Recent trends and developments in the fields of Big Data, Machine Learning, and Artificial Intelligence are completely transforming the way brands are engaging and communicating with their audience, allowing more personalized communications than ever. With the spread of social networking sites, such as Facebook, YouTube or Instagram a new opportunity arises for companies to connect to their consumers. However, since social media personalization implies the collection and analysis of highly personal data, consumers may develop negative reactions, attitudes or perceptions towards personalized advertising. Research covers extensively issues such as privacy concerns, invasiveness, forced exposure or irritation, which can lead to advertising avoidance. Though understanding the user perspective is crucial, the topic advertising avoidance in the context of personalization, especially in social media environments, hasn’t been discussed at great length. The purpose of this thesis is to understand how YouTube users experience personalized advertising while using the platform. The empirical findings of this thesis contribute to the ongoing research on personalized advertising within a social media setting. In addition, by understanding what can influence personalized ad avoidance on YouTube and describing how consumers express ad avoidance on the platform, this thesis aims to nurture a deeper understanding of the phenomenon. This study is based on an interpretative, abductive as well as a qualitative research design. It uses semi-structured interviews to explore the views, experiences, beliefs, and motivations of individual participants as well as focus groups that can leverage group dynamics to generate new qualitative data. The results of this thesis show that YouTube users experience ad avoidance in relationship with personalized ads for several reasons linked to prior negative attitudes, perceived goal impediment or ad irritation. The analysis of the findings revealed that users can experience cognitive, affective and behavioral ad avoidance as presented in the literature, but a theoretical model which can perfectly explain the phenomena of personalized ad avoidance on social media is currently not existent. While some antecedents claimed by the previously mentioned theoretical frameworks were also visible in the study, additional aspects may have an impact on how consumers experience personalized advertising avoidance in the social media environment, and more specifically on YouTube.

Advertisements have been in digital media for most of its lifetime. They have, however, been increasing with the years and more people are finding the number of advertisements to be excessive. Online users have therefore taken to avoiding advertisements by installing ad-blockers. There have been multiple studies on how ad-blockers work and why people use them. There have also been studies on which demographics mostly use ad-blockers. Younger men are generally seen as the typical ad-block user. However, none have seen if certain personality traits are more common amongst ad-block users. The purpose of this research is therefore to investigate if there are any differences in personality traits amongst ad-block users and non-ad-block users. The Big Five Inventory with 10-questions (BFI-10) personality test is used in an online survey to get an understanding of participants ad-block usage and personality traits. The personality traits that stood out were among females ad-block users with the personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism. The purpose of the study is to indicate a possible way for advertisers to prohibit their message to fall on uninterest and ad-avoiding recipients, and to provide some insights regarding ad-block user segmentation among Swedish ad-block users. / Reklamer har funnits i digitala medier i stort sett hela dess livstid. De har däremot ökat med åren och fler finner att antalet reklamer är överdrivet. Online användare har därför börjat undvika reklam genom att installera ad-blockers. Flertal studier har gjort på hur ad-blockers fungerar och varför de används. Det har även gjorts studier på vilken demografi som mestadels använder ad-block. Unga män är generellt det som ses som den typiska ad-block användaren.Ingen har däremot forskat på om något särskilt personlighetsdrag är vanligare bland ad-blockanvändare. Syftet med denna forskning är därför att utforska om det finns några skillnader i personlighetsdrag mellan ad-blockanvändare och användare utan ad-block. Personlighets testet,The Big Five Inventory bestående av 10 frågor (BFI-10), används i en online undersökning för att få en förståelse om deltagares ad-block användande och deras personlighetsdrag. Personlighetsdragen som stod ut var bland kvinnliga ad-blockanvändare extraversion och neurotisicm. Syftet med studien är att ange ett möjligt sätt för annonsörer att undvika att deras meddelande faller på ointresserade och reklamundvikande mottagare, och att ge insikt gällandesegmentering av ad-blockanvändare bland Svenska ad-blockanvändare.

