Advertising Attributes of One-Person Media Distribution in Purchase Intent

Abstract

Purpose: Mobile media is gaining ground as an independent and core platform, and corporate interest and the expectations forstrategic use are rising in one-person media. Therefore, this study aims to establish interactivity, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date as the sub-factors of one-person media advertising properties, and to study the effect of one-personmedia advertising attributes on purchasing intention. Research design, data, and method: After collecting data from a total of 202 people, including 106 men and 96 women with the online survey method, frequency analysis and regression analysis were conducted using SPSS 25.0. Results: Research has shown that information, professionalism, entertainment, and up-to-date have a significant influence on purchasing intent. In addition, although information and expertise are found to have a significant influence on trust which shows a direct impact on the purchasing intention, the results of verification for the effect of purchasing intent through the medium of trust found to be significant in entertainment, information and up-to-date. Conclusions: There is a difference in Professionalism and Entertainment between men and women. This study provided the suggestions for establishing the most effective measures and marketing strategies in producing one-person media advertisements.

1. Introduction

The Internet has become a daily routine with the trend of the information age, and the modern people lifestyles are rapidly changing through their experiences such as the virtual space of the Internet. In addition, the way of Internet users' activities is evolving away from the traditional single-track content delivery method to a social activity. The users interact actively with a large number of others through collaborative and shared platforms such as services and social media in which they produce their own content. In particular, the expansion of Internet services and the broadband of telecommunications networks enabled streaming technology that making real-time playback of voice or video over the internet. As a result, the boundaries between producers (transmitters) and consumers (acceptors) of information have also collapsed.

In addition, as broadcasting and telecommunication technologies converge in the early 2000s, the dissemination and development of mobile media began to take place. Mobile media has distinct advantages from traditional media in that it has not only the ability to provide consumers with information anytime, anywhere, but also real-time interaction (Lee, 2010). The supply of tablet PC, smartphones, and others representing mobile media has caused many changes in our daily lives, with one of the most notable changes recently being the creation of an environment. That is, consumers can produce and consume a variety of video content through mobile media, which does not have to be constrained by time and place. In the video's distribution environment, mobile media is no longer becoming an auxiliary medium but an independent and core platform, thus, the expectations of them are rising for corporate interest in mobile video and strategic use. With the explosion in the type and quantity of media and content and the availability of mobile media anytime, anywhere through mobile devices, the use of mobile media has a distinctive feature as a consumer's active and selective consumption in comparison with traditional way of consuming newspaper or broadcast content. After exposure to mobile media, people read comments from others, press the "like" button expressing their opinions or feelings in the comments, and recommend or share them with friends via SNS. The emergence of various forms of communication related to mobile media, such as sharing through social media and recommendations, is one of the important characteristics of mobile media usage. One-person media is difference from TV, because it optimized for the exposure and reach rate of advertisements, and the effect frequency and the effect delivery rate by providing optimized advertisements to target audiences in both directions, away from the way that TV advertisements were directed to the public in one direction.

Growth in the video market has been accelerated due to content differentiation and increasing competition among platforms, and the change in content consumption patterns has resulted in a new content ecosystem centered on one-person creator, as video viewing through mobile media has increased. Because the contents are free from regulations unlike existing media, one-person media is diverse from eating show, game, music, beauty and sports. It is considered an opportunity to produce and distribute new media content as advertising revenue begins to grow.as because it quickly produces contents made by creators through mobile and satisfies consumers' needs with content containing fun and empathy.

This advertising revenue is beginning with the growing marketing needs of the company's marketing department for specific targets. If the content produced by the creator is good, one-person creators who have succeeded in personal branding starts to get word-of-mouth reviewers from viewers. Through continuous uploading content, one-person creators who have succeeded in personal branding increasingly influential to users by forming fanatic layers (Park, 2015).

Recently, the one-person media market has become more active as 'MCN service' that specializes in managing and supporting one-person media content has been created. This allows consumers to make more systematic use of the content they want, while also providing an environment for content producers to produce quality content, as well as an opportunity to generate revenue, including advertising.

