Int. J. Internet Marketing and Advertising, Vol. 13, No.

1, 2019 73

Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised

social media advertising on online impulse buying
tendency

Naa Amponsah Dodoo*

Department of Marketing Communication,
Emerson College,
120 Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02116, USA
Email: naa_dodoo@emerson.edu
*Corresponding author

Linwan Wu
School of Journalism and Mass Communications,
College of Information and Communications,
University of South Carolina,
800 Sumter Street, Columbia, SC 29208, USA
Email: linwanwu@mailbox.sc.edu

Abstract: Online impulse buying is a critical factor that can result in desired
outcomes for online retailers and advertisers. Personalisation is progressively
being used in marketing practices on social media. However, largely
unexplored is the potential relationship between personalisation and online
impulse buying tendency on social media. This study provides insights about
the significance of personalisation on social media as an antecedent of
customers’ online impulse tendency, an especially important topic for online
retailers. Specifically, this study develops and tests a conceptual model using
different factors to determine the predictive power of perceived personalisation
of social media ads on online impulse buying tendency. A noteworthy finding
from the survey was the positive influence of perceived personalisation of
social media ads on perceived relevance, which subsequently predicted
customers’ online impulse buying tendency. Results also indicate the impact of
perceived personalisation on perceptions of value, relevance and novelty of
social media ads. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Keywords: personalisation; perceived personalisation; social media; social
media advertising; perceived relevance; perceived advertising value; perceived
novelty; online impulse buying tendency.
Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Dodoo, N.A. and
Wu, L. (2019) ‘Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media
advertising on online impulse buying tendency’, Int. J. Internet Marketing and
Advertising, Vol. 13, No. 1, pp.73–95.
Biographical notes: Naa Amponsah Dodoo’s research revolves around her
fascination with evolving new media technologies, its role in digital and social
media environments, and subsequent influence on consumer psychology and
behaviour in offline and online realms. Primarily, she explores the effects of
individual traits and contextual aspects of digital communication on persuasion.
Her work has been published in journals such as Journal of Promotion
Management and Journal of Marketing Communications.

Copyright © 2019 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

74 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

Linwan Wu’s research adopts the empirical and social scientific approach
investigating how communication technologies influence consumers’ responses
to strategic communication. He is interested in seeing how different features of
digital media work together with other factors (e.g., message, individual, and
contextual factors) to influence consumers’ cognitive, affective, and conative
responses. His work has been published in journals such as International
Journal of Advertising and Journal of Marketing Communications.

This paper is a revised and expanded version of a paper entitled ‘The interplay
of personalized social media ads and online impulse buying’ presented at
American Academy of Advertisers Conference, Seattle, WA, 17–20 March
2016.

1 Introduction

Within the impulse buying literature and industry research is evidence that impulse
buying constitutes 60% of all purchases (Amos et al., 2014) signalling the significance of
impulse buying. As further evidence, reports suggest that impulse buying accounts for
about 40% of all online expenditures (Verhagen and van Dolen, 2011). Other industry
research indicates that almost 90% of US adults have engaged in online impulse buying
with each person spending about $82 averagely totalling an estimated $17.78 billion
spend (McDermott, 2017). Jeffrey and Hodge (2007) estimated that a 1% increase in
online sales would lead to $690 million more in retail revenue. Indisputably, impulse
buying represents an important customer behaviour that online retailers must consider for
increasing revenue. The predominance of online impulse buying (Dawson and Kim,
2010; Wells et al., 2011) can be attributed various factors such as the ease of access to
products, website quality and virtual cues (Floh and Madlberger, 2013; Jeffrey and
Hodge, 2007; Wells et al., 2011).
Impulse buying is predominant in the online environment (Dawson and Kim, 2010;
Wells et al., 2011). The prevalence of e-commerce facilitates the ease of making
purchases, due to its advantages like broader flexibility, expanded product lines,
faster transactions and personalisation (Srinivasan et al., 2002). In addition, the large
availability of products and services through e-commerce often come at reduced prices
(Grandon and Pearson, 2004). All these factors may compel individuals to engage in
online impulse buying, given the right circumstances, such as enhancement of its
antecedents. Impulse buying connotes immediacy in purchase behaviour and e-commerce
permits individuals with the ability to exert the minutest expenditure of time and effort in
online purchase behaviour.
By and large, online retailers desire to have customers’ offline purchase behaviour
translated into or sometimes even replaced by online purchases. Hence, online impulse
buying is critical to retailers. On the one hand, it may increase sales, attract new
customers and provides opportunities for nurturing brand-customer relationships. On the
other hand, impulse buying may sometimes be detrimental to online retailers. For
instance, if consumers are dissatisfied with the outcomes of their online impulse
purchases, they may express this by engaging in negative e-WOM which would not bode
well for these retailers in the current digital realm. Therefore, it is important to
understand customers’ psychological and environmental antecedents of online impulse
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 75

