Living On The Technology Era

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

1.0 Introduction

In this 21st Century, human beings are living on the technology era. The information technology, digital technology, nanotechnology and wireless technology are accelerating at breath-taking speeds (Pelletier and Dick, 2012). The improvement of these technologies lead to the especially the information and communication technologies (ICT) which include computers, tablets, smartphones, software applications and internet had bring the society to the ‘Third Industrial Revolution’, the ‘new economy’ or the ‘information age’ (University, 2011). In this information epoch, human relies on technological devices in their daily life as these technologies bring tons of conveniences to them.

Recent years, internet is not only the platform for people around the world to upload, download and review information they required, but it has transform to become a more mature place. It also becomes a place that full with potential for many companies and individuals to promote their goods and services which also called as e-commerce and e-business. This platform provides a convenience place for all people especially those that are busy with their job task and required to monitor the goods through online. Online money transactions also becoming so common for all internet users in the purchasing the goods without moving a single step out from home.

Other than the searching for information resources and e-commerce, internet social networks had become a platform for all internet users. Nowadays, communication between people with people highly through the social network sites, it had become parts of life for people around the world especially Generation Y. In year 2010, people around the world spend more than 11 billion hours per month in total on Facebook from the 750 million users (Lawrence, 2012). They are so active in the communication with the friends, family and others through these internet social network websites.

"Facebook was built to accomplish a social mission - to make the world more open and connected."- Mark Zuckerberg.

The rapidly increase of the internet social networks as it brings a lot of advantages for the user. The social network has provided a place for people not only improving the better relationship between peoples, but it helps to let people decrease the gap and distance among peoples. Therefore it also consider as a place of entertainment and sharing interest through internet connection (Hadija et al., 2012). There are many examples of internet social network sites around the world such as Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, LinkedIn, YouTube and MySpace (Hadija et al., 2012).

The rapidly improvement of the internet surfing speed of telecommunication technology, smartphone and tablet technology, also directly have the relationship on the growth increases of social network sites viewing volumes (Cooper and Robert, 2010). Generation Y spend most of their time in the online social network sites daily as it had become a target place for the advertisers and businesses. Most businesses and advertisers try to offer the advertisements in the online social website to get the attention from the users and boost the company’s sales. Advertisement through online social network sites is new for the marketers and it can be call as the revolution of advertising from the traditional printed advertisements or it is the line extension for the advertisers in the methods of advertising. According to a research, quarter of people get the news from social networks in year 2012 (Lawrence, 2012). In year 2011, there are only 4 out of 10 people said that they get the news from newspaper (Lawrence, 2012).

1.1 Research background

The development of Web 2.0 has affected the consumers, particularly Generation Y. Generation Y try not to purchase the printed newspaper but choose to get the information from the online media platforms (Lee and Alice, 2010). The rapidly decrease in the sales of printed newspaper because of the boomed up of social network. Generation Y uses of social media and blogging services to get the current issues or news and paid attention on the non-news information online. Consumers view news through online make the advertisers to restrategized their action and have to shift the focus more deeply into online advertising (Graham and Smart, 2010).

Advertising means the offering of products, services or any others important view through the printed medium, internet medium or any public communication intermediary (Fathima et al., 2012). Advertising can be considered as a huge amount of investment and it had been practices as an evidence of the economies of the world. The advertisement message delivered can be simple or it can be complicated by adding the responses of attitudes or it has a 3 dimensions effect (Parsons and Schumacher, 2012). Advertising can be divided into two groups, which are directional and brand building. Directional advertising is the searching of advertisement by people due to his or her interest while brand building is the marketers post the advertisements into the public media and make the products or services becoming more popular (Wang et al., 2002).

Advertising on internet increase the importance and opportunity in the long term. Website research companies forecast an increase in value of $22 billion US dollar in year 2004 in the internet advertising medium (Gretzel et al., 2000). Most of the online advertisements are created by the website design company and minority advertisements created by the company selves own. Successful advertisement on the website needs a lot of innovation idea and concept compared to the traditional advertisement which only putting banners with simple description and design. However, the basic knowledge of traditional advertising is needed before venture in online advertisement industry. Online advertisement not only a basic advertisement medium, but it also becomes a flexibility information representation, collaboration, interaction and transactions (Gretzel et al., 2000). In order to support that, online advertisement is built to be easily customization so people will more easily adopt with the ads (Wang et al., 2002).

Traditional advertising models is opposite with the online advertising. Traditional advertising medium for example television control the audience and force them to look over the advertisements. Online advertisement mostly needed the permission from the consumers by giving the opportunity to volunteers. The volunteers are more likely to pay attention on the advertisement they are look into before purchasing (Gretzel et al., 2000). The Online Advertising Expenditure Report (OAER) shows that traditional advertising market is softening while the online advertising in showing 10 percent year on year stable growth. The statistic shows that more advertisers are noticed the changes in the advertising trend from general advertising to online medium (Writer, 2012).

"Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories you tell."- Seth Godin.

People are highly socialize through online social networking had turned the method of promoting and advertising of products and services. Human are widely connected to each other had generated word-of-mouth by sharing the information through the online social medium. Marketer need more focus in the delivered of stories and information that have high customer attractive rate in order to get the customer attention and effectively generate word-of-mouth among customers.

The most recent issue to be discussed is the online social media advertisement. The volume of Facebook social media users had reaches 51.15% from the total population in Malaysia, which around 14millions people. The majority of user age distribution on Facebook in Malaysia is from 18 years old to 34 years old and this group of people are fall under Generation Y (Socialbakers, 2012). From the top website ranking in Malaysia, Facebook had ranked number 1, YouTube number 4, Blogspot.com number 5, Twitter number 8 and Blogger.com ranked number 9 (Alexa, 2012). These data shows that online social media websites become more and more popular.

