Het effect van sponsorvermeldingen op merkevaluaties en geloofwaardigheid van bloggers De rol van tweezijdige boodschappen

Nowadays many bloggers include brand or product reviews in their blogs. They are often sponsored by companies to provide a (positive) review on their product. Since many consumers are unaware of these sponsorships they can be perceived as misleading. To guarantee fair communication the Dutch social media advertising code states that when blogs are sponsored it has to be revealed. The present study examines the effects of sponsorship disclosures on trustworthiness of the blogger and brand evaluations. Moreover the effect of type of review (one versus two-sided) is investigated. It is expected that two-sided reviews might diminish the anticipated negative effects of sponsorship disclosers on trustworthiness and brand evaluations. Although the interaction effect between sponsorship disclosure and review type was not observed, the results do reveal that the negative effect of sponsorship disclosure on brand attitude and buying intentions is mediated by a decline of trustworthiness of the blogger. Moreover, a two-sided blog review (vs. one-sided) has a positive effect on brand attitude and buying intention, which can be explained by increased trustworthiness of the blogger.