Background: Digital advertising has changed the way businesses market their goods or services, providing an attractive approach for clients to interact with content. The rapid growth of digital advertising is also associated with its efficacy and cost-savings measures which have seen an increase in digital ads’ exposure among users. However, this could result in negative attitudes towards adverts leading to ad avoidance as a growing trend. Many users apply self-control strategies to prevent the appearance of digital ads through ad-blocking technologies or subscriptions. This movement of ad avoidance incurs financial costs, and loss of revenue and makes it difficult to impact consumer behavior. Consequently, customer engagement becomes poor since users often find it hard to convince probable buyers not to view commercials therefore destroying the notion that advertising is a tool for promotion.   Purpose: This study explores ad avoidance and consumer choice in digital advertisements. It seeks to determine the influence of ad avoidance on consumers’ alternatives, and how it impacts their attitude, perception, and behavior regarding a particular product or service. The research will integrate what we already know and give recommendations on how marketing strategies can be used to mitigate negative outcomes arising from ad avoidance while increasing the involvement of customers with digital ads. Method: A qualitative method with an abductive approach conducted through semi-structured interviews with a focus group was carried through to examine the behaviors and motivations of people who avoid ads. Conclusion: In this study, the effect of ad avoidance on consumers’ mobile phone decision-making journey was explored. The study focuses on the consumer decision-making journey and its effects on purchase decisions. It is established that consumers consciously shun irritating ads which affect all the stages of the decision-making process. Ad avoidance influences the initial phases such as need recognition, information seeking, and evaluation of alternatives. Moreover, it also investigates advertising types, ad blockers, and people's views toward mobile versus desktop ads. Mainly, it highlights trust in advertising as crucial, especially in influencer marketing, difficulties posed by intrusive mobile advertisements as well as constraints inherent to ad-blockers.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T19:03:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 6547.pdf: 18207568 bytes, checksum: 3178104b1f9800bdbe79b401c9aeaf51 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-10-15 / Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos / Interactive multimedia applications can turn contents into a much more interesting presentation for users, promote more effective transmission of information, hold the user s attention and eventually promote more satisfaction. However, it is observed that the spread of such applications is very timid. Multimedia content, in general, has been summarized to video and hypermedia documents based on images and text. There are few effective initiatives interactivity with content that benefit from media synchronization. The environment of the Interactive Digital TV offers good potential for exploitation of sync media, however we observe numerous obstacles arising from the conservatism of the industry. The few options available to viewers often end up being ignored. Some reasons may explain the low adoption of interactive multimedia applications: (i) the production of such content is complex - existing authoring tools contribute little to simplify this process, keeping away unskilled designers and developers who choose to use content that can be captured in a simple way (usually video); (ii) the presentation of interactive multimedia content may require specific environments or applications not very widespread or require specialized development; (iii) the content consumption should occur on multiple platforms, making it expensive to develop specific applications for each; (iv) there is a lack of applications widely known to the general public that are really attractive and innovative and that stimulate interactivity. It is believed that this scenario can be changed and interactive multimedia applications can contribute to user satisfaction. It has been hypothesized that attractive interactive multimedia applications can be built with automatic or semiautomatic incorporation, to a leading media, of other media related to it. Related media may be the result of human authorship, with facilitators support, capturing context information, mining the collective interaction in presentation sessions with multiple viewers or combinations of these sources. Based on several published articles, authored or co-authored by the author of this thesis and related to projects managed by him, this text presents efforts and results that contribute to the validation of the hypothesis. These are works that address aspects of multimedia authoring, dissemination of multimedia applications on multiple platforms and media synchronization, all inherent to innovative applications with strong potential to captivate users and serve as catalysts for new applications. / Aplicações multimídia interativas podem tornar conteúdos muito mais interessantes para os usuários, promover transmissão de informação mais efetiva, prender a atenção do usuário e eventualmente promover maior satisfação. Entretanto, observa-se que a disseminação desse tipo de aplicação é muito tímida. Conteúdo multimídia, de maneira geral, tem se resumido a vídeo e documentos hipermídia baseados em imagem e texto. São poucas as iniciativas de interatividade efetiva com o conteúdo que se beneficiam da sincronização de mídias. O ambiente da TV Digital Interativa apresenta bom potencial para exploração do sincronismo de mídia, entretanto observam-se inúmeros obstáculos decorrentes do conservadorismo do setor. As poucas opções disponíveis aos telespectadores acabam sendo muitas vezes ignoradas. Algumas razões podem explicar a baixa adoção de aplicações multimídia interativas:( i) a produção desse tipo de conteúdo é complexa - as ferramentas de autoria pouco contribuem para simplificar esse processo, em geral afastando designers e desenvolvedores não especializados, que optam por utilizar conteúdos capturados de maneira simples (geralmente vídeo); (ii) a apresentação de conteúdo multimídia interativo pode requerer ambientes ou aplicações específicas não muito disseminadas ou que necessitam desenvolvimento especializado; (iii) é desejável que o consumo de conteúdo ocorra em múltiplas plataformas, tornando custoso o desenvolvimento específico para cada uma; (iv) não se conhecem aplicações que sejam inovadoras e que realmente estimulam a interatividade. Acredita-se que esse cenário pode ser mudado e que aplicações multimídia interativas possam contribuir com a satisfação do usuário. Tem-se como hipótese que aplicações multimídia interativas e potencialmente atrativas podem ser construídas com a incorporação automática ou semiautomática, a uma mídia principal, de outras mídias a ela relacionadas. As mídias relacionadas podem ser resultado de autoria humana, com apoios facilitadores, da captura de informações de contexto, de mineração da interação coletiva em sessões de apresentação com multiespectadores ou combinações dessas fontes. Fundamentando-se em artigos publicados, com autoria ou coautoria do autor desta tese e relacionados a projetos por ele gerenciados, apresenta-se neste texto os esforços realizados e os resultados que contribuem para a validação da hipótese. São trabalhos que abordam aspectos de autoria multimídia, da difusão de aplicações multimídia em múltiplas plataformas e da sincronização de mídias, todos inerentes a aplicações inovadoras com potencial de cativar usuários e servirem como catalisadores de novas aplicações.

