Adbusting: How advertising altered by activists affects brands

Maier, Erik; Mafael, Alexander Article — Published Version Adbusting: How advertising altered by activists affects brands Psychology & Marketing Provided in Cooperation with: John Wiley & Sons Suggested Citation: Maier, Erik; Mafael, Alexander (2024) : Adbusting: How advertising altered by activists affects brands, Psychology & Marketing, ISSN 1520-6793, Wiley, Hoboken, NJ, Vol. 41, Iss. 4, pp. 938-957, https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21961 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/290157 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. 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If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Received: 18 July 2023 | Accepted: 21 December 2023 DOI: 10.1002/mar.21961 RESEARCH ARTICLE Adbusting: How advertising altered by activists affects brands Erik Maier 1 |Alexander Mafael 2 1 HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management, Leipzig, Germany 2 Center for Retailing, Stockholm School of Economics, Stockholm, Sweden Correspondence Erik Maier, HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management, Jahnallee 59, 04109 Leipzig, Germany. Email: [email protected] Abstract A subversive phenomenon is challenging advertisers and brand managers: adbusting, a form of activism that alters existing brand communication (e.g., a billboard ad) to promote social/political issues (e.g., pro‐environmental behavior) or denounces the targeted brand (e.g., its labor standards). We conceptualize the effect of adbusting on consumers and provide empirical evidence that adbusting has ambiguous effects on consumers' brand perception. On the one hand, the incongruency of the message with consumers' existing brand schemata raises ad awareness. On the other hand, the effect of an adbust on subsequent cognitive and behavioral outcomes depends on the content of the adbust: if the brand itself is targeted (vs. a social or political issue), brand perception, word‐of‐mouth, and purchase intention are negatively affected. This negative effect is mitigated if the adbust targets a social/political issue. In a mixed‐method design, we use a panel of real‐world adbusts (Pilot Study) and four experimental studies (Studies 1–4) to shed light on these effects. KEYWORDS ad awareness, adbusting, brand perception, political activism, subversive advertising, subvertising 1|INTRODUCTION Companies invest in marketing activities such as advertising to build brand equity (Rego et al., 2009). To maximize the impact of these investments, brand managers aim to influence brand perception strategically (Eisend & Küster, 2011). A subversive form of activism is emerging, however, in which brands lose control over consumers' brand perception: adbusting.Alsoreferredtoas“brandalism”or “billboard hacking”adbusting involves a third party (e.g., an activist group) altering existing brand communications to promote social/political issues or to attack the brand (Kozinets & Handelman, 2004), thereby displaying resistance against the brand's actions or societal developments (Schmitt et al., 2022). Adbusts typically take place in the offline space and involve replacing or altering original brand communication to communicate a divergent claim (see examples in Figure 1). Subsequently, adbusts often receive widespread attention online and in the press, thereby increasing the adbusts' impact on brands. While extant research has investigated the effects of brands promoting their products and image through advocating social and political issues (e.g., Cristobal et al., 2022; Eyada, 2020; Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020; Zhou et al., 2023), less attention has been directed at cases where the brand is unwillingly the vehicle of activist communication. Adbusting is prevalent in many markets and can take the form of isolated incidents or widespread campaigns. For example, in 2021, a Psychol Mark. 2024;41:938–957.938 | wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/mar This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2024 The Authors. Psychology & Marketing published by Wiley Periodicals LLC. Erik Maier and Alexander Mafael contributed equally to this study. UK‐wide campaign targeted advertising billboards and bus stop posters of major brands (e.g., Shell, BP, Land Rover, and EasyJet) to criticize their involvement in carbon‐intensive industries (The Drum/ Ormesher, 2021). Not surprisingly, firms are concerned about adbusting because they fear it negatively affects consumers' beliefs about the brand and threatens brand safety (i.e., the extent to which the brand is in control of its public appearance, Lee et al., 2021), especially when the adbust criticizes the brand and motivates consumers to boycott (Klein et al., 2004). Industry experts have cautioned firms as adbusting “reveals a different side of a brand— often the side the company wants to keep quiet”and, given potential online amplification of adbusts, have asked, “what impact does this have on brands and should they be concerned?”(MarketingWeek/ Hammett, 2018). Judging the impact of an adbust is difficult for brands because it differs from other forms of third‐party‐induced advertising in which an entirely new creative is produced, mostly positive or humorous in content, and disseminated online taking part in cultural conversations (e.g., spoofs, parodies, and memes; see Gelb, 1997; Knobel & Lankshear, 2007). In contrast, adbusts alter existing ads, taking a pronounced critical stance, often towards the brand (Fournier & Avery, 2011). Thus, the advertising brands need to understand the influence of adbusts, as a new form of socio‐political activism at the citizen‐brand interface (Korschun et al., 2020). At the same time, providing a deeper understanding of how consumers respond to adbusts and how characteristics of the adbust influence their perceptions of the brand is necessary to help companies strategically manage the phenomenon (Chisam et al., 