The advertisers start to target their customers through the hottest social platform but not only focus on normal internet websites. Study about the user’s perception towards online social network advertising can let the advertisers have a better idea and direction on what advertisement should they offer in the online social medium and how they can successfully target their customers so the customers will spend some times in viewing of the advertisement.

1.2 Problem Statement

There is a study on the evolution of marketing on how marketers and advertisers can have a better connect with the consumers through communicating and developing strong connection relationship between companies and ever-adapting customers (Campbell and Jeffrey, 2010). The study found that positive behaviours of human being towards the advertisement will be more easily persuaded by the particular advertising and take an action towards the advertisement. Most marketers advertise the advertisement without separate the internet users into targeting groups but combining them together even the advertisement is globalize. The study also focuses on the demographic differences and their lifestyle segmentation towards the response in the advertisement online (Yang and Kenneth, 2004). However, the focuses of age of respondents are not highly being research and therefore, study on the view of advertising among generation Y can be recommended.

Research shows that Generation Y people have lesser impact from the advertisement compare to others generation people (Fathima et al., 2012). Furthermore, some researches focus on the factors that affect the attitude of people towards advertising. Those researches are involve the internet and printed media but hardly to find it about online social media. They are focus on the perspective and finding the consumers perception of different types of advertisements (Wang et al., 2002). In the finding, the area of study on the types of advertising is wider and therefore, study that narrow down the types of advertising and focus only on the online social advertising will have a higher accuracy outcome.

At the same time, there are few research focus on the prevention and avoidance of advertise on the online platforms. They found some prove that advertise in the online places include online social media will somehow bring negative effect in the user response. Some users just ignore on the advertisement and some are lesser trust on the advertisement online (Kelly et al., 2010). Those researches are focus only internationally but not narrow down the geographical in the target respondents. Study found that there are the fact that the contents inside the online social network websites much more attractive than the advertisement, so they will not purposely focus on the advertisement in the online social network. The study listed out the rapid increases of social media user’s volume but there is only few respondents are target in finished of the study (Hadija et al., 2012).

Moreover, there is no research that only concentrates the study of advertising at online social website in Generation Y Malaysia but most of the studies are based on the online advertising in western countries. The social network popularity has lot of difference between western and Asia people. The Web 2.0 has just become hot cake in Asia that means the online social media websites is just a start in Asia countries. Study the young generation’s perception towards their perception in Malaysia will be a new turn so others include the advertisers which plan to advertise in the online social media websites will have a brighter direction.

This study attempted to get the perception of the individual who have the experience in the online social networking and click through or viewing the advertisement that posted in those social media network. There is insufficient evidence in the literature which discuss about this issue. On the other hand, there is more evidence showing on the attitude of people towards online advertising. Advertising at the online and advertising inside the social media website are showing different in the direction. People might have a difference in the perception towards the online advertisement and the online social network advertisement.

1.3 Research question

What are the perceived factors that can influences Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement in Malaysia?

Is credibility one of the factors that can affect Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement?

Will informativeness affect Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement?

Is entertaining one of the factors that can influence Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement?

Is perceived interactivity one of the factors that can influence Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement?

Is irritation one of the factors that can influence Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement?

1.4 Research objective

To examine the perceived factors those significantly influence Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement in Malaysia.

To examine the relationship between credibility and Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement.

To examine the relationship between informativeness and Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement.

To examine the relationship between entertainment and Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement.

To examine the relationship between perceived interactivity and Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement.

To examine the relationship between irritation and Generation Y’s perception towards online social network advertisement.

1.5 Scope of study

The centre of attention in this study was the population of Generation Y in Malaysia. In order to make this study more reliability, the scope of Generation Y had been set on the person who only joining in any online social network sites. This scope is to obtain the perception of individuals from Generation Y in Malaysia on the online social network advertisements.

The primary data and secondary data will be used in the study. The primary data was collected through questionnaire survey and analysed in statistical form to explain the results whereas the secondary data was obtained from existing sources such as journals, article and websites to strengthen the structure of this study.

The selection of sample respondents will be more focused on the university students in Malaysia as university student mostly joining in any online social network. The study will survey equal on the number of male and female gender. The class sampled encompassed students from varying level of education including Foundation, Diploma, Degree, Master and PHDs standards as well as others that fall under Generation Y category.

1.6 Significant of study

This study is to examine the effectiveness of current online social network advertising towards the users as there is lack of research in this area. This study will show the response and action of users on how they will react towards the advertisement in the online social networks. The user’s response will reflect the successive of the advertisement on the online social network. This study serves as an informational and reliable source to the public especially those have no idea with the online social network advertisement.

This study focus on the Generation Y in Malaysia, who are living in the technology advanced era. By doing research in the range of Generation Y, it helps the data collection to be more precise and higher accuracy result when it touches about technological services. Furthermore, this study can provide information for the online marketers to understand the trend of advertisements and making any modification and continuously innovate so they can survive in the strong competitions of this globalization of online social network. This study shows the higher favourable on types of products advertisement and the placement of advertisement in the online social network that can increase the attractiveness to the Generation Y.

In addition, this study will also able to provide the trend flow of current social network users attitude and perception on the advertisement indirectly so the developers of these online social network able to understand what types of advertisement more suitable to be offered to the users and the placement of the advertisements on the website. The understanding of the user’s perception will be able to make the changes of the website on time, and this will influence the faster user’s increases volume and better user satisfaction level.

As for the future study and research, this study is providing a foundation concept of the perceptions that influences online social network advertisement in Malaysia. Moreover, this study also serves as a reference for future researchers to conduct different studies across various areas and backgrounds of the society.

1.7 Justification of study

Research found that a business is hardly to expand the market size and share without the advertising activity take part (Puranik, 2012). On the other hand, it means that advertisement is considered important in the marketing and promoting the goods and services. Advertisement in the right places and right mediums have the ability to gain customer attention.

