Product salience in influencer endorsement posts

Abstract Influencer endorsement posts on social media platforms such as Instagram differ regarding the salience of the endorsed product. Some posts make the product the dominant visual and narrative element, whereas others integrate it peripherally into the scene with little emphasis. We investigate how such salience of the endorsed products is related to consumer engagement on Instagram for two product categories (watches and shoes). We find that while endorsement posts with low product salience create more post engagement (i.e., likes and comments of endorsement posts), endorsement posts with high product salience create more brand engagement (i.e., likes and comments of subsequent brand-owned posts). Accordingly, the optimal level of product salience depends on the goal of the influencer campaign. As influencers aim to build their own popularity through higher levels of post engagement, the goal of the company and the goal of the influencer might not be aligned in campaigns where companies aim to drive brand engagement. We test a rich set of visual and textual product salience cues that can help managers and influencers to design endorsement posts in line with their objectives. Our research thus has important implications regarding how to design effective endorsement posts.