buying and determine the appropriate strategies for handling this behaviour. To address
this need, this research explores the role of marketing strategies in influencing the
important and related concept of online impulse buying tendency. One of the most
popular strategies of encouraging impulse buying is personalisation. Personalised
messages have been used by online retailers to trigger customers’ impulse buying
(Brohan, 1999, 2007; Dawson and Kim, 2010). Brohan (1999) notes that online retailers
who have incorporated personalisation strategies to influence impulse buying have seen
increased sales as a result (Dawson and Kim, 2010).
Social media provides a unique setting for the marketing strategy of personalisation.
While the rich personal information available in social media makes it easy to generate
highly personalised messages, customers may also express strong concerns of privacy
violation as social media are often considered as more private compared to other online
platforms. Therefore, personalised advertising on social media deserves increased
research attention. Moreover, the advertising messages posted on social media can easily
direct customers to other websites for online purchases. Given that impulse buying is
likely to be predominant in online shopping context and personalisation tends to trigger
such behaviour (Dawson and Kim, 2010), it is possible that personalised social media
advertisements play an important role in inducing online impulse buying. However, this
proposition has not been empirically tested.
The current study aims to fulfil this glaring gap in current literature on online impulse
buying and its antecedents and determinants. Specifically, this research aims to identify
how personalisation triggers the related concept of online impulse buying tendency in the
context of social media advertising. Based on literature in personalisation, advertising
and e-commerce, this study proposes a conceptual model to explain how perceived
personalisation of social media advertisements influences customers’ online impulse
buying tendency, which may subsequently trigger impulse buying. It is predicted that
customers’ perception of personalised social advertisements may govern customers’
likelihood of engaging in online impulse buying as reflected in their online impulse
buying tendency. The concepts of perceived relevance, novelty and advertising value are
introduced as potential facilitators of online impulse buying tendency associated with
perceived personalised social media ads. Privacy concern, in contrast, may hinder the
relationship between perceived personalisation of social media ads and online impulse
buying tendency. Theoretically, this research seeks to progress extant literature by
demonstrating the unexplored association between advertising personalisation on social
media and online impulse buying tendency. Practically, this study may offer important
insights that online retailers account for in its efforts to understand and enhance
customers’ online purchase behaviours.

2 Literature review

2.1 Personalised advertisements in social media

Personalisation has a long history in marketing communication (Walrave et al., 2016). Its
use in design of advertising messages has gained increased significance particularly in
the current social media environment (Van Doorn and Hoekstra, 2013). Personalised
advertisements in social media refer to the advertising messages that are presented on
social networking platforms and are tailored to some aspects of individual customers
76 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

(De Keyzer et al., 2015; Tran, 2017). The inherent nature of social media as a
platform that presents individuals with means of enhanced online self-disclosure allows
personalisation to occur in a much more effective way compared to other media
platforms, making it important for retailers and marketers to gain comprehensive
knowledge of advertising personalisation in social media (Walrave et al., 2016).
In particular, the uniqueness of personalised advertising in social media can be
summarised as follows. First, social media are characterised by rich personal information
shared by a large number of users (Kelly et al., 2010). Such personal information
includes demographics, personal interests, social relationships, online activities, real time
locations, emotions and so on. On the one hand, by analysing posts, comments, likes and
shares, retailers could develop a deep understanding of their customers and precisely
target them through personalised messages (Aguirre et al., 2016). On the other hand,
social media users may be highly sensitive to the fact that their personal information is
collected and used by retailers and marketers. In other words, one’s privacy concern
related to personalised advertisements may be considerably salient in social media.
Second, social media websites or applications may also obtain user information from
other partner websites (Aguirre et al., 2016). Just think of the last time when you browsed
some products on Amazon and later saw sponsored posts of the same products in your
Facebook news feed. This is a highlight of advertising personalisation in social media
which provides customers with highly relevant information, but meanwhile intensifies
privacy concern among social media users. Third, social media are not primarily used for
commercial purposes (Ellison et al., 2007).
Prior studies have discovered that the top three motives for using social media are to
pass time, to seek for entertainment and to maintain relationships (Ku et al., 2013;
Quan-Haase and Young, 2010). As a result, social media users may find generic
advertisements intrusive in general, making personalisation almost necessary for social
media advertisements. Fourth, the social media environment is designed as a personal
space in which individuals are granted a high level of control over their information
consumption (Kelly et al., 2010; De Keyzer et al., 2015, Dodoo, 2018). That is to say,
users can simply block undesired messages in social media. Personalised advertising
may increase the chance that customers will devote their attention to the commercial
messages.
Previous findings of the effectiveness of personalised advertisements in social media
are equivocal. Some researchers applaud the positive impact of personalisation. For
example, De Keyzer et al. (2015) discovered that perceived personalisation of Facebook
advertisements positively influences customers’ brand evaluation and click intention.
Tran (2017) found that advertising personalisation in social media improves customers’
perceived credibility and ad attitude. Some industry reports also suggest that on the
whole, customers view personalised ads as more engaging, timesaving and memorable
than generic ads (Marketing Charts, 2014).
However, other researchers have pointed out the negative impact of personalised
advertising in social media. For example, Aguirre et al. (2015) reported that the
click-through rate of personalised ads drops intensively when social media users notice
the unauthorised use of their personal information. Similarly, Aguirre et al. (2016)
summarised that personalisation can both promote and harm customers’ engagement with
brands in social media. The impact of personalisation largely depends on how personal
data are collected and how brands disclose the data collection process (Aguirre et al.,
2016). Such mixed findings actually reflect the so-called ‘personalisation paradox’ of
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 77

social media advertising (see, Aguirre et al., 2015), demonstrating that personalised
advertisements in social media deserve enhanced research attention.
Moreover, customers’ perceived personalisation plays an important role in
determining advertising effectiveness (Baek and Morimoto, 2012; Tam and Ho, 2005;
Tran, 2017). Previous research has already substantiated that there is not an automatic
match between actual personalisation (e.g., retailers tailor advertising messages based on
customers’ interests) and perceptions of personalisation (i.e., a customer perceives
whether the ad message fits him/herself) (Kramer et al., 2007; Simonson, 2005). It is
plausible that a personalised message may be perceived as generic by some customers
(Kramer et al., 2007). Therefore, perceived personalisation is believed as more important
than actual personalisation in the context of social media advertising (De Keyzer et al.,
2015; Tran, 2017). Following previous research, the present study focuses on customers’
perceptions of advertising personalisation in social media.