El presente trabajo analiza los videos espontáneos de los adprosumers de la marca Takis en TikTok como posibles agentes de influencia en el panorama actual. Se decidió estudiar a la marca Takis por el impacto que tuvo en los usuarios de dicha red social en el año 2020-2021. Estos, en gran parte, se convirtieron en adprosumers de Takis, generando una gran cantidad de publicidad gratuita y espontánea. De ahí que se proponga en este estudio de paradigma fenomenológico y enfoque cualitativo, el análisis y contraste de opiniones y percepciones de consumidores que fueron testigos del fenómeno sucedido en dicha aplicación. Para ello, se entrevistó a diecisiete usuarios activos de TikTok, que a su vez, son consumidores de Takis. Entre los hallazgos principales se encontró un proceso en el modo de actuar de estos videos, este proceso sucita la auto-proyección del consumidor en el adprosumer, lo que posteriormente puede despertar la curiosidad por la marca. Finalmente, el estudio concluye que la espontaneidad, en los videos de los adprosumers, es un elemento que aporta emociones y percepciones positivas hacia la marca. Ya que estos videos actúan como un agente de influencia con el cual los usuarios de TikTok se identifican y empatizan por tratarse de personas sin auspicios, ni publicidad pagada. / The present study analyzes spontaneous videos published by adprosumers for the brand Takis on TikTok as potential agents of influence in the present context. The brand Takis was chosen for the impact that it has had on users of the chosen social network from 2020-2021. These users, to a large extent, have become adprosumers of Takis, creating a considerable amount of unpaid, spontaneous advertising for the brand. Therefore, this research, which is based on the phenomenological paradigm and employs a qualitative approach, conducts a contrast analysis of the opinions and perceptions of users witness to the studied phenomenon on said application. To carry out this analysis, 17 respondents who were both TikTok users and consumers of Takis were interviewed. One of the key findings obtained in this study is that there exists a specific behavior process in these videos; this process encourages consumers’ self-projection in the adprosumer, which may arouse curiosity surrounding the brand. Furthermore, this study finds that, in the videos created by adprosumers, spontaneity is an element that creates positive emotions towards and perceptions of the brand. These videos act as an agent of influence with which TikTok users identify and empathize as they are created by individuals that are neither sponsored nor paid for publicity. / Tesis

More and more people choose to watch television online through online video-on- demand services. For media corporations, such as the Modern Times Group (MTG), this means that video-on-demand will become an increasingly important source of revenue. Because video-on-demand is an online service, advertising products offered therein are in competition with other online advertising products. Currently, MTG’s video-on-demand advertising products are the same as on regular television, meaning they haven’t yet taken advantage of any advertising product development opportunities made possible by Internet technology. The purpose of this thesis is therefore to determine what MTG’s strategy should be to improve the competitiveness and revenue of their video-on-demand advertising products, and what key concerns need to be addressed in order to realize the determined strategy. By request of the commissioner, MTG, possible uses of segmentation to achieve the strategy are studied. The methods used to collect data include multiple interviews both at MTG and at their current advertising customers, as well as web analytics and a questionnaire. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis was used to answer the research questions. Findings suggest that MTG should strive to improve the engagement of their advertising products, through the use of contextual segmentation and self-segmentation. This goes against the current trend in online advertising, where segmentation is primarily used for ad targeting. The reason for not adhering to the trend is that MTG’s advertising customers operate in a television mindset, where ad targeting is of a very limited nature and engagement is of greater perceived value.