2022). Introducing further complexity, examples from real‐world adbusts illustrate that the effects of adbusting on brands might be more ambiguous than they first appear. Specifically, adbusts that target a brand focus on criticizing the brand for their actions, while social/ political adbusts use the brand's platform to communicate a message but do not criticize the brand itself. Figure 1illustrates this with examples from real‐world adbusts: the brand‐targeted adbusts (bottom left) criticize the brand for food quality (Mcdonald's), environmental destruction (Burger King), or vehicle emissions (Volkswagen), and can, therefore, harm brand perceptions. In contrast, social/political adbusts (bottom right) use the brand platform to communicate a social or political cause, such as the dangers of smoking (Marlboro), the dangers of right‐wing parties (Nutella), or the depiction of women in advertising (H&M), without necessarily criticizing the brand itself. These socio‐political adbusts might, therefore, increase awareness for a given ad and even have a positive impact on brand perceptions. For instance, in 2018, an activist collective “hijacked”a German Coca‐Cola advertisement to promote resistance against a right‐wing party. Both the media and consumers disseminated the campaign extensively, creating widespread awareness for both the original ad and the adbust, and substantial positive word‐of‐mouth (The New York Times/Karasz, FIGURE 1 Examples of adbusting campaigns. MAIER and MAFAEL | 939 2018). This even created follow‐up adbusts (e.g., the Nutella adbust in Figure 1). To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to investigate the effects of adbusting on consumers and brands. In doing so, we extend the conceptual work by Rumbo (2002) and make three main contributions to the literature. First, we define adbusting and contrast it against established types of third‐party‐induced advertising and brands using advocacy in their advertising. Second, we extend the literature on the influence of third parties on brand perception (e.g., Korschun et al., 2020) by showing how adbusting affects consumers' ad awareness and brand perception and, in turn, brand intentions. Third, our mixed method approach combines data on real‐world adbusts with experiments, allowing for ecologically valid estimates of the impact of adbusts on brands as well as a more fine‐grained understanding of the underlying consumer reactions that inform these aggregate‐level effects. Therefore, we hope to contribute to a better understanding of how the activities of political activists and groups influence marketing strategy (Chisam et al., 2022; Korschun et al., 2020) and brand communication. Our empirical application highlights that adbusting has consistent and substantial effects on brands that are moderated by the adbust's content focus (brand vs. social/political). We show that adbusts criticizing the brand harm brand perception and, in turn, reduce consumers' positive word of mouth and purchase intention, while adbusts that focus on social/ political issues exert a positive effect. 2|CONCEPTUALIZING ADBUSTING Advertising is considered one of the key instruments to build brand image over time (Chaudhuri, 2002). Such brand advertising extends to political (e.g., for a candidate or party; Spenkuch & Toniatti, 2018) and social cause advertising (e.g., for healthy eating: Skard & Thorbjørnsen, 2014). In recent years, many brands have advocated social/political issues as a form of brand activism (Moorman, 2020; Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020; Sibai et al., 2021; Zhou et al., 2023). A common feature of these advertising types is that brands and institutions initiate and control them, and thereby influence consumers' brand perceptions strategically. In contrast, other forms of advertising have emerged that modify existing advertising and media content for different purposes (see Table 1). Memes, parodies, and spoofs use recognizable elements from existing popular culture, such as publicly available media, to create new and often humorous and positive messages (Gelb, 1997; Sabri & Michel, 2014). Parodies, memes, and spoofs are internet phenomena and often have a known originator (e.g., consumers, brands, or institutions) that aims to generate awareness for themselves or their message (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007). Successful memes often inspire additional memes, resulting in different digital versions of the initial content. Memes are rarely critical of a brand or a social/political issue, but often a positive and playful treatment of existing media content. Consequently, parodies, memes, and spoofs tend to produce positive TABLE 1 Adbusting in comparison to different types of advertising. Type Brand activism Memes, parodies, and spoofs Adbusting Approach Brands use their advertising to take a public stand on social or political issues Use and reimagine key elements of a public medium (e.g., a photo, video screenshot or an ad) Activists alter existing brand communication, e.g., through billboard hacking Intent Communicate the brand's stand on certain issues while promoting the brand and its offerings Mock and imitate specific (cultural) phenomena to draw attention to the content Critique or comment on specific brand activities or draw attention to social/ political issues Advertising example Nike takes a stand on race equality following the “Black Lives Matter” protests Gillette uses the #MeToo movement to promote rethinking the role of men in society Animation firm parodies “Epic Split” Volvo ad with Jean Claude van Damme Heating company memes Bernie Sanders’2021 inauguration look to promote its services Greenpeace alters Shell billboards to criticize the company for exploiting the environment. Activists alter H&M poster to criticize depiction of women Originator Brand Consumers and brands Nongovernmental organizations, activist groups, artists Identity of the originator Known Known Unknown Content focus Social/Political Issues Diverse