2.2 Online impulse buying tendency

Impulse buying tendency is the extent to which an individual is predisposed to “make
unintended, immediate and unreflective purchase (e.g., impulse purchases)” [Weun et al.,
(1998), p.1124]. Impulse purchases connote “a sudden and immediate purchase with no
pre-shopping intentions either to buy the specific product category or to fulfill a specific
buying task” [Beatty and Ferrell, (1998), p.170]. In other words, impulse buying as a
concept refers to instances where a person feels a sudden urge to buy (de Kervenoael
et al., 2009). Lim and Yazdanifard (2015) identify several features that can expound the
concept of impulse buying. First, impulse buying is usually unplanned. Second, impulse
buying is a behaviour or tendency prompted by external stimuli. Third, impulse buying is
immediate in nature and little consideration is given to information search or evaluation
of alternative choices. Within literature, impulse buying tendency is recognised as an
individual trait that determines regular responses to external stimuli (Park and Lennon,
2006). As a trait, impulse buying tendency may be even more enhanced in social media
settings, which encompasses an online social environment where individual experiences
are personalised. This is especially important as researchers posit that impulse buying
tendency may be strongly connected to impulse buying (Dholakia, 2000; Rook and
Fisher, 1995; Park and Lennon, 2006).
The personalisation literature confirms that research in this field mostly deals with
customers’ cognitive and affective responses to personalised content. This study seeks to
expand the literature by scrutinising the influence of personalised advertisements in
social media on customers’ online purchase behaviour – particularly online impulse
buying. However, this inquiry is taken from the perspective of the import of online
impulse buying tendency. Though limited, a few studies pave the way for the exploration
within this study with empirical evidence suggesting that personalisation does influence
online impulse buying (e.g., Dawson and Kim, 2010; de Kervenoael et al., 2009;
Koufaris et al., 2001).
The online environment is believed to stimulate impulse buying. For instance,
LaRose (2001) argues that electronic commerce may undermine customers’ buying
restraint through their engagement with features such as attractive product stimuli, point
programs and chat rooms, steering customers towards impulse buying. Indeed, previous
research has identified some factors that influence online impulse buying which include
78 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

product images, banner advertisements as well as low prices and special offers
(de Kervenoael et al., 2009). Other research has also examined online impulse buying
either as a state of mind or an inherent personality trait (Wells et al., 2011). For instance,
Zhang et al. (2006) demonstrated the role of an individual’s impulsiveness in his/her
likelihood of engaging in online impulse purchases. In addition, the role of environmental
cues (i.e., website quality) in individuals’ likelihood of engaging in online impulse
buying has been examined (Parboteeah et al., 2009; Wells et al., 2011). However,
research is limited with respect to investigations into the influence of personalisation on
online impulse buying tendency especially in the social media environment.
As discussed previously, the essential meaning of personalisation is to link messages
to some aspects of the self (Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006). The inquiry of whether
personalised advertisements influence customers’ online impulse buying is rooted in
existing research which shows that the self and impulse buying are closely associated
(Dittmar and Drury, 2000; Kacen and Lee, 2002; Phau and Lo, 2004). Aspects of the self
that have been confirmed to influence impulse buying include self-concept, self-identity,
cultural values and so on (Dittmar and Drury, 2000; Kacen and Lee, 2002; Phau and
Lo, 2004). The wealth of personal information enables the creation of social media
advertisements that take advantage of the advanced targeting options. For online retailers,
this represents an auspicious avenue through which online purchases can be generated.
These retailers can capitalise on these targeting options that ensure that the social media
ads presented to individuals are relevant in a way that is unparalleled compared to other
advertising formats (Ganguly, 2015). Given that social media provide individuals with
enhanced opportunities for self-expression, it is expected in this study that customers’
perceived personalisation of social media ads would influence their online impulse
buying tendency. In particular, this study seeks to examine what factors associated with
personalisation influence customers’ online impulse buying tendency.

2.3 Perceived relevance

A personalised advertisement on social media is created by learning a customer’s online
profile and activities and matching the advertising content with his/her needs, interests, or
browsing history. As a result, customers tend to feel a personalised advertisement as
self-relevant because it matches some aspects of themselves (Kreuter and Wray, 2003;
Petty et al., 2002). Existing research has confirmed that perceived relevance is the
underlying process that accounts for the effects of personalisation (Kalyanaraman and
Sundar, 2006; Kim and Sundar, 2008; Sundar and Marathe, 2010). Prior studies also
discovered that a lack of relevance is one primary reason that users avoid advertisements
in social media (Kelly et al., 2010). Therefore, this study predicts that customers’
perceptions of advertising personalisation in social media will positively influence their
perceived relevance of the ads.
More importantly, perceived relevance may influence impulse buying tendency. As
suggested by previous research, self-referencing may contribute to decision-making when
individuals do not take much cognitive effort in information processing (i.e., peripheral
processing) (Tam and Ho, 2006). The act of impulse buying is normally not the result of
careful thinking. In other words, it is likely to occur in the situations in which customers
make decisions based on peripheral cues. Such cues may enhance one’s impulse buying
tendency in social media. Previous research has confirmed that perceptions of relevance
due to personalisation give rise to behavioural changes (Rimer and Kreuter, 2006).
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 79

Therefore, this study predicts that perceived relevance of social media ads may influence
online impulse buying tendency, as customers tend to feel that the ads exclusively speak
to them and provide them with reasons for immediate actions:
H1 Customers’ perceived personalisation of social media advertisements will positively
influence their perceived relevance of these advertisements.
H2 Customers’ perceived relevance of social media advertisements will positively
influence their online impulse buying tendency.

