1. Young Consumers’ Online Brand Communications Literacy in the Context of Social Media Dr Margaret-Anne Lawlor (Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland) Áine Dunne (Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland) Professor Jennifer Rowley (Manchester Metropolitan University, UK)

2. Structure of Presentation
Theoretical background - children's advertising literacy in an online & offline context
Research Methodology & Findings
A reconceptualisation of advertising literacy – the Online Brand Communications literacy framework

3. Children in an online context
5-15 year olds = now spend more time online than watching TV (OfCom, 2016)
72% of year olds = social media profile (OfCom, 2016)
Emergence of ‘non-traditional’ platforms (e.g. advergames, social media, branded websites, influencer / blog marketing)
Capacity for interactivity, subtlety, engagement

4. Advertising Literacy (AL)
The importance of AL
The contribution of the Persuasion Knowledge Model -> agent knowledge & persuasion knowledge (Friestad and Wright, 1994)
Retrieval & employment of knowledge as a defence against advertising (e.g. Rozendaal, Lapierre, Van Reijmersdal and Buijzen, 2011; Verhellen, Oates, de Pelsmacker and Dens, 2014)
Application in traditional adv. context (paid advertising)

5. (e.g. Forrester, 2009; Stephen & Galak, 2012)

6. Leading to the present study’s focus on:
Young consumers’ awareness & understanding of the forms of commercial content within social media;
their ability to filter and critique such commercial messages;
application of AL in this context.

7. Qualitative Study: Sample = 47 girls, aged 12-14 years, in Ireland
15 focus groups
Participant observation
11 in-depth interviews
Ethical considerations

8. Discussion
Participants’ awareness of advertising / marketing formats in social media -> video/photo/text ads
Use of brands / commercial messages as a form of self-expression & social capital
Sharing behaviour = a form of peer-to-peer marketing
Participants do not view their actions as a means of generating earned media for the brand

9. The importance of brands – personal & social aspects
Donna, 14 years
There is a quiz on my page that is called ‘What shoe are you?’
I'm a big fan of Converse shoes and I wanted the quiz to show that on my page, so I took the quiz a couple of times to make sure that the result showed Converse….
I love Converse shoes, they’re cool and really, it is just a bit of fun.

10. Unintentional Brand Ambassadors
No, I don’t think so. I just like these brands.
I like their stuff and like to wear them so that is why I have them on my profile page.
Not because I’m promoting the brands to my friends.
Donna, 14 years

11. Generation of earned media for the brand?
Sandra: I like that ad, it’s funny and I just wanted to put it on my profile for people to see. Interviewer: Do you think that you are helping Cadbury’s advertise their Dairy Milk product? Sandra: No, of course I'm not advertising for them. It’s just funny. (aged 14 years)

13. The importance of rethinking AL:
convergence of traditional online adv. & other forms of online brand content (e.g. ‘opting in’ to a brand on Facebook);
brand messaging may originate from the brand owner in a variety of overt and covert forms;
online consumers may also act as brand promoters when they engage in brand-related word-of-mouth.

14. consider advertising that ‘does not look like advertising’ e. g
consider advertising that ‘does not look like advertising’ e.g. native advertising, blogger / influencer marketing, advergames.
Therefore, is the advertising literacy paradigm fit for purpose in an online context?