基于真实市场投放的微信朋友圈原生广告效果研究

A Study on the Effect of WeChat Moments Native Advertising Based on a Natural Field Experiment

在具有社交属性的信息流中如何提高原生广告点击率?这个问题影响着年营业额数百亿元人民币的社交媒体广告市场。研究以微信朋友圈原生广告为对象,通过真实市场实验,探讨腾讯广告平台提供的基本投放功能和常见创意形式,对提升微信朋友圈广告效果产生的独立影响和协同作用。实地检验主流社交平台的广告功能与真实市场反应的关系,避免了实验室实验的介入性问题,有助于研究者提出探索性的理论命题。研究在腾讯广告平台按照不同的广告投放定向性(定向与非定向)、广告头像关联性(高、中、低关联性)、广告图片情景性(高、低情景性)和广告文案互动性(高、低互动性)投放了24组广告,共产生2177.9万次曝光和7.3万次点击。结果显示:第一,定向投放相较于非定向投放广告点击率更高;第二,当广告头像关联性高时,广告点击率最高;第三,情景性程度高的广告图片相较于情景性程度低的广告图片广告点击率更高;第四,广告图片调节了定向投放的影响,只有在广告图片情景性程度高时,定向投放才对点击率有明显影响。根据真实市场的投放结果,研究提出了影响微信朋友圈原生广告效果的双路径--信息路径和社交路径--概念模型。在信息路径下,定向投放利用用户的人口特征、兴趣和行为标签,增强广告内容与用户信息需求之间的相关性,促成用户在信息线索上的认知加工连续性。在社交路径下,与用户身份相似的广告头像缩短了社会距离,表现互动情景的广告图片营造了社会临场感,两者更好地将广告嵌入社交平台的“关系”功能和“互动”功能,促成用户在社交线索上认知加工的连续性。研究还发现,在具有社交属性的信息流中,原生广告不仅具有信息价值,还具有关乎社会联结的关系价值,社交因素调节了信息因素对广告原生化的作用。研究为发掘社交媒体独有的广告原生化潜力提供了一系列思路和证据,为腾讯广告系统oCPM定价机制中预估点击率和预估转化率的算法提供了参考。

How can we increase the click-through rate of native ads in information flow embedded with social attributes?This question affects the social media advertising market,which has an annual turnover of tens of billions of RMB.Focusing on WeChat Moments native ads,the study investigates the independent and synergistic effects of placement functions and advertising creative forms offered by Tencents advertising platform on improving the efficacy of WeChat Moments native ads through a natural field experiment.By an-alyzing the relationship between basic placement functions and real market responses through field testing,researchers can develop exploratory theoretical ideas and avoid the interventional problem of laboratory inves-tigations.The study placed 24 sets of ads on the Tencent advertising platform according to the targeting of ad-vertising placement(targeted vs.non-targeted),the relevance of advertising profile pictures(high,medium and low relevance),contextualization of advertising pictures(high and low contextualization)and interactivi-ty of advertising copywriting(high and low interactivity)generating a total of 21,779,000 exposures and 73,000 clicks.The results show that:1.the click-through rate of targeted ads is higher than that of non-targe-ted ads;2.the click-through rate of ads is better when the relevance of advertising profile pictures is high;3.the click-through rate of ads pictures with high contextualization is higher than that of ads with low contex-tualization;4.ad pictures moderate the influence of targeted advertising:targeted advertising has a signifi-cant influence on click-through rate when ad pictures are more contextualized.Based on the experimental re-sults,the study constructs a dual-path conceptual model of information path and social path that affects the effectiveness of native ads in WeChat Moments.Under the information path,the targeted placement makes use of usersdemographic characteristics,interests and behavioral labels to enhance the relevance between ad content and usersinformation demands,leading to continuity of cognitive processing on information cues.Under the social path,advertising profile pictures similar to the users identity shorten the social distance,and advertising pictures showing interactive scenarios create a sense of social presence,both of which better embed the advertisement into the"relationship"and"interaction"functions of the social platform,contribu-ting to the continuity of the users cognitive processing on the social cues.The study also found that in news feed with social attributes,native ads have not only informative value,but also relational value concerning social connections,and social factors moderate the role of informative factors on the effects of native ads.The study provides a series of insights and evidence for exploring how advertising achieves natives in social media.It provides a reference for the algorithms of estimated click-through rate and estimated conversion rate in Tencents oCPM pricing mechanism of the advertising system.The limitations of the study mainly lie in the fact that the natural field experiment does not have access to userspersonal information and only uses the click-through rate of the ads as an indicator of the placement effectiveness,which fails to provide a direct ob-servation of the psychological process and intermediate mechanisms.