The importance of internet in recent years has changed the original structure of advertising industry. People especially Generation Y rarely spend time or not even viewing the newspapers in their daily life. The internet advancement had switch users from getting news from offline to online especially social network sites. People can easily view on the most recent news in the first minute after the incident happened and it is costless.

The shift of consumers from offline to online had affected the drop in the printed advertisement spending. Advertisers try to find the correct ways in the marketing and advertising through internet medium such as online social networks. Advertisers need to forecast and analyze the attitude and behavior of customers to understand the effective ways that can attract customer’s attention towards the advertisement on the online social networks.

This study provided public an insight on the perception of Generation Y towards the online social network advertisement. The perception of people towards the online social advertisement can be credibility, informativeness, entertainment, perceived interactivity and irritation. Without customer trust and credibility, advertisers are hardly to attract attention of user in clicking through the advertisement. So the advertiser need to have a strong ability in delivered the message of advertisement to the audience by using the user acceptable advertising strategy.

Social network sites are strong in attracting the number of customers to join on the sites and the earning profit from the advertisement had become a concerned issue. For example, Facebook had the advertisement revenues of US$ 3 billion in the company annual report and estimated earnings of US$ 5 billion in year 2012 with 60% growth rate (Grove, 2012). The strong growth amount in the advertising revenue shows that social network advertising still at the growth stage but not yet matured. There will be many uncertainties on the effectiveness of advertising in the online social network sites.

So this study is to examine and find out more precise on the value perception of Generation Y towards online social network advertisement in Malaysia. This paper will serves as helpful and useful reference for further researchers on the online social network advertisement in other countries.

1.8 Structure of the project

Chapter One of the research outlined the introduction of the study. It described the research background of the study and identified the research problem through the problem statement. The research objective had been listed and research question were formulated that parallel with the research objective in the study. Besides, the scope of study and significant of study were explained in detail in this chapter. The chapter was summarized in brief so readers are able to understand more about the research.

Chapter Two highlighted the literature review by giving the prior studies made on the same range on the topic of the research on the perception of online social network advertising. This chapter stated five independent variables that contribute to the online social network advertisement, which include credibility, informativeness, entertainment, perceived interactivity and irritation based on the existing researches. The ideas of independent variables and dependent variable had been developed and lastly, this chapter was summarized.

Chapter Three focused on the research methodology used in the data collection purpose of the research. The theoretical framework was established and hypothesis statements were developed. The chapter also further explained the approach of the research, data collection methods, measurement, sampling design, the unit of analysis, data analysis techniques and also measuring scales used for the research.

1.7 Chapter summary

The revolution of technology had brought human into a new living style and it was so successful in becoming a part of human. Technology improvements bring conveniences in getting news, information and social with others. It shortened the distance of this world so we can get the newest news and information around the world in a blink of eye. At the same time, it’s also easier and faster the connection and communication of people around through the online social networking.

This study shows the changes of trend of advertising from the traditional ways which through the printed medium and media to the internet advertising and online social media network advertising. The huge volume of internet users and rocket speed of increases on the online social network population are the main reason for the marketers to shift their advertising method.

There have been many studies touched about the online advertising around the world but yet the studies on the online social network advertisement still very limited. The few studies in this area mostly research about the attitude of the users towards the advertisements and the negative effect of the online social advertisement. There was a need to test the user’s perception towards the online social media advertisement. The social media network is at the hot current issue and the online social advertising just at the start-up level so many uncertainty need to be find out for better improvement.

The conduct of this research may bring a positive contribution to the advertising companies in Malaysia especially the online social network market as it is still a very new ways for them. So the advertisers have more ideas on how the tactics they need in the catching of the Generation Y online user’s attention in viewing the advertisements.

CHAPTER TWO

LITERATURE REWIEW

2.1 Introduction

The literature review describes the research topic from the perspective of recent studies by various researchers. A detailed analysis of advertisement concepts is discussed as well as the audience perception towards online social network advertisement. Moreover, this chapter also includes a chronological order of the development and renovation of advertisement and how the advertisement outcome in Malaysia. In addition, in the demographic aspect, Generation Y and their perceptions are explained based on prior research. Furthermore, the chapter focuses on the intention towards online social network advertisement as a dependent variable. This is followed by prior research views of individual determinants of advertisement from persistent use and reliance on online social networks. This is followed by a summary of the key points of the chapter.

2.2 Defining advertisement

According to Taflinger and Richard (1996), Advertisement can be defined as the impersonal communication and delivery of information that usually compelling about products and services that usually paid by particular sponsors through different media. Consumers try to group all the form of commercial marketing and promotional activity as advertising (Schultz and Don, 1995). Advertising is known as the promotion or marketing of ideas, goods or services by an individual or sponsor company (Puranik, 2012). In the current world, a business hardly want to promote its company and product branding if there is unused of advertising method (Puranik, 2012).Advertising have the potential of generating affirmative reaction for instance higher market awareness, consumer preference, brand image and quality rivalry (Luo and Pieter, 2010).

Advertising is a marketing activity that consists on multi-billion dollar of investment in this economical world. Advertising design can be vary in the form from simple information such as hours, prices or places to a high complexity messages that including images, ideas and behavioral responses, advertisement itself become an accepted method of communicating machine that delivered message to existing and potential customers (Parsons and Schumacher, 2012).

Advertising had been widely used by organizations to create its products and services awareness. At the same time, it also became a marketing tool to build a positive and strong image of its brands to represent the products and services in the sense to attract customer attention (Shah and Akbar, 2008). In the adding of creativity in advertisement, it consists of higher probability to gain consumer attention and loyal value to brands. These benefits providing the ability of bring up the sales and revenue of the organization (West et al., 2008).