Therefore, many companies are trying to market various kinds of advertisements, advertisements, and events using one-person media. Despite this growth in one-person media, the research on the effectiveness of advertising attributes in one-person media is still insufficient. Thus, this study set interactivity, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date as sub-factors of one-person media advertising properties, and focuses on the effects on purchasing intention with one-person media advertising properties. In addition, the mediating effect of trust and the moderating effect of gender were verified. By discussing marketing strategies using one-person media and consumers' use of information, this study aims to provide the implications for companies that use one-person media as advertising media in the future.

2. Literature Reviews

V commerce, which means consumers buy goods while watching videos, is evolving from the initial one-sided method of information delivery to the one-person media based on the fun and empathy of video content linked to the product, inducing consumers to voluntarily share and recommend the contents to be linked to the purchase of the product. In order to enhance the fun and empathy of the content, the company actively utilizes celebrities who run SNS or blogs and form a consensus with the target consumers, and produces brand-new content aiming 'unadvertised advertising' based on it (Cho et al., 2011; Lee & Kwag, 2017).

Branded content projects a brand image in the story through a collaboration with various fields, that is, a kind of marketing technique that fuses advertising messages and content to attract consumers' attention (Kwon, 2019). Branded content has recently been used as a major promotional medium for information supply, consumer education, funding, and building relationships with the public by not only businesses but also non-profit institutions. The types of content with the most active brand content in online and social media can be divided into brand-run blogs (cafes), brands and webtoons, brands and Web dramas, brands and one-person media, brands and music, brands and games (Lee & Han, 2018; Razak et al., 2019; Mullatahiri & Ukaj, 2019).

In the Theory of Use and Gratification, active media users selectively use the media among various competing media, depending on their needs. And the fulfillment is a form of satisfaction that the user perceives as a result of the use (Park & Chong, 2013). In other words, users expect satisfaction from the use based on their motivations to use, and evaluate the satisfaction with the acquisition expected as a result of the use and decide their intention to following use (Wu & Chang, 2015).

Especially, the traditional customer changed because of Internet, which moving from a mass-market to a very specific market (Abrahamson, 1998; Ruggiero, 2000). Satisfaction with media and content involves a combination of factors, such as motivation and context for use. However, even media with similar purposes may be used to expand functions depending on the properties of newly emerging media or contents, which may change the service's motivation or customer value. Song and Lee (2016) presented entertainment, newness, social interaction, and convenient watching as motivations to use web video content. Among them, newness was found to have a significant influence on web content usage (Song & Lee, 2016). Son(2016) derived entertainment (entertainment value), social interaction(social value), convenience(functional value), conformity (functional value), and economics (monetary value) through web content attributes that affect customer values, which were found to have a significant impact on the willingness to continue using and recommend web content (Son, 2016). Combining these studies, users' perception of one-person media advertising attributes can be expected to have a positive effect on their satisfaction.

3. Data and Research Methodology

3.1. Research Model and Hypothesis

Unlike traditional media, one-person media, where one-person creators produce contents on a variety of topics and share them with a large number of users through an online platform, has enabled two-way communication instead of one-way communication due to the widespread use of the Internet (Cho et al., 2011). In particular, since real-time interaction between creators and receivers is possible, sharing and dissemination of information is much faster than conventional media, and unlike traditional media, information can be communicated to an unspecified many people using the internet and mobile technology. As the ability and influence of one-person creators to propagate video content has increased, so have their business value as well as social networking services such as YouTube, Facebook, and Internet broadcasting such as Africa TV and Kakao TV. Thus, the product promotion using one-person media images has emerged as a major form of infusion marketing that transcends the utility of power bloggers in the past (Lee & Han, 2018).

Checking the preceding studies related to one-person media, Seong and Lee (2018) have shown that the higher the expertise of internet personal broadcasting BJ and viewers, the more social interaction, social distance, and BJ have more positive effects on the PPL effect. Park and Chong (2013) set SNS characteristics as accessibility, interaction, information reliability, information service, entertainment, and intimacy. Then she said accessibility, interaction, and information service affect the formation of a positive attitude regarding the brand.