Reklam anses vara lika gammal som mänskligheten och lika universell som kultur. Ur den synvinkeln är reklam en del av det sociala livet, där människor gör utbyten som gynnar båda parterna. Under de senaste decennierna har samma mänsklighet upplevt den digitala världens intensiva tillväxt, där idag nästan allt går att finna. Det har aldrig varit lättare för företag att inte enbart marknadsföra sig globalt men även ha omedelbara interaktioner med deras konsumenter. På andra sidan spektrumet spåras alla internetanvändare genom sin digitala resa med företag och organisationer som tittar på deras varje steg för att sedan presentera personligt anpassade annonser. Denna utveckling i teknik och annonser på internet har lett till att påträngande annonser har blivit ett frekvent klagomål kring internetmarknadsföring. Adblock är ett filtreringsverktyg (tillägg) som kan appliceras för att blockera reklam på webben. Verktyget kom till vid sekelskiftet och har snabbt blivit ett populärt tillägg till webbläsare. Många har kommit att ta del av dess fördelar med att blockera banderoller, pop-ups och videoannonser. Samtidigt som reklamundvikande inte enbart orsakar företagen enorma förluster kan det ytterligare skada webbplatserna samt alla andra parter inblandade. Dessutom kan en fortsatt ökning av annonsblockerare i slutändan leda till slutet av gratis digitalt innehåll. Vidare kan ett reklamundvikande ske kognitivt, beteendemässigt eller mekaniskt utan att nyttja annonsblockerare. Detta kan också resultera i kostnader för företag som producerar reklam på internet. Därav ansågs en studie utförd på icke-annonsblockerarnas synpunkt vara nödvändig för att förstå vilka faktorer det är som gör att man inte installerar och använder en annonsblockerare.   Syftet med denna studie är att kartlägga och belysa individers bakomliggande faktorer till varför de inte installerar annonsblockerare. Teorigenomgången av denna studie omfattar ämnen om varför människor installerar eller avböjer från att installera applikationer, automaticity, approach-avoidance theory, inattentional blindness, och banner blindness theory. Den analyserade data i studien samlades in genom en kvalitativ metod med 18 semistrukturerade intervjuer med individer som har en kännedom om annonsblockerare och som även har medvetet valt att inte tillämpa tillägget på webben. Studien avgränsade sig till att undersöka människors uppfattning och upplevelse mot banderoller, pop-ups och videoannonser på endast datorer. Studien har upptäckt att respondenterna bland annat inte upplever reklam som störande, att de är tekniskt okunniga eller att reklam upplevs som intressanta. Vidare undviker dock respondenterna redan reklam genom en vana och erfarenhet. Dessutom att de fokuserar på sina behov som huvudändamålet när de besöker webbsidor. Vidare hade webbsidors design och miljö en påverkan i närmande och undvikande av reklam. Denna data tolkades och sedan analyserades vara faktorer till varför man inte blockerar reklam. Slutligen har studien även upptäckt att banderoller beroende på dess design eller budskap är den mest positivt mottagna annonstypen. / Advertisement is considered as old as mankind and as universal as culture. In that sense it is a part of social life itself, where mutually beneficial exchanges are made. During the last couple of decades that same mankind has experienced the intense growth of the digital world, where today almost anything and everything can be found. It has never been easier for companies to not only market themselves globally but have instant interactions with their consumers. On the other side of the spectrum, all internet users are tracked throughout their digital journey with companies and organizations watching their every move to then present personalized advertisement. Thus, intrusion have become a frequent complaint associated with online marketing. Adblock is a filtering tool (extension) that can be applied to block out advertisement on the web. This tool came to be at the turn of the century and have rapidly become a popular addition to browsers. Many have come to take part of its benefits of blocking out banners, pop-ups and video ads alike. While ad avoidance is not only causing companies tremendous amounts of loss, it could further harm the websites that carry them, and all other parties involved. Furthermore, a continued increase of ad blockers could ultimately lead to the end of free digital contents altogether. Moreover, ad avoidance can still take place cognitively, behaviourally or mechanically without the use of an adblocker. This can also cause losses for the companies producing ads on the internet. Thereof, a study executed upon the non-ad blockers’ point of view is deemed necessary in order to understand what factors prevent the installation or use of an adblocker.    The purpose of this study is to map out and highlight individuals’ underlying factors to why they do not install ad blockers. The literature review of this study covers the subjects of why people install or reject applications, automaticity, approach-avoidance theory, inattentional blindness, and banner blindness theory. The analysed data in the study was collected through a qualitative method with 18 semi-structured interviews with individuals who are not only aware of the existence of ad blockers but who have deliberately chosen not to make use of the extension. The study delimited itself to studying people’s perception and experience of banners, pop-ups and video ads through computers only. The study found that the respondents for instance do not experience ads as disruptive, that they are technologically inexpert or that ads are perceived as interesting. However, the respondents already do avoid ads through their habit and experience. Moreover, that they focus on their needs as their main purpose of visiting websites. Furthermore, websites’ design and environment did influence approaching or avoiding ads. This data was interpreted and analysed to be factors as to why people do not block ads. Finally, the study finds that banners depending on their design or message were the most positively received ad form.