Moreover, advertising may increase the customer reaction speed and speeding the market permeates process (Luo, 2010). The improvement in the sales resulting in more and faster cash flows in the organization. Advertising will improve the company competitiveness and achieve the greater efficiency in adapting the changes from outside environment compare to its competitors (Luo and Pieter, 2010). All of these advantages of advertising enable the organization earn for higher financial income and it is worth for an organization market the products, services or even the brands through advertising (Joshi and Hanssens, 2009).

2.3 Development of Advertisement

Traditional and General Advertising

The history of advertising was focusing to the benefits of product promotion by Egyptians and Greeks and the early examples of advertising were found in the ruins of Pompeii (Tungat and Mark, 2007). Cao (2001), a China Cultural Relics Association researcher found that China was the first country using paper advertisements as they were the founder of paper making technology and China also the first country that using trade marks on commodities. Paper was taken to Europe in 12thCentury; oral advertisements were famous and popular till 1450 before the printing press in 1450. China modern advertisements appears after the economic reform to opening the country to the outside world in 19th century (Cao, 2001).

The English printed advertisement was started in year 1477 by William Caxton and the word "advertisement" had begun to be used in year 1666 by London Gazette (Boone and Gloria, 2007). In 16th century, advertising used for the purposed of spread and expanding of religious, political and economic (O'Barr and William, 2005). Sponsors placed advertisements in newspapers that promised solutions to solve problems and advertisements that shows the realization of hopes and fulfillment of dreams (O'Barr and William, 2005).In America, the printed advertisement was started in year 1704 under the colonial period and the first advertisement showed the notices of tangible goods (Boone and Gloria, 2007). The traditional advertising methods was over in year 1860s and after the industrial revolution in the United States during 1870, the strong developing of technologies make the modern advertising emerged (Boone and Gloria, 2007). At those 18th Century, all the advertising was based on printed media including newspapers, magazines and posters (Boone and Gloria, 2007). The advertising agents were become a new services in the advertising industry and start providing the services for the advertising sponsors in the middle of 18th century. The advertising contents become more complicated as the advertisers start to put in slogan for the advertisements in the late of 18th century. After the emerging of branding as a member of marketing, it had been used as a new pattern of advertising (O'Barr and William, 2005).

The radio and television era started in 19th century and that was the time of reformation of advertising, more and more products joining the advertising industry to promoting their products (Boone and Gloria, 2007). The trend of worldwide advertising were start later in the mid of 19th century (Tungat and Mark, 2007). The improvement of broadcast technologies in that era brings the advertising into global stage (Boone and Gloria, 2007). Advertising methods had a gradually changes from time to time due to the new technologies and new techniques (Richards and Curran, 2002). Advertising got a direct relationship with the industrial revolution. The rise of newspaper and mass medium make advertising become more popular (Tungat and Mark, 2007).

Internet Advertising

In the late of 19th century, the advertisement on the internet begins (Boone and Gloria, 2007). In 20th century, advertising become very common for everyone and it growth faster in the mail advertising sending (Tungat and Mark, 2007). The booming of internet technologies affects the decline in the mass media user volume. The advertising becomes more focused in creating more targeted groups of viewers as the internet is worldwide access. Marketers use internet surfing habits, page view volumes and patterns to estimate the individuals interests and buying behaviors of individual, making online advertising more effectiveness and efficiency (O'Barr and William, 2005).

Currently, advertisers continuously move the trends of advertising to the online advertising and social media advertising (Tungat and Mark, 2007). The advertising industry is continuously growing as ZenithOptimedia make a prediction of raising 4.8% in the advertising medium in year 2012, 5.3% in year 2013 and 6.1% of growth in advertising industry (Maddox and Kate, 2012). The strong growth of the advertising medium is mainly because of the fast growing of World Wide Web (Rabil et al., 2010). Online advertising will going to overtake newspapers advertising ranking and become world’s second largest advertising medium in year 2013 and just behind television advertising (Rabil et al., 2010).

The online advertisement shows a clear advantage for the consumers that they can choose whether going to view or click over the advertisement or not (Wakolbinger et al., 2009). Online advertisements not only offer different size and color of advertisement which same as printed or paper advertisements, but it also offer various forms of animation such as interactive flash banners, video advertisements, layer advertisements and others (Wakolbinger et al., 2009). The term online advertising is the combination of all sorts of internet advertising, game advertising, email advertising, and keyword advertising. Recent years, online social advertising is closely related to online advertising as they are offering the highly similarity of advertisement (Wakolbinger et al., 2009).

The acquisition of online social network company such as YouTube and MySpace by the internet giant, Google and traditional media companies, News Corp had showing the potential of generate highly advertising profit through these social networking websites through their own news released (Erik, 2007). Push-based advertising strategy had been implementing in the social network sites on the paid advertising to influence the users and boost the sales outcome (Clemons et al., 2007).

According to (Sinclair, 2008), the sales on the online social network advertising is expected to have 155% increases compared to last year US 1.2 billion dollars. Facebook third quarter revenue had an increase of US 200 million dollars to 1.09 billion dollar (Edwards, 2012). The revenue mostly comes from the advertisers and marketing purposes in the Facebook social site. The huge growth of the advertising in the online social network shows there is a potential to gain profit from the social network sites by advertisers.

Comparison between traditional advertising and internet advertising expenses globally

According to MarketingCharts (2011), the total global advertisement spending will reached the percentage increased of 11% from year 2011 to year 2013. Although the advertisement expenses increase from year to year, but most of the organizations will cut down the advertising expenses that they spend in the newspaper and magazine medium. The decrease in the investment of these two types of medium shows that the volume of readers are decreases and the profit return for the advertising investment in the newspaper and magazine is reduce from time to time (MarketingCharts, 2011).