Interaction is about sharing one-person media advertising information, helping to bond and build relationships through communication (Oh & Kim, 2014). Before the Internet developed, interactivity was recognized as a part of communication. In today's smart world, the importance of interactivity is emphasized more (Wu & Chang, 2015). This is effective in attracting consumers and increasing their appeal in itself. Fun and entertaining advertising has a positive effect on consumers (Park & Chong, 2013). Of the informality, entertainment and interception that explain the attitude of advertising, entertainment gives advertisers a positive effect by moving away from the real world and providing them with an emotional pleasure and enjoyment that encourages consumers to buy by feeling the value of consumption (Ducoffe, 1996). Informatization is a key element of perceived advertising properties (Kim & Han, 2011), and is defined as the ability of advertising to inform consumers about products being advertised (Park & Chong, 2013). This can be a key function of rationalizing the advertising itself to provide the information consumers want and to be able to provide the relevant information. In addition to the product information that consumers simply accept as an attribute that can provide the information they want (Chung & Kye, 2004). Of the advertising attributes, information is said to affect advertising attitudes and willingness to purchase, which is an important factor in the formation of consumers' willingness to buy (Wu & Chang, 2015). Expertise refers to the consumer's perception that how the source in convincing message is well aware of his or her field, and that the source provides the right answer or correct judgment on the subject or issue of the convincing message. To be recognized as such an expert, one must have a high degree, professional training, license, certificate, as well as practical experience and abundant knowledge or skills in the areas involved (Lee, Liu & Ryu, 2018).

The up-to-date is the ability to quickly download, update, and modify content through mobile and includes instant messaging on mobile. One-person media enables real-time communication among users based on mobility and immediacy. The combination of mobile's mobility, immediacy, and individuality is further maximizing online relationship formation and real-time information production (Oh & Kim, 2014). The more up-to-date information, the more likely it is to change the consumer's attitude in the direction it is intended, and recipients also tend to pay attention to the most up-to-date information and accept it. Purchase intent means the possibility that the intended and planned future actions of an individual who intends to purchase a particular product will be transferred and acted upon (Engel et al., 1986). More specifically, when advertising a particular product through one-person application, it can be defined as the consumer's willingness to purchase the product, and as the final indicator of the effectiveness of the advertisement, the probability of making a purchase on the product if the opportunity arises after exposure to the advertisement (Park & Kim, 2001). Users said they are more interested in content than in advertising, thus, it makes difficult to attract users' attention even though the size of the advertisement is large when presented separately from the content (Park & Kim, 2001). Thus, for an entity, forming purchases to users through one-person mechanism serves as an important variable (Kim & Kim, 2003). As such, the following hypotheses are established on the assumption that significant attributes in existing media advertisements would affect the purpose of purchasing even in media with a single personality.

Hypothesis 1: Advertising attributes (interaction, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date) in one-person media will have a positive effect on the intent to purchase.

The trust is the extent to which one-person media carrier is recognized of having knowledge, skills and experience related to the product advertised and it will provide unbiased opinions and objective information (Shankar et al., 2002). In addition, in the field of marketing, trust is defined as an exchange relationship and an individual will not take advantage of the weakness to exploit the other party (Dyer & Chu, 2003). Specifically, trust plays an important role when consumers make decisions or respond to uncertain information. The trust of information is the most important characteristic because it makes a change in attitude towards the intended direction of information when the information carrier is gaining high confidence from the user as an important variable that affects the user's purchase of the product (Lee et al., 2015). Thus, the hypothesis was established that reliability would mediate the process in which advertising attributes in one-person media affect the intent of purchase.

Hypothesis 2: In one-person media, trust will be the medium between advertising attributes and intent to buy.

In recent social roles, the gender gap has been weakening, but the biological and information processing characteristics of women and men remain different. There are also differences between men and women in information processing, product evaluation, and intent to buy (Melnyk et al., 2009). There are basically differences between men and women at biological, cognitive and behavioral levels. In particular, gender differences over advertising can be found primarily at the cognitive level. While men selectively focus on the glaringly noticeable clues, women display a wide range of information searches that try to look at all the information in the stimuli. This is also related to men having a high level of sophistication to avoid refinement of stimuli and women having a low level of informatization threshold that easily begins to refine. Also, men are rational and analytical, while women show intuitive and empirical cognitive traits. In fact, various decision studies show that gender has a direct impact on decision making (Gefen & Straub, 1997) and serves as a modifier. (Morris et al., 2005). Based on these existing studies, the hypothesis that there are adjustment effects that vary by gender is established.