2.4 Perceived novelty

Nowadays, retailers tend to employ novel strategies to break through the ad clutter that
customers are exposed to daily. For instance, mobile social media and location-based
advertising have risen as innovative ways for retailers and marketers to reach customers
with personalised marketing messages (Ketelaar et al., 2017; Unni and Harmon, 2007;
Wu, 2016; Xu et al., 2009). In addition to perceived relevance, novelty perception is also
confirmed as another underlying process that explains how personalisation results in
positive communication outcomes (Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006). In other words,
when exposed to a personalised media message, individuals tend to perceive this message
as innovative and respond to it positively, even though they are familiar with the
content (Carpenter et al., 1994; Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006). Since personalised
advertisements require a larger investment of time and money than generic ads, it is still
not so common to see a large volume of personalised advertisements on digital media.
That is to say, personalised advertisements that are relevant to customers’ personal needs
may still seem novel to them. Moreover, innovative forms of personalised ads keep
appearing in social media. For example, geo fencing offers marketers even better
opportunities of using proximity to target customers (Ruffin, 2016). These advertisements
give customers a break from the current advertising clutter in the digital media
environment. Therefore, this study predicts that customers’ perceived personalisation of
advertisements in social media will positively influence their perceptions of novelty of
the advertisements:
H3 Customers’ perceived personalisation of social media advertisements positively
influences their perceived novelty of these advertisements.
True impulsive purchases are also responses to novelty (LaRose, 2001). This idea is
supported by empirical evidence. For instance, Yu and Bastin (2010) found novelty to be
the most critical factor affecting consumers’ impulse buying in their research. Similarly,
Sharma et al. (2010) in their study alleged the possibility of the involvement of novelty
seeking in impulse buying as driven by the need for something different in purchases.
Furthermore, Hausman (2000) found a positive relationship between novelty, as an
indicator of hedonic desire and impulse buying. This research expects a similar pattern of
the relationship between novelty and impulse buying tendency in the context of social
media advertising.
Novelty in advertisements is usually realised by presenting customers with innovative
content or features that may elicit the desired level of attentiveness. Personalised social
media advertisements may be considered as innovative because of the tailored content.
For social media ads that elicit perceptions of novelty, because of the attention that such
80 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

ads may draw and the value that customer may place on the ads, their likelihood of
engaging in online purchases could be magnified. Perceived novelty could also stimulate
customers’ tendency to engage in online impulse buying given that social media websites
often offer features of easily conducting purchases, such as the ‘shop now’ button with
sponsored ads on Facebook and Instagram that takes customers directly to online stores
for purchases. Social media’s ability to facilitate the exposure to novel advertising and
evidence from past research indicates the relationship between novelty and impulse
buying tendency. Taken together, this research posits that:
H4 Customers’ perceived novelty of social media advertisements will positively
influence their online impulse buying tendency.

2.5 Advertising value

The construct of advertising value was proposed by Ducoffe (1995, p.1) to evaluate “the
relative worth or utility of advertising to customers.” Two important dimensions of
advertising value are informativeness and irritation (Dao et al., 2014; Saxena and
Khanna, 2013). Informativeness refers to the extent to which an advertisement delivers
useful information (Ducoffe, 1996). Irritation occurs when advertising messages result in
increased annoyance of viewers (Ducoffe, 1995). In the context of social media
advertising, it is expected that personalisation is able to increase users’ perceptions of
informativeness of the advertisements and reduce their feelings of irritation. When
customers see personalised advertisements on social media, they may get useful
information from these ads and feel less irritation because the advertising information is
created based on their needs, interests or browsing history. The positive relationship
between personalisation and advertising value has been determined in the context of
smartphone advertising (Kim and Han, 2014). Therefore, it is plausible that one’s
perceived personalisation of social media advertisements will positively affect his/her
perception of advertising value:
H5 Customers’ perceived personalisation of social media advertisements will positively
influence their perceived advertising value of these advertisements.
Customers’ perceptions of advertising value may also influence their impulse buying
tendency. This study argues that individuals are likely to engage in impulse buying
when they perceive some form of utility or usefulness of personalised social media
advertisements. Customers may feel the urge to buy products or pay for services that are
perceived as valuable at the time of exposure. For retailers and marketers, the key is
being able to deliver the right content to its customers at the right touchpoints. Impulse
buying can be prompted by heuristic processes such as whether or not a product evokes
an urge to buy (Verplanken and Sato, 2011). Advertising value, delivered through its
informativeness in a personalised social media advertisement, may activate such an urge
to buy, increasing the likelihood of online impulse buying:
H6 Customers’ perceived value of social media advertisements will positively influence
their online impulse buying tendency.
In addition, perceived relevance and novelty are also expected to positively affect
advertising value in the context of social media. When customers perceive a high level of
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 81

relevance and novelty in personalised advertisements, they may retrieve considerable

value from the ads. This is because a highly relevant ad speaks directly to a customer’s
personal needs and interests, providing useful information to direct his/her behaviours.
An advertisement perceived as novel will capture a customer’s attention, eliminating
his/her feelings of irritation. Research also suggests that customers may construe
innovative features as an indicator of marketers providing additional value (Mukherjee
and Hoyer, 2001). Therefore, relevant and novel advertisements in social media due to
personalisation may be considered as worth more to customers than generic ads. In other
words, how relevant and novel customers rate personalised social media advertisements
may influence the amount of utility or value they perceive from the ads:
H7 Customers’ perceived relevance of social media advertisements will positively
influence their perceived advertising value of these advertisements.
H8 Customers’ perceived novelty of social media advertisements will positively
influence their perceived advertising value of these advertisements.