The global growth rate of traditional advertising will be slowdown year by year and the expenses of advertising in the traditional ways had becoming lower than expected rate such as radio, cinema and outdoor advertising. Television advertising expense will have an 12% increases in between year 2011 and year 2013 and it is still the strongest advertising medium among all the advertising medium (MarketingCharts, 2011).

The internet advertising spending have very strong and powerful rise from year to year. The spending in the internet advertising will have a roughly 33% increase between year 2011 and year 2013 through the forecast. The great percentage growth of internet advertisement around the world had become a threat for the others advertising medium (MarketingCharts, 2011). Out of 7 mode of advertisements, it is observed that internet ads had a continuous growth of demand, whereas others are maintaining or decreasing. Therefore, the needs of studying online social network advertisement is essential and plays a significant roles in marketing strategy especially among Generation Y audience.

Figure 2.1: Global Advertising Expenditure by Medium from 2009 to 2013

http://www.marketingcharts.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/zenithoptimedia-advertising-expenditure-by-medium-2009-2013-oct11.gif

Source: Marketing Charts, 2011.

Figure 2.2: Global advertisement share percentage by each medium between year 2009 and 2013.

zenithoptimedia-global-share-of-total-ad-spend-2009-2013-oct11.gif

Source: Marketing Charts, 2011.

2.4 Advertisement outcome in Malaysia

Malaysia is a special country that combined by multi-racial and ethnic groups (Malays, Chinese and Indians) have different religion, culture, beliefs and behaviors (Hashim and Azirah, 2010). The language used in advertising is important as it can determine the success rate of an advertisement (De Run, 2006). The languages used in the advertising in Malaysia become a consideration as because of the ethnic differences (Ernest et al., 2010). Language used in advertisement in Malaysia is highly important as it have strong relation with the culture and races to all Malaysians (Kuppuswamy, 2003). Advertising in Malaysia need to have multimodal with difference in language but message delivered and information transferred are the same (Hashim and Azirah, 2010). Furthermore, combination form of languages in an advertisement also had been used in the society (Hashim and Azirah, 2010).

Malaysia’s advertisement mostly use of similes and metaphor in the explanation of the advertising (Ramli and Khamis, 1993). Advertisements of property in Malaysia have high resemblance in the information posted (Hashim and Azirah, 2010). The visuals and texts interact of the advertisements need to be considered as the social and culture difference between the ethnic groups (Hashim and Azirah, 2010).

Printed media marketing is one of the importance media in helping the development of cultural and economic in the developing countries (Hashim and Azirah, 2010). Advertising in Asian countries have a differences in the sense of products compare to advertising in Western Countries (Hashim and Azirah, 2010). Mostly Asia countries are in the stage of developing including Malaysia which has the cultural differences between countries. Malaysia’s printing advertisements mostly using the influencing and pushing method to reach their objective of sales. Individual are force to accept the advertising since the printing advertising are posted in the obvious places, sound delivery and attractive visual video advertisements showing by media are repeated continuously (Hashim and Azirah, 2010).

The speedy development of technology and social network sites had changes the game of advertising industry. Many companies take the first step by taking parts in the online and social network sites as the promotional tools for example advertising to gain the advantage of the changes of the economy transformation from offline focusing to online attention (Calisir, 2003). Advertising on internet had become a more mature and flexible channel as there are more types of goods and services are able to advertise online (Ducoffe, 1996).

Every user has different view on the website advertisement, strong belief of the web user towards the advertisement will have higher level of buying intention (Lim et al., 2010). These kinds of user have a stronger faith to belief that it is worth to own those goods and services through information on the advertising (Lim et al., 2010).

According to Boardroom Research (2011), the forecast on allocation of marketing budgets in year 2011 had been carried out. The research shows that 39% of the marketing budget allocation in year 2011 will be used as advertising expenses in Malaysia and it coverage the highest percent from the overall marketing budget spending. The advertisement include traditional media and non-traditional media. More than one-third of the marketing budget used in advertising purposed shows that advertisement in Malaysia have highest percent in the profit returned from the overall marketing activities (Boardroom Research, 2011).

Figure 2.3: Allocation of marketing budgets in year 2011

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Source: Boardroom Research, 2011

The allocations of advertising budgets from non-traditional media such as online, mobile etc. that show in the figure 2.4 occupy 39% from the total advertising budgets in Malaysia in year 2011. The non-traditional media consist of digital advertisement, online advertisement, e-mail advertisement, mobile advertising, online social network advertising and others online advertisement. From the figure 2.5, it shows that social media advertisement one quarter from the total advertising budget and it occupy highest percent compare to the others online advertising medium in Malaysia. The marketers predict the social media advertising and mobile advertising are still in the fast growth state from year 2012 to year 2016 in Malaysia.

Figure 2.4: Allocation of advertising budgets in Malaysia year 2011C:\Users\Tay Khey Tong\Desktop\ScreenHunter_01 Jan. 21 14.21.gif

Source: Boardroom Research, 2011

Figure 2.5: Allocation of Advertising Budgets for Non-Traditional Media in Malaysia year 2011

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Source: Boardroom Research, 2011

2.5 Generation Y

The basic definition of Generation Y based on the age structure is those that born from year 1977 to year 1995 (Barlett, 2004). Paul states difference in age stages which from year 1982 to year 2001 (Paul, 2001). Generation Y also can be known as Echo Boomers or Millennium Generation where music, television and video games that consist of high graphics growth fast in Generation Y (Paul, 2001).

Generation Y’s thinking are more accessible than Generation X, they try to think broader for problem solving (Paul, 2001). Generation Y is being a happy go lucky generation, they more likely to enjoy their life and not always shows the pessimistic feeling. Their attitudes towards the power of earning money are more optimistic as they thought they will have an affordable lives when they growth up (Paul, 2001). Furthermore, Generation Y is willing to spend their money to catch-up the trending life which also known as high consumption tendencies to enjoy life. The cons of too enjoying life is having large amount of debts among these generation (Paul, 2001). The high purchasing power of Generation Y shows that they have high experience in the bargaining of prices towards goods (Heaney, 2007).