Hypothesis 3: There will be a difference in the relationship between advertising attributes and purchasing intent depending on gender.

In this study, we would like to confirm whether the five factors of one-person media advertising attributes (interaction, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date) have a significant impact on the intent of purchasing, and whether the reliability of one-person media advertising has an impact on advertising properties and gender. The research model of this study is shown in [Figure 1].

Figure 1: Research model

3.2. Data Collection and Research Method

In this study, the advertising properties were subdivided into interaction, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date, as shown in [Table 1] and divided into seven variables, including trust and intent to purchase. It measured on a four-point scale except for demographic questions.

Table 1: Questionnaire

The survey of this study consisted of online questionnaires and distributed questionnaires to people who had experience using one-person media, then explained them the purpose of this study and responding to the questionnaire. This survey was conducted from May 17, 2019 to May 24, 2019 and a total of 202 questionnaires were retrieved and used for the final analysis. A demographic and regression analysis of respondents was conducted using SPSS 25.0.

4. Results

4.1. Respondent Attributes

A total of 202 people responded to this survey conducted from May 17 to May 24, 2019, compared with 106 men (52.5 %) and 96 women (47.5 %). Those in their 20s or younger accounted for 158 (78.2 %) and 44 people aged 30 or older (21.8 %). The proportion of people in their twenties is high, which is reason of the actual users of one-person media. The respondents were 177 unmarried (87.6 %) and 25 married/separate/separate by death (12.4 %). The proportion of singles is high, which is also due to the large number of low age. The demographic characteristics of the respondents are as shown in [Table 2].

Table 2: Demographic Characteristics of Respondents Category Classification

The survey was distributed to people with having experience for one-person media, with 202 respondents (100.0 %) answering yes. Among the respondents, 39 (19.3 %) were used for single media, 51 (19.2 %) three to four days a week, 40 (19.8 %) and 72 (35.6 %) every day. The average daily use time of a one-person media was 37 (18.3 %), 54 people (26.7 %), 66 people (32.7 %) for two to three hours, and 45 people (22.3 %) for more than three hours. 99 people were in game broadcasters (49.0 %) as the most, 48 people eating shows (23.8 %), and 55 people beauty/ fashion shows (27.2 %). The type of one-person media use of the respondents is as shown in [Table 2].

4.2. Validity and Reliability Analysis

Verification was performed using exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach's α coefficients to review the validity and reliability of the measured items in this study. The factor analysis was first performed using a perpendicular rotation method. Factorial analysis has resulted in factors higher than 1 eigen value standard in seven dimensions: interaction, entertainment, information, professionalism, reliability, and intent to purchase. The results of the Cronbach's α calculation show that the value is between 0.809 and 0.899, beyond the normal Cronbach's α value of 0.7, thus, the reliability of the measurement item is ensured. [Table 3] The check of the porosity between the variables found that the VIF value was lower than the 10 permissible level, from a minimum of 1.559 to a maximum of 2.3, so there was no problem with the porosity.

Table 3: Results of Factor Analysis

4.3. Hypothesis Analysis

In order to identify the impact of purchasing intent from advertising properties, interaction, information, entertainment, professionalism, and up-to-date factors of advertisement properties were set as independent variables, and the degree of turnover was set as subordinate variables, and a medium regression analysis was conducted.

Table 4: Results of Regression

R²=.674, Adjusted R²=.666, F=81.101, p=.000, Durbin-Watson=2.104

In the regression model, F-value shows 81.101 figure at the level of p=.000, and also shows an explanatory power of adjusted R2=66.6% for the regression formula. Based on the analysis of the relationship between the sub-factor of advertising properties and the intent to purchase, except for Interaction, Entertainment(t=2.893, p<0.01), Information(t=3.684, p<0.01), Professionalism(t=2.921; p<0.01), Freshness(t=2.834; p<0.01) were found to have a significant effect on the degree of purchase. This paper also compared the ß value of the standardized regression coefficient to determine the importance of the sub-factories that affect the intent to purchase. As the result, Information is the strongest influence as the figure of .277. Therefore, the higher the Entertainment, Information, Professionalism, and Freshness among advertising attributes, the higher the intention of purchasing, and the interaction cannot show a meaningful effect.