2.6 Privacy concern

In spite of all the benefits discussed earlier, one major problem of personalisation in
social media is the violation of privacy. In general, privacy is defined as “the ability of
the individual to control the terms under which personal information is acquired and
used” [Westin, (1967), p.7]. In order to receive personalised messages, internet users
have to trade off part of their privacy (Chellappa and Sin, 2005). However, when doing
so, individuals’ privacy concerns increase (Culnan and Armstrong, 1999; Roussos et al.,
2003). For example, although a personalised shopping list based on the analysis of
one’s online purchase history is useful, it definitely triggers customers’ privacy concern
because it also tells them that their transactions are monitored (Sheng et al., 2008). A
survey conducted by Antón et al. (2010) demonstrated that internet users’ privacy
concerns due to personalisation did increase overtime. Such a personalisation-privacy
paradox (Awad and Krishnan, 2006) is even salient on social media. According to
Toch et al. (2012, p.205), “implementing privacy preserving personalisation in SNS is
particularly challenging”, because users normally have a high tendency to protect their
privacy on real-name social networking platforms. Along with the development of mobile
internet, contemporary social media providers can even collect information of users’
physical locations, providing more personalised services on the one hand, but leading to
more controversy of privacy on the other hand (Toch et al., 2012).
One of the biggest upshots of personalisation is the concomitant loss of privacy
(Chellappa and Sin, 2005). Though research suggests that customers’ willingness to
disclose personal information and preferences is contingent upon beneficial returns from
such a disclosure (Culnan and Amstrong, 1999) and privacy takes primacy in customer
concerns (Culnan, 2000). Privacy concern is not constant (Galanxhi and Nah, 2006). It
will arise if individuals strongly feel losing control of their personal information (Dinev
and Hart, 2005). In the context of social media advertisements, a high level of
personalisation may trigger strong feelings that one’s personal information is vulnerable,
especially when no explanation is provided as to how personalisation is achieved.
Therefore, it is expected that one’s perceived personalisation of social media
advertisements will positively influence his/her privacy concern:
82 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

H9 Customers’ perceived personalisation of social media advertisements will positively

influence their privacy concern of these advertisements.
Furthermore, privacy concern should not be dismissed entirely because of the role it plays
in customers’ attitudes and behaviour. The average citizen has privacy concerns about
how information is accrued and used by companies (Awad and Krishnan, 2006). Privacy
concerns also can influence the value that customers ascribe to advertising messages
(Haghirian et al., 2005). As exemplified by Haghirian et al.’s (2005) study, which
discovered that individuals who place emphasis on privacy evaluated mobile advertising
as less valuable and privacy concerns can shape customers’ perceptions of the relative
worth of the advertising. Accordingly, this research expects that privacy concerns
inversely affect customers’ perceptions of advertising value when exposed to
personalised advertising messages in social media. In particular, in cases where
customers feel that online retailers and marketers have overstepped the boundaries of
information profiling in social media, they may consider personalised advertising as
offering decreased value to them:
H10 Customers’ privacy concern of social media advertisements will negatively
influence their perceived value of these advertisements.

Figure 1 Presents the conceptual model proposed in this research

Previous research has shown that customers’ privacy concerns are negatively associated
with their purchase behaviours on the internet (Dinev and Hart, 2005). Many users are
reluctant to purchase products online because of the uncertainty related to privacy and
security of the transaction information (Luo, 2002). Information privacy, therefore, has
been identified as one of the most important issues in today’s digital environment
(Chellappa and Sin, 2005; Stewart and Segars, 2002). If customers realise that their
online behaviour is monitored when exposed to personalised social media ads, an adverse
effect might be that these customers are put off due to their perceptions of personalisation
and thus refrain from conducting online transactions which may allow being further
monitored (Sheng et al., 2008). This is detrimental to online retailers and marketers that
desire the opposite of that action regardless of the type of online purchase behaviour.
Given that online impulse buying falls within the domain of online purchases, it is
plausible that past research’s revelation of the negative influence of customers’ privacy
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 83

concern on online purchases may similarly be exhibited in this study. Therefore, this
research extrapolates that privacy concern may have a negative influence on the
likelihood of engaging in online impulse buying:
H11 Customers’ privacy concern of social media advertisements will negatively
influence their online impulse buying tendency.

3 Methodology

3.1 Procedures
An online survey was conducted in a large Southeastern University in the USA.
Two hundred and forty-nine undergraduate students (N = 249) were recruited to
participate in the survey. Students participated in exchange for extra credit. Industry
reports suggest that college aged students are one of the most active groups on social
media, hence the use of a student sample for this research. First, participants were asked
about their general social media use. Next, participants answered questions related to
their perceptions of social media ads and online impulse buying tendency. Finally,
demographic data was collected.

3.2 Participants
Among all the participants (N = 249), 22.9% of them were male (Nmale = 57) and 77.1%
of them were female (Nfemale = 192). The age of these participants ranged from 18 to 33,
with 19.99 as their mean age. In terms of race, 81.9% of them were White (NWhite = 204),
5.2% of them were Asian (NAsian = 13) and 2% of them were African American
(NAfrican American = 5).