These ages of people start have a touch to electronic devices at the earlier age (Allerton, 2001). The technology advancement allows people live in this generation become more proficient towards the use of electronic devices and electronic media (Murray, 2000). Generation Y had done most of the things through online services especially e-mails, e-Commerce and e-Finance (Murray, 2000). Generation Y socialization are actively connected through the air which include the peer communication and online social network communication (Harrington, 2011). They are also motivated to communicate more with family members, friends and improved the socialization circle (Harrington, 2011). Wilson, 2003 states that more than 50% of youth in United States had their own mobile device.

The improvement in the wireless technology allows them to ease the communication channel among each other through the online social network and short message services (SMS) (Kumar and Lim, 2008). A data shows that the average SMS sent in a month among generation Y are exceed 120 messages per month (Perez and Gen, 2006). Currently, youth spend mostly of their daily time in the online social network for example Facebook, Twitter, Blogger and YouTube. At the same time, the mobile messengers or networking sites for example Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger and Line Messenger also improve rapidly as a purpose of social communication. All these applications in the smartphone not only can send message, but also voice and visual message and sharing of pictures and files (Zelenka and Anne, 2007).

2.6 The Growth of Online Social Network

Human are trying to have a wider social network in his or her "circle", the concept had been implemented in the internet which called as social networking sites (Nitin et al., 2011). Web 2.0 technologies are the fresh tools that used in building of online social network sites (Forbes, 2003). Online social networking sites have a fast dramatically growth since 2004, it change the role play of the internet (Vogt et al., 2008).Social networking sites connecting people from the global of different countries. Social networking sites made people connected to each other whether known or unknown and easier the communication among people and sharing self’s profile between each other (Nitin et al., 2011). Social networking sites allow people share similar interests and having discussion on their like and unlike matter together (Nitin et al., 2011). Young generation used social network sites to increase their social circle other than offline social (Forbes, 2003).

Online social network can be the linked or ongoing relations of range of people in a frequent contract socially for some reasons through the network (Clemons et al., 2007). The first online social network launched in year 1997 by SixDegrees.com. At those times, Social Network Sites were only applicable to lets the users adding the user profile and find their friends through the friend list (Boyd and Ellison, 2007). The internet technology, the surfing speed and high cost of network fees are the main causes of lesser people joining the social network sites. The continuous improvement on social network technology by adding more and more features in the social network sites and improvement of internet surfing technology affect more people joining the social network sites (Boyd and Ellison, 2007).

The launched of a profitable online social dating site, Friendster in year 2002 that focused on introducing people around with similar interests and connecting then together as friends (Cohen, 2003). From year 2003 onwards, the social network sites boomed, there are more and more social network developers joining into this social medium. Most of the social network sites have their own targeting groups of people. For example, Boyd and Ellison (2007) stated that LinkedIn is targeting and focusing on the business people and it is categorize in professional social network sites. MySpace asked the musicians to join its social network site to attract the musicals fans and differentiated itself by adding more feature than comparing to Friendster by allowing users to personalize the user pages (Boyd, 2006).

Online social networking sites are a recent year’s trend (O’Murchu et al., 2004). In the rise of popularity in social network site, the phenomenon spread globally. Friendster, MySpace, Orkut, Hi5, QQ, and Bebo focus and targeting on their own segmentation and make the social network sites starting become parts of daily life of youth (McLeod, 2006). After that blogging services that consist of social network sites features also become highly popular (Boyd and Ellison, 2007). The improvement of social network sites indicates a shifting of organizational online communities and start invest money in promoting and advertising through social network sites (Boyd and Ellison, 2007).

Social networking site connects and presents the people based on the user profile of the person with the information they store and share about themselves. The user profile can let the third party to understand who they are and expand their friendship volume (O’Murchu et al., 2004). Online social network has open up the new way of community relationships that traditionally preoccupation bounded solidarity and neighborhood (Wellman and Barry, 1999). It freely link all among others without counting for the distance (Wellman and Berry, 1999). Online social network not only allow individuals to build their own profile, but it allow the sharing of connection with list of others users and the connections make by others within the server or system as well (Boyd and Ellison, 2007).

Social network sites have integrated into the user daily practices (Boyd and Ellison, 2007). There are a lot of online social networks that supports a huge volume of peoples with their interests and practices by the differences of technological affordances. The quick growths of social network sites allow people to share their interests together even though they are strange to each other (Boyd and Ellison, 2007). The interests can be any activities, views or pages that using common languages. These online social network sites also support most of the new information and communication tools which include the mobile connectivity, blogging and file sharing (Boyd and Ellison, 2007). The growth of online social network allow anyone to add "friends" to their own network to share their activities doesn’t show the similarity of trust level compared to the actual face to face friendship (Clemons et al., 2007).

According to Alexa (2013), the ranking of the online social network had been arranged through the number of users and total daily page view of the website. Most of the top world websites are social networking sites in the recent years. Facebook was ranked number two from the total website world ranking with more than 1 billion of users (Alexa, 2013). The advertising revenues of Facebook Company were around US$ 3.1 billion and the company has more than 1 billion of users around the world (Clickz, 2012).

YouTube was a subsidiary of Google Company with an annual income of US$1.6 billion and it was ranked number 3 in the world ranking (Sheet, 2011; Alexa, 2013). Twitter able to generate around triple earning in the revenue of 2011 compare to year 2010 which had growth to US$ 140 million in year 2011 (O’Dell, 2011). LinkedIn had a continuous growth of revenue year by year and reached US$ 140.8 million while MySpace had generated US$ 184 million in year 2011 (Hachman, 2011; O’Dell, 2011).