From the Relationship between Advertising Attributes and Purchasing Intention of one-person media, the results of an analysis in accordance with the three-phase process of how trust supports the medium effect are as shown in [Table 5]. Based on the parameter setting and the analysis for Entertainment, the first-phase regression coefficient of the Entertainment is .133 and has a positive effect, and in the second stage, the result shows .242, and phase 3 are expressed in .198. The t and p-values for the significance level are significant levels in phase 1, but phase 2 and 3 show significant results above 0.05. In addition, the effects of independent variables in phase 2 are significantly greater than the effects of independent variables in phase 3. Therefore, entertainment, which is a sub-factor of advertising attributes in the relationship between entertainment and purchasing intent, has a partial mediating effect. Based on the parameter setting and the analysis for information, the first-phase regression coefficient for information is .246, with a positive effect, and the second-phase value is .277, and third-phase shows 1.194. The p-values represent 0.01 in all the phases 1, 2 and 3 and show significant results. In addition, the effects of independent variables in phase 2 are significantly greater than the effects of independent variables in phase 3. Therefore, Information, a sub-factor of advertising attributes in the relationship between information and intent to purchase, has partial mediating effect. Based on the parameter setting and the analysis for Freshness, the regression coefficient is .099 which has a positive effect, and .186 in phase 2 and in phase 3, It shows a value of .153. The p-value is significant in phase 1with the figure of 0.1, but in phase 2 and phase 3, the results shows significant as the figure of more than 0.05. In addition, the effects of independent variables in phase 2 are significantly greater than the effects of independent variables in phase 3. Therefore, the freshness, a sub-factor of advertising attributes in the relationship between the 'freshness' and the 'purchase intent', has a partial mediating effect. On the other hand, it is not possible to confirm the mediating effect because the effect of the purchase intent in the other sub-factories of advertising attributes, interaction, and professionalism, do not meet the step-by-step conditions for verification.

Table 5: Moderating Effects

The results of the adjustment effect on purchasing intent by gender show that in the case of professionalism, R square increased gradually from Model 1 as 49.5 %, in Model 2 to 50.2 % and in Model 3 as 50.9 %. The significant probability is also less than 0.05, which can be said to have a moderating effect. In addition, Entertainment has been shown to increase gradually to 57.6 % in Model 1, 58.4 % in Model 2, 58.9 % in Model 3, and the significant probability is greater than 0.05 in Model 3, but the significant probability is less than 0.05 in Model 1 and Model 2. However, there was no statistically significant moderating effect in interaction, information, and freshness in Model 3.

Table 6: Mediating Effects

p< .1, **p<.05, ***p<0.01

5. Discussion

From these backgrounds, the study discusses the results of empirically validating and analyzing the impact of one-person media advertising attributes, such as interactivity, entertainment, information, professionalism, and up-to-date, on consumers' trust and purchasing intent.

Research has shown that information, professionalism, entertainment, and up-to-date have a significant influence on purchasing intent. In addition, although information and expertise are found to have a significant influence on trust which shows a direct impact on the purchasing intention, the results mean while up-to-date and entertainment are important factors in the content market, it can be seen that trust should be mediated when purchases are made. It also can be interpreted as the recognition of the risk that may occur in online trading rather than offline trading.

First, in one-person media, trust was identified as a significant influence on purchase intention in relational marketing (Morgan and Hunt, 2004). Information and expertise are found to have a significant influence on trust which shows a direct impact on the purchasing intention, the results mean while up-to-date and entertainment are important factors in the content market, it can be seen that trust should be mediated when purchases are made. It also can be interpreted as the recognition of the risk that may occur in online trading rather than offline trading.