3.3 Measures
All measures, unless otherwise indicated, were assessed on a seven-point Likert scale.
• Perceived advertising personalisation on social media: Participants rated their level
of agreement with six items measuring their perception of personalised social media
ads adapted from previous research (Komiak and Benbasat, 2006; Li, 2016). Items
included ‘the ads on my social media seem to be designed specifically for me’, ‘the
ads on my social media seem to target me as a unique individual’ and ‘the ads on my
social media seem to reflect my interests’.
• Perceived advertising value: Advertising value was measured using items adapted
from previous research (Ducoffe, 1996). Items were ‘social media ads are useful’,
‘social media ads are valuable’ and ‘social media ads are important’.
• Perceived relevance: Participants rated their level of agreement with five items
measuring their perception of relevance of personalised social media ads, which
were adapted from previous research (Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006). Items
included ‘the content of social media ads say something important to me’, ‘the
content featured in social media ads are meaningful for me’ and ‘the social media
ads do not have anything to do with me or my life’.
84 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

• Perceived novelty: Items used to measure perceived novelty were adapted from
previous research (Cox and Cox, 1988; Kim et al., 2010). Items included
‘personalised social media ads are unanticipated’, ‘personalised social media ads are
innovative’ and ‘personalised social media ads are distinctive’.
• Online impulse buying tendency: Items used were adopted from previous research
(Sun and Wu, 2011). Items included ‘I often buy things online spontaneously’, ‘‘Just
do it’ describes the way I buy things online’ and ‘I often buy things online without
thinking’.
• Privacy concern: Participants’ concern for privacy was measured using items
adapted from prior research (Sundar and Marathe, 2010). Items included ‘I am
concerned about privacy when I see personalised social media ads’, ‘I am sensitive
about giving my information to websites when I see personalised social media ads’
and ‘I am concerned about information collected when I see personalised social
media ads’.

3.4 Data analysis

The abovementioned hypotheses were tested with structural equation modelling (SEM)
(Bollen, 1989) by using Amos 21.0. The following indices were used to estimate the
model fit: chi-square / df (less than 3) (Carmines and McIver, 1981), GFI (close to 1.00)
(Kang, 2014), NFI (greater than 0.90) (Bentler, 1992), CFI (greater than 0.90) (Bentler,
1992) and RMSEA (less than 0.08) (Hu and Bentler, 1999). Before SEM, a confirmatory
factor analysis (CFA) was conducted to test reliability and validity of measures.

4 Results

4.1 Reliability and validity

A first-order CFA was conducted by using Amos 21.0 to assess the fitness of the
measurement model for the latent variables. The initial model fit for the CFA model
was not good, so the standardised regression weight was examined for each item.
Three perceived relevance items and one perceived novelty item were deleted because
they did not exceed the recommended .70 threshold weight. After revision, the CFA
model had an acceptable model fit based on Hair et al.’s (2010) recommendation.
Specifically, goodness of fit indices for the revised CFA model (χ2 = 631.869, df = 284,
χ2 / df = 2.225, CFI = 0.949, TLI = 0.942 and RMSEA =0.070) indicated adequate fit for
the data.
Standardised loading, Cronbach’s alpha (α), composite reliabilities (CR) and average
variance extracted (AVE) estimates were used to gauge reliability and convergent
validity of the measures (see Table 1). The loadings ranged from 0.79 to 0.97, which
were highly significant. Cronbach’s alpha (α) ranged from 0.92 to 0.96, all surpassing the
minimum limit of 0.70 (Chin, 1998). CR ranged from 0. 92 to 0.97, all exceeding the
minimum limit of 0.70 (Hair et al., 2010). AVE estimates ranged from 0.72 to 0.88, all
exceeding the suggested minimum limit of 0.50 (Fornell and Larcker, 1981). Therefore,
all factors in the measurement model had sufficient reliability and convergent validity
(see Table 1).
Items Measures Standardised loadings CR AVE
Perceived ad personalisation The ads on my social media seem to be designed specifically for me 0.86 0.96 0.72 Table 1
(Komiak and Benbasat, 2006; The ads on my social media target me as a unique individual 0.89
Li, 2016, α = .95)
The ads on my social media seem to reflect my interests 0.91
The ads on my social media seem to reflect my needs 0.80
The ads on my social media seem to show my wants 0.84
The ads on my social media seem personal to me 0.90
Online impulse buying tendency I often buy things online spontaneously 0.87 0.97 0.73
(Sun and Wu, 2011, α = .96) ‘Just do it’ describes the way I buy things online 0.94
‘I see it, I buy it’ describes me in online transactions 0.91
‘Buy now, think about it later’ describes me in online transactions 0.87
Sometimes, I feel like buying things online on the spur of the moment 0.79
I buy things online according to how I feel at the moment 0.87
Sometimes, I am a bit reckless about what I buy online 0.88
Perceived relevance (Kalyanaraman The content of social media ads say something important to me 0.95 0.94 0.88
and Sundar, 2006, α = .94) The content featured in social media ads are meaningful for me 0.93
Advertising value (Ducoffe, 1996, Social media ads are useful 0.89 0.94 0.84
α = .94) Social media ads are valuable 0.96
Social media ads are important 0.90
Perceived novelty (Cox and Cox, Personalised social media ads are unanticipated 0.86 0.92 0.79
1988; Kim et al., 2010, α = .92) Personalised social media ads are innovative 0.91
Privacy concern (Sundar and I am concerned about privacy when I see personalised social media ads 0.89 0.97 0.83
Marathe, 2010, α = .96) I am sensitive about giving my information to websites when I see personalised 0.91
social media ads
I am concerned about information collected when I see personalised social 0.97
Questionnaire items, factor loadings, reliability and convergent validity

media ads
I am concerned about giving unidentifiable information to websites when I see 0.84
social media ads
Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising

I am concerned about giving identifiable information to websites when I see 0.93

personalised social media ads
85
86 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

Table 2 Correlations and discriminant validity

Online
Perceived ad impulse Perceived Advertising Perceived Privacy
personalisation buying relevance value novelty concern
tendency
Perceived ad 0.849a
personalisation
Online impulse 0.234** 0.854a
buying tendency
Perceived relevance 0.406** 0.322** 0.938a
Advertising value 0.440** 0.278** 0.496** 0.917a
Perceived novelty 0.449** 0.251** 0.522** 0.421** 0.889a
Privacy concern 0.134* –0.124 –0.167** –0.040 0.038 0.911a
Mean 4.494 2.856 3.185 3.847 3.876 5.000
Standard deviation 1.477 1.622 1.374 1.632 1.381 1.519
Note: aThe square root of AVE, **p < 0.01 and *p < 0.05.
To test discriminant validity, the square root of AVE was calculated for each construct
and was compared to its correlation coefficients with other constructs (see Table 2). It
showed that all the diagonal numbers (the square root of AVE) were larger than the
corresponding offdiagonal numbers (correlation coefficients), indicating adequate
discriminant validity.