According to the table 2.1, most of the online social networks are launched during 20th century (Alexa, 2013). The strong growth of the online social networks and the rapid increases of the number of users in the social networking sites affect the advertising role playing. The marketers changes their advertising method from the traditional ways to the social network sites to attract the young generation consumers especially Generation Y people (Biakelsey, 2012). In the figure2.6, the marketers had forecast the rocket speed increases in the revenue generate by advertisement from US$ 4.6 billion in year 2012 to US$ 9.2 billion in year 2016 (Biakelsey, 2012).

Table 2.1: Top 5 social network sites and the revenue from advertisement in year 2011

Ranking

Social Network Site

Revenue in year 2011

(US Dollar)

Launched date

Number of user

1

Facebook

3154 Million

4 Feb 2004

1 Billion

2

YouTube

1600 Million

14 Feb 2005

-

3

Twitter

140 Million

21 March 2006

500 Million

4

LinkedIn

522 Million

5 May 2003

200 Million

5

MySpace

184 Million

August 2003

25 Million

Adapted From: Alexa top sites, 2013.

Figure 2.6: Global Social Network Advertisement Spending Forecast

http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/BIA-Local-Social-Media-Spend.jpg

Source: Biakelsey, 2012.

2.7 Prior Research on Independent Variables

2.7.1 Credibility

According to Gavin and Li (2010), credibility is the level of related profession information sources that a company able to provide from the customer perceived. Credibility can strongly affect the attitude of consumers towards the advertisement (Gavin and Li, 2010). The credibility of advertisers is based on how the firm or organization fulfills the customer needs and wants by through the serving of goods and services. An organization is able to satisfy the customers by creating the positive image and attitude in respondent their request (Gavin and Li, 2010).

Advertising credibility defined as the reality and trust of advertising by the consumers (Mackenzie and Lutz, 1989). Furthermore, credibility also can be differentiated from different of advertising media. Research shows that printed advertising achieve higher of credibility than advertising online with the same kind of message provided unless the advertisement is advertise by the strong brand company (Azeem and Haq, 2012). Online social networking sites are able to be accessed by all and the complicated of information had shown the sign of shorting trust and credibility (Kelly and Bus, 2008). Youth especially Generation Y shows that they treat online information more credible which have an opposite finding with some of other research even though online shows more untrusted information than the offline media (Johnson and Kaye, 1998).

Youth customers are more credible on the websites that supply information through video and music (Kelly and bus, 2008). Advertisers hope to integrate into the youth environment in the online social network sites to get the trust of the doubtful market that full with potential (Kelly and Bus, 2008). Kelly and Bus (2008) point out that advertiser can use combination advertisement campaign on more type of media such as television and online social network sites to decrease the doubtful level of the customers. The advertisers should respect the youth customers by treating them with reliable promises that they had advertise in order to claim for credibility and trust (Kelly and Bus, 2008).

However, there are consumers that don’t like the advertisers or marketers to disturb their social network by providing too much of advertisements or act as the consumer’s friend and sending the advertisement to consumer’s social site inbox (Kelly and Bus, 2008). In order to building trust with the Generation Y people, advertisers need to develop high credibility strategies such as simplify the buying process and reduce the level of risk at the customer site (Kelly and Bus, 2008). However, the point for credibility may not be the prior concern of advertiser and therefore, the variable of credibility is important to show the relationship with online social network advertisement.

In addition, online social network sites have lack of credibility as the users can easily to setup the profile (Kelly et al., 2010). Users are free to say what they like to say and be anyone they like to be by creating fake social account. The increases of fake account make the credibility level decreases between each other, and this will affect the user’s trust on the advertisement in the social network sites (Kelly et al., 2010). Furthermore, there are many people like to spam their post and the post of advertisement to get the attention from the user but this will make user feel annoying on it. Many users feel that they are heedless on clicking the advertising and the personal detail had been sent to the advertising company (Kelly et al., 2010).

2.7.2 Informativeness

Information plays an important role in the advertisement whether it is an offline advertisement or online advertisement (Azeem and Haq, 2012). The quality of information provided in the advertisement will significantly influence the perception of customer towards the firm and the selling goods and service provided (Azeem and Haq, 2012). Furthermore, the qualitative feature and useful information need to be included in the advertisement when the message was delivered to customer (Siau and Shen, 2003). Consumers are more likely to focus on the content that they are searching for rather than the quality of information provided (Kaasinen, 2003). In order to improve the probability that customer viewing for the advertisements on the online social network sites, the developers of social network sites need to track the content of customer searching and offer the similar advertisements in the page (Kaasinen, 2003). The content similarity can directly influence the customer to look into the advertisement and this can show the effectiveness of online social network advertising (Kaasinen, 2003). Consumer will feel comfortable in getting the related information and usable to them (Milne and Gordon, 1993). Therefore, information may be an essential variable to be studied for identify Generation Y’s perception on online social network advertisement.

There are marketers who are trying to develop the online advertisement entertaining and focus on the expose of the brand name to get customers attention (Gordon and Kathryn, 1997). The product description will be showing when the customers have a click on it or advertisers will be posting the product on the advertisement itself to ease the customer to view on it (Zinkhan and Watson, 1996). The study had conduct the survey on internet users and found that customer prefers useful information ads than providing entertaining activities (Internet Marketing Digest, 1996). This may be a contradict studies and therefore; informative can be a variables for identifying the reason for Generation Y’s perception on social network advertisement.

