Recommendation or Advertisement? The Influence of Advertising-Disclosure Language with Pictorial Types on Influencer Credibility and Consumers’ Brand Attitudes

The impacts of advertising-disclosure language on influencer marketing have increasingly attracted researchers’ attention. However, little research has focused on the role of pictorial types on social media influencers and brands. Thus, this study explores how different combinations of advertising-disclosure conditions and pictorial types can affect social media influencer credibility and consumers’ brand attitudes. By using an experimental 3 × 2 between-subject design, we collected data from 264 followers of beauty influencers on Weibo. Results revealed that a post that disclosed sponsorship significantly decreased influencer credibility and consumers’ brand attitudes compared to a post without any disclosure. Results also showed that a post with no-sponsorship disclosure significantly increased influencer credibility and consumers’ brand attitudes than a post without any disclosure or a post disclosing sponsorship. With regard to pictorial types, the influencer-with-product type led to higher influencer credibility and more positive brand attitudes in consumers than the product-only type in all three disclosure conditions. This study highlights the role of pictorial types in strengthening the power of advertising-disclosure language, which can further affect influencer credibility and consumers’ brand attitudes. This study contributes to the visual complexity literature for influencer marketing.