4.2 Model fit

A SEM was conducted to test the model fit of the conceptual model and hypotheses
proposed. Goodness-of-fit indices for this model were χ2 / df = 1.880, CFI = 0.964,
GFI = 0.863, NFI = 0.926 and RMSEA = 0.060. All model fit indices exceeded the
suggested acceptance levels in previous research, signifying that the model offered a
good fit with the selected sample. Therefore, the next step consisted of an analysis of the
path coefficients for the conceptual model.

4.3 Hypotheses testing

Hypothesis 1 predicted that perceived personalisation would positively influence
perceived relevance. The results indicated that perceived personalisation positively
affected perceived relevance, β = 0.378 and p < .001. Therefore, H1 was supported.
Hypothesis 2 predicted that perceived relevance would positively influence online
impulse buying tendency. The results indicated that perceived relevance positively
affected online impulse buying tendency, β = 0.254 and p < .01. Therefore, H2 was
supported.
Hypothesis 3 predicted that perceived personalisation would positively influence
perceived novelty. The results indicated that perceived personalisation positively affected
perceived novelty, β = 0.412 and p < .001. Therefore, H3 was supported.
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 87

Hypothesis 4 predicted that perceived novelty would positively influence their online
impulse buying tendency. The results indicated that perceived novelty did not have a
significant effect on online impulse buying tendency, β = 0.119 and p > .05. Therefore,
H4 was not supported.
Hypothesis 5 predicted that perceived personalisation would positively influence
perceived advertising value. The results indicated that perceived personalisation
positively affected perceived advertising value, β = 0.236 and p < .001. Therefore, H5
was supported.
Hypothesis 6 predicted that the perceived advertising value would positively
influence online impulse buying tendency. The results indicated that advertising value did
not have a significant effect on online impulse buying tendency, β = 0.124 and p > .05.
Therefore, H6 was not supported.
Hypothesis 7 predicted that perceived relevance of personalised social media
advertisements would positively influence the perceived advertising value. The results
indicated that perceived relevance positively affected advertising value, β = 0.376 and
p < .001. Therefore, H7 was supported.
Hypothesis 8 predicted that perceived novelty of personalised social media
advertisements would positively influence the perceived advertising value of the
advertisements. The results indicated that perceived novelty positively affected
advertising value, β = 0.188 and p < .05. Therefore, H8 was supported.
Hypothesis 9 predicted that perceived personalisation of social media ads would
positively influence privacy concern of these advertisements. The results indicated that
perceived personalisation did not have a significant effect on privacy concern, β = 0.099
and p > .05. Therefore, H9 was not supported.
Hypothesis 10 predicted that customers’ privacy concern of personalised social media
advertisements would negatively influence their online impulse buying tendency. The
results indicated that privacy concern did not have a significant effect on online impulse
buying tendency, β = –0.113 and p > .05. Therefore, H10 was not supported.

Figure 2 The structural model with path coefficients

Notes: ***p < .001, **p < .01 and *p < 0.05. Dashed paths indicate non-significant
relationships.
88 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

Hypothesis 11 predicted that privacy concern of personalised social media advertisements

would negatively influence the perceived advertising value. The results indicated that
privacy concern did not have a significant effect on advertising value,
β = –0.034 and p > .05. Therefore, H11 was not supported.

5 Discussions

In summary, this study proposed and tested a general model to demonstrate the
anteceding association between perceptions of advertising personalisation on social
media and online impulse buying tendency in the social media setting. The results
indicated that perceived personalisation of social media advertisements positively
influenced perceived novelty, perceived relevance and advertising value. Moreover,
perceived novelty and perceived relevance of social media advertisements were
positively related to the value of the advertisements. Though hypothesised, surprisingly,
there was no significant relationship between perceived personalisation of social media
advertisements and privacy concern. There were no significant effects of perceived
novelty, advertising value and privacy concern on online impulse buying tendency as
well. However, the impact of perceived relevance on online impulse buying tendency
was significant, suggesting that advertising personalisation did influence online impulse
buying tendency through customers’ perception of relevance. These results offer
interesting insights, theoretically and practically, into the role of personalisation in online
consumer behaviour, as in this case, online impulse buying.

5.1 Theoretical implications

The findings of this study are believed to provide some important theoretical
implications. First, personalisation of social media advertisements was discovered to
influence online impulse buying tendency through customers’ perceived relevance of
the ads. To the authors’ best knowledge, this study is the first demonstration of the
relationship between personalisation and impulse buying tendency in the social media
setting. Impulse buying tendency presupposes an individual’s likelihood of engaging in
impulse buying is normally due to an urge of quick action (de Kervenoael et al., 2009).
Such an urge occurs especially when the stimuli are somewhat related to the self (Kacen
and Lee, 2002; Phau and Lo, 2004). The key theoretical component of personalisation is
to match the message with the self (Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006). Therefore,
although the demonstration that personalisation leads to impulse buying tendency is
innovative, it is actually rooted in a solid theoretical foundation laid down by previous
research. In addition, the unique contribution of this study is to showcase that perceived
relevance accounts for the impact of personalisation on impulse buying tendency. On the
one hand, such a finding is consistent with existing theoretical frameworks, which
suggest that perceived relevance is one of the underlying processes of the effects of
personalisation (Kalyanaraman and Sundar, 2006; Tam and Ho, 2006). On the other
hand, it expands the literature by showing that perceived relevance explains not only how
personalisation leads to attitude change, but also its influence on the tendency of
unregulated customer behaviour.
Second, personalisation of social media advertisements also resulted in perceptions of
novelty of the ads. For instance, as noted earlier, mobile social media and location-based
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 89