The information advertises in the advertisement and the products have to be relevance as it is very important for the user (Kelly et al., 2010). Furthermore, the advertisement that provided in the online social network sites should have related to the customer needs and wants (Kelly et al., 2010). Advertisers need to analyze the consumer interest and provide the advertisements that have high relevance with the user needs (Kelly et al., 2010). There are some kind of advertisements that may not suitable to be advertised online especially on social networking sites (Kelly et al., 2010). Therefore, marketer needs to bear in mind with the information that they wish to deliver to their customer.

Study found that the effectiveness of internet advertising came from the contextual relevant advertisement. The advertisement relevancy may influence the user’s perception towards the online social network advertising (Zeng et al., 2009). Advertisers can create the advertisement explanation on the other webpages to improve the connection with the customers (Zeng et al., 2009). The user may accept the advertisement in the social networking sites as it provides the relevance information and does not show annoying message (Zeng et al., 2009).

2.7.3 Entertainment

The term entertainment can be generally defined as the external motivation provided by someone and delivered to the third parties by using delightful way (Bates and Ferri, 2010). Meyersohn and Rolf (1978) defined entertainment as the culture of each individual in their daily life such as belief, practice and habit. The traditional advertising value has a closed relation to the entertainment of advertising message (Ducoffe, 1995). From the previous research, (Gavin and Li, 2010), theoretically describe that the relevancy between the user views of the entertainment value of online advertising and the behaviors towards online advertising. The study have a closely relation to the online social network advertising in the marketing environment (Gavin and Li, 2010).

The time range that user spend in front of the computer will affect the feeling of the consumer towards the advertisement (Hoffman and Novak, 1996). The mood of pleasure brings the relation of the customer’s attitude towards the advertisement online and social network (Shavitt, 1998). Entertainment have the power of enjoyment that can help people in release the stress, hide for the real world and improve the level of happiness (McQuail, 1983).

Advertising online also delivered the funny and enjoyment message for the consumers to attract their attention (Azeem and Haq, 2012). Entertainment had become the strategies of the marketers to advertise the advertisement on the internet (Azeem and Haq, 2012). Message in the online social network that consist of the entertainment value are able to increase the customer’s loyalty. Online advertisement that provides entertaining activities such as the games service to the valuable customers can let them remembering of the firm’s advertisement for a longer period. Through the previous research, the entertaining information in the online social network advertising perceived a positive value and may enhance greater customer attention (Azeem and Haq, 2012).

Other than games and enjoyment message used as the entertainment value in attracting the customers, incentive can also be a part of attractiveness that customers can enjoy the special offer. Incentives can be known as the given of reward in term of monetary value in the marketing environment (Gavin and Li, 2010). The incentives can be price discounts and item rewards that able to attract the attention of the customers and persuade them to purchase for the goods or services (Gavin and Li, 2010). Basically, the offering of incentives to the customer through the advertising will effectively generate the sales in the increasing order (Gavin and Li, 2010). Furthermore, previous research had shown that information are the superb precious incentive in the online advertising and marketing as consumer respond affirmatively to the advertisement that showing incentives (Varshney, 2003). The offer given to the customers can let them enjoying the worth of the goods and services with cheaper and lower prices (Gavin and Li, 2010).

2.7.4 Perceived Interactivity

Ha and James (1998) defined interactivity as the effectiveness of personal communication without calculates the distance or time on a personal level. On the other hand, interactivity also can be defined as the medium that has the feature of giving permission to the users to design or redesign the substance (Yaakop et al., 2012). User perceived on advertising had changes after the interactivity on social network sites increases (Hadija, 2008).

Website that user have the chances to build their own profile will have higher interactivity compare to those fixed content website (Forbes, 2003). Macias (2003) state that interactivity is the exchange of conservation between communications and the role of individual can be changed through conversations. There are six elements that can explain interactivity such as choice complexity, effort paying to access the advertising information, the responsibility of the user, the monitoring of information use, the convenience for user to add, edit and view for the information and the interpersonal communication between advertisement and customers (Heeter, 1989). The online interactivity can be the done through surfing of information on the internet and the online social network sites chat features (Macias, 2003).

Advertisers have to do research and analyze the reason that affect the consumer perception towards the social media advertising as the advertising had move from offline media to online medium rapidly (Yaakop et al., 2012). Social network sites have affects the views of individual on the decision making process with their own ideas and behaviors (Yaakop et al., 2012). The study shows high degree of perceived interactivity will create positive and beneficial behaviors towards the online social networking sites (Yaakop et al., 2012). Therefore, perceived interactivity may have significant relationship with Generation Y’s perception on social network advertisement.

The study shows that Facebook’s content such as use the text message, images and videos is the strategies used to interact with the users and increase the customer perceived value. Facebook create a platform for the advertisers to advertise the goods and services through the medium and allow the buying and selling process through this platform. The advertisements are showing in every single page on the website to attract potential customers and increase the interactivity between the advertisers and the customers (Yaakop et al., 2012). This will increase the interactivity between sellers and buyers and increase the positive attitudes of customers towards the online social networking sites. These social networking sites are creating a positive rating from the online marketers and advertisers (Yaakop et al., 2012).

2.7.5 Irritation

According to Ducoffe (1996), irritation determined as annoy, insult and bringing of trouble that consists of feeling that consumer dislike. The strategy of advertisers used in attracting and influences the user’s interest can be annoying or offending to the readers (Xu, 2006). Based on Speck et al. (1997), the annoying and irritating of advertisement will affect the user’s attitude towards the advertisement and user try to avoid clicking and viewing on the advertisement.

Advertising avoidance means the customers have a very low attendance in the participant of viewing of advertisement (Speck et al., 1997). The study also shows that advertising avoidance happened based on the mental, attitude and mechanism means (Speck et al., 1997). There are too many of untrusted advertising and junk advertising had been sent by the advertisers’ influence the users of internet feel guilty on advertising online and social networking sites and try to escape on viewing the advertisements (Gritten and Adele, 2007). An individual have the right of not to view and avoiding the advertising online by co