (2020) Throw the book at them: Why the FTC needs to get tough with influencers. J. Law Policy 29(2):406–458.Google Scholar
• Thoumrungroje A (2018) A cross-national study of consumer spending behavior: The impact of social media intensity and materialism. J. Internat. Consumer Marketing 30(4):276–286.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wang H, Overby E (2023) Do political differences inhibit market transactions? An investigation in the context of online lending. Management Sci. 69(8):4685–4706.Link, Google Scholar
• Wang YY, Guo C, Susarla A, Sambamurthy V (2021) Online to offline: The impact of social media on offline sales in the automobile industry. Inform. Systems Res. 32(2):582–604.Link, Google Scholar
• Wathen CN, Burkell J (2002) Believe it or not: Factors influencing credibility on the web. J. Amer. Soc. Inform. Sci. Tech. 53(2):134–144.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wei ML, Fischer E, Main KJ (2008) An examination of the effects of activating persuasion knowledge on consumer response to brands engaging in covert marketing. J. Public Policy Marketing 27(1):34–44.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wojdynski BW, Evans NJ (2016) Going native: Effects of disclosure position and language on the recognition and evaluation of online native advertising. J. Advertising 45(2):157–168.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wooldridge JM (2010) Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).Google Scholar
• Yang M, Ren Y, Adomavicius G (2019) Understanding user-generated content and customer engagement on Facebook business pages. Inform. Systems Res. 30(3):839–855.Link, Google Scholar
• Yoon G, Li C, Ji Y, North M, Hong C, Liu J (2018) Attracting comments: Digital engagement metrics on facebook and financial performance. J. Advertising 47(1):24–37.Crossref, Google Scholar