advertising such as geo fencing have risen as inventive ways for retailers and marketers
to reach customers with personalised marketing messages (Ketelaar et al., 2017; Unni and
Harmon, 2007; Wu, 2016; Xu et al., 2009). The results are also consistent with previous
research on perceived novelty. For instance, Kalyanaraman and Sundar (2006) has
confirmed the fact that personalisation elicits perceptions of novelty and they also
identified perceived novelty as one of the underlying processes of the effects of
personalisation on attitudes. However, perceived novelty could not predict online impulse
buying tendency in this study. It seems that novelty may be sufficient for attitude
formation/change, but insufficient to stimulate the urge of buying. In other words,
a customer makes quick purchase decisions probably because he/she feels that an
advertisement directly speaks to him/herself, but not because of some novel elements
within the ad. Future research may study the effects of perceived novelty on attitudes and
online impulse buying tendency together, so that the differences can be more clearly
exhibited.
Third, results of this study indicated that personalisation of social media
advertisements not only directly influenced advertising value, but also indirectly
influenced it through perceived novelty and relevance. Such findings present the
importance of investigating personalisation in the advertising field. The data suggest that
customers tend to perceive great utility or usefulness from personalised ads because these
ads match some aspects of themselves, and deliver a sense of novelty. Therefore, this
study provides a potentially promising conceptual model to explain the value of
personalised advertisements in social media. However, advertising value was not
confirmed as a determinant of online impulse buying tendency. One plausible explanation
is that customers may need to carefully process advertising messages for value
assessment. Such a careful evaluation may inhibit the urge of making quick decisions.
Future research is suggested to provide more evidence for such a justification or to seek
for other possible explanations.
Fourth, there were also some surprising findings related to privacy concern. Different
what was predicted, perceived personalisation of social media advertisements did not
give rise to respondents’ privacy concerns. This is possibly because users publicly
present their personal information on social media and they are well aware of the fact that
the information is likely to be used by advertisers and marketers. It is also plausible that
personalised services on social media are so appealing that users are willing to trade off
part of their privacy. Although the data in this study cannot give sufficient evidence
to identify the exact reasons, it does imply that theory building for advertising
personalisation in social media may lessen the weight given to privacy concern. For
instance, despite the potential risks to privacy, Facebook users appear to have a lax
attitude towards the notion of privacy invasion (Debatin et al., 2009). Debatin et al.
(2009) concluded that the apparent gratifications of using Facebook offset any perceived
threat to privacy. This lax attitude may be pertinent across most social media platforms as
demonstrated in this research. Future studies are suggested for further confirmation. In
addition, privacy concern did not influence online impulse buying tendency. Since
impulse buying involves an immediate action, customers may not use or rely on privacy
concern as a determinant of impulse buying. Alternatively, it is possible that because
privacy concern tends to arise from the use of individuals’ personal information whereas
impulse buying consists of spontaneous purchases without careful consideration of its
90 N.A. Dodoo and L. Wu

pros and cons, it made it difficult to establish a relationship between privacy concern and
online impulse buying tendency because these constructs comprise of distinct ideas.

5.2 Managerial implications

In addition to the abovementioned theoretical implications, this study also has some
practical implications to online retailers, marketers and policy makers. This is especially
important given that there is collaboration between social media platforms and
technology giants to deliver more personalised advertising (Tran, 2017) thus lending
significance to insights from this research. First, online retailers and marketers need to
deliver content that meets relevance expectations customers have, especially in the
context of social media. With the bulk of technologies in current social media platforms
that can provide better targeting for online advertisers, the recognition of the weight of
perceived relevance in customers’ decision-making process in online transactions can
assist online retailers and marketers who invest in social media for delivering their
messages. Second, customers increasingly want novelty and value in content and
advertisers should leverage this insight in developing personalised social media
advertisements. This may deter the message’s disappearance into the void of advertising
clutter particularly in the current digital media environment. For instance, Facebook
recently announced that brands can buy sponsored space within a Facebook user’s
messenger inbox providing online retailers and advertisers a more unique opportunity of
reaching a customer (Swant, 2017). Third, this study also calls for attention from
advertising policy makers. Although personalisation is an effective strategy to increase
advertising value, it does activate online impulse buying tendency through customers’
perceptions of high relevance as suggested by this study. Since impulse buying is a
normal type of unregulated customer behaviour and might eventually impair customers’
long-term well-being, advertising policy makers should keep an eye on the adoption
of personalisation in advertising practices. Perhaps, some industry standards can be
developed to encourage appropriate use of this strategy. Accordingly, more empirical
research needs to be conducted to investigate the relationship between personalisation
and actual unregulated customer behaviour.

6 Limitations and future research

Similar to most research, this study has its limitations. First, this study was based on
self-reported data. In other words, actual behaviour was not measured. Future research
could consider an experimental design that will allow for a more robust investigation into
the effects of perceived personalisation of social media advertisements on customers’
online impulse buying tendency. Second, the student sample in this study limits
generalisability of the findings. Future research could have a sample that can better
represent the general population. Third, while this study focused on the examination of
the role of perceived personalisation, future research could examine other factors that
could influence customers’ online impulse buying tendency such as product category.
Furthermore, interactivity may be another intervening variable that may influence the
relationship between perceived personalisation of social media ads and online impulse
buying tendency and needs further examination in future studies.
 Exploring the anteceding impact of personalised social media advertising 91

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