Second, an analysis of one-person media advertising attributes that affect purchasing intent shows that information, expertise, entertainment and up-to-date have a significant influence on purchasing intent. The result is interpreted as a result of one-person media advertisement that determines a purchase only when sufficient information about the advertised product is provided and that consumer's willingness to buy has also become an important factor in the formation of the purchase (Lee et al., 2015; Choi et al., 2018). In addition, in the case of expertise has shown that higher level of expertise in advertising results in a more positive willingness to buy (Newell et al., 2011). It is also similar to a study by lee et al.(2018), which shows that entertainment has had a significant positive effect on the willingness of Korean consumers to buy media content, and that the more entertainment fun they provide, the more willing they are to buy. Similar to the study of Oh et al.,(2014) that the up-to-date in the characteristics of SNS have a significant effect on purchasing intent. Depending on the results of the research, the company will need to establish a strategy that can effectively lead to the intention of purchasing by providing quick feedback to users through one-person media. Unlike traditional marketing channels such as newspapers and TVs, one-person media has the advantage of providing various contents while continuously updating. When uses the characteristics of one-person media well, the channel has its advantages.

Third, information and expertise have been shown to have a significant positive impact on reliability. Newell (2011) study was consistent with the results of the study, which showed that the higher the expertise of information, the more reliable to trust, and that media information today with increasing amounts of information can give greater confidence to the information acceptor amid a flood of information. This shows that the media operator's professionalism plays an important role in differentiation from other media in one-person media. It can be seen that it is a differentiation factor of single media.

Fourth, verification of the mediating effect by reliability has shown that entertainment, information, and up-to-date are mediated in purchasing intent through trust. The results show that interactions are unrelated to trust and purchasing intent, which can be interpreted as the basic properties of media, and thus do not affect trust or purchasing intent simply by interaction. This means that shopping through advertisements using one-person media will only be achieved if it involves trust beyond entertainment and the up-to-date. On the other hand, in the case of expertise, it can be interpreted that one-person media with expertise has a direct impact on trust and purchase, but a purchasing intent is formed without trust.

Fifth, advertising attributes that differ between men and women are identified as Professionalism and Entertainment. It is believed that men are more active in information exploration than women, and prefer advertisements with detailed and professional information showed significant results. It can also be interpreted that after the advertisement, entertainment has shown significant results due to emotional areas such as fun, emotion, excitement and interest. On the other hand, other items that do not differ by gender are interaction, information, and up-to-date, which can be understood as the basic items in one-person media. As such, this study provides the suggestions for establishing the most effective method and marketing strategy in the production of one-person media advertisements.

6. Conclusions

The paradigm of the past, which could be generalized by the unilateral delivery of information and the passive acceptance of information by consumers, evolved into an era in which consumers took the initiative in the production and distribution process of information and exerted great influence. This change in the environment has led to further development of single-person media and the revitalization of the market for video content. Companies have also begun to pay attention to new and potential communication channels, and more and more attempts are being made to strategically use one-person media for corporate marketing. This phenomenon shows also academically implication of the need for new perspectives and the expansion of research areas. In other words, the success of one-person media requires in-depth and multifaceted research efforts because it is a media phenomenon that implies a frame transition from corporate voice to consumer voice, from limited information to diverse and expanded information.

This study has validated the impact of one-person media advertising attributes on reliability and purchasing intent, but has the following limitations: First, because of the people who are in their 20s or younger accounted for 78.2 percent of those surveyed, it is difficult to generalize the results of the study into the entire consumer class. However, the reason why 78.2 percent of people in their 20s and younger accounted for the study is because of the high utilization rate of one-person media and the age at which the most exposure to marketing is in the 10-20s. In other words, this research is conducted in that it provides basic marketing information as it reflects the 20s who are the main target layer of single media and are most active in using one-person media and are interested in advertising. For more accurate measurements in the future, a balanced age group will need to be sampled. As a follow-up study, it is recommended to propose a one-person media attribute preference study for different age groups.

Second, the progress of this study is for the subjects that responds to the survey based on their viewing experiences. Since this research design may have individual differences in user preferences and acceptability depending on a number of factors, such as the type and characteristics of one-person media content, the recognition of one-person media creators, and the type of products that appear, thus, it is expected that more multi-dimensional research results can be obtained in future studies by dividing various types and characteristics of content.

Third, in this study, five of the characteristics of one-person media advertisement were set up as independent variables based on prior researches. But this describes the various characteristics of one-person media, and there is a lack to be applied to all advertising products. Moreover, the theoretical basis is not solid because the researches on advertising properties of one-person media are still lacking. Therefore, it would be possible to develop more suitable research variables by deriving advertising properties of one-person media through various research methods, such as dividing and comparing a wide range of questions through qualitative researches.