How brands engage with college students

Abstract

With Facebook and digital technology being such a large part of everyday life now, it is important for advertisers to understand how best to utilize the power of these platforms to reach consumers. In order to examine effective strategies for low-involvement brands to engage with college students on social media (i.e. Facebook), this study tested how image (vs. no image) and narrative (vs. no narrative) influence college students' engagement with Facebook posts through an online experiment. Findings from the experiment showed that the presence of a picture did increase perceived engagement. Specific Facebook posts with images had higher transportation and perceived interactivity to those without image. The narrative, however, had no effect on engagement in study participants.