Criticism of a brand or social/political issues Content New New content based on original content Altered original content Valence Positive Typically positive Typically negative Media Any Online Typically physical ads Legality No legal issues Typically protected under fair use laws Illegal Exemplary research Mukherjee and Althuizen (2020) Gelb (1997) This research 940 | MAIER and MAFAEL brand‐level effects (Fournier & Avery, 2011). Therefore, brands increasingly use memes, parodies, and spoofs: On the one hand, brands produce “meme‐able”content for their brand communication (Forbes/Greenwald, 2019). For example, Volvo's “Epic Split”ad featuring Jean‐Claude van Damme sparked more than 100 memes on YouTube. On the other hand, brands are producing their own memes, such as a glove company using an image of the freezing politician Bernie Sanders. Thus, marketers are less concerned about memes' brand effect and more about whether they should also use memes themselves. In contrast to these positive forms of advertising, activists increasingly target firm advertising to promote their messages. We refer to this as adbusting, where activists alter existing brand communication (e.g., billboards: see Figure 1, top part) to convey an alternative message that diverges from the original brand advertising claims (Billboard Liberation Front, 2008; see Figure 1, bottom part). This form of activism rejects advertising as a common market practice by taking communicative resistance against the ad as a representation of mainstream consumerist ideology (Schmitt et al., 2022). Adbusting, thus, poses a challenge to traditional advertising. Brands, therefore, are the object and not the originator of activist content (Sibai et al., 2021). While adbusts are similar to memes and spoofs in that they alter existing brand communication, they differ in their intent. Spoof advertising often has a positive connotation (Berthon & Pitt, 2012) and usually pivots on existing advertising claims (Thota & Villareal, 2020). In contrast, adbusting is usually critical and negative, as the underlying intent is to voice criticism, related to either the brand itself or a social/political issue. Adbusts thereby “challenge the role advertising plays in promoting …consumerism”(The Conversation/Dekeyser, 2015) to reclaim public (ad) spaces (Rumbo, 2002). Adbusts typically occur in physical spaces (e.g., billboards) and are subsequently shared online (e.g., through photos). The originators behind an adbust leverage the fact that well‐known brands have a distinct and recognizable communication style; for example, H&M's red logo, Coca‐Cola's cursive font, and the McDonald's “M”are easily identifiable parts of brand identity. Using existing color schemes, fonts, and even the communication style employed by a brand makes it difficult for consumers to distinguish adbusts from actual advertising. This element differentiates adbusts from memes, which use the theme of an ad or image and alter the latter in an obvious manner. In summary, adbusts are a form of activism that differs from brand advertising and third‐party‐originated advertising in the following five ways: They (1) alter existing brand communication without prior consent (vs. using recognizable elements to create something new), (2) typically occur in a physical (i.e., offline) setting (although they might be shared online), (3) directly target a brand or a related social or political issue (vs. simply convey humor), (4) do so in a negative and critical (vs. a positive and promoting) manner, and (5) are focused on the message rather than the originator, with the latter often remaining unknown. Thus, adbusting is a novel form of advertising, and its effect on targeted brands requires systematic empirical investigation (see Table 1for an overview). 2.1 |How adbusting differs in content focus Adbusting can take different forms, depending on the main intent motivating the adbust, the content of the adbust, and how it voices criticism. We distinguish two main forms of adbusting depending on the content focus of the adbust: those where the adbust criticizes the brand (Figure 1, bottom left) and those where the adbust sheds light on social or political issues without criticizing the brand (Figure 1, bottom right). When the focus is on criticizing the brand, the main intent behind the adbust is to voice criticism for the brand's actions, products, or advertising strategies. The content typically modifies existing brand messaging to highlight and satirize the brand's messaging, drawing attention to the (presumed) problematic behavior. The content of the adbust can refer to different themes but oftentimes focuses on societal issues where the brand is perceived to be a part of the issue. For example, an adbust voicing criticism for a fast fashion brand's exploitation of natural resources criticizes the brand's actions by targeting the (social) issue of resource exploitation. Alternatively, the adbust might not target the brand itself but rather be directed toward a social or political issue (e.g., climate change, gun violence) to raise public awareness and change perceptions of the issue without criticizing the brand (Nomai, 2008). Here, the primary intent is to draw attention to broader societal or political concerns, rather than critiquing the brand itself, by utilizing the brand's communication as a vehicle. As a result, the message advocates for societal awareness of these issues. In summary, the adbust's content focus captures the main target of the adbust, that is, whether it is directed at criticizing a brand or whether it aims to promote attention to a social/political issue. 3|THE INFLUENCE OF ADBUSTING ON BRANDS AND CONSUMERS Since adbusts use the communication means of existing brands to promote their message, several questions arise: How do adbusts affect ad awareness and brand perceptions of the focal brand? Do adbusts exert a positive or a negative effect on brand perceptions and does this translate to brand intentions, such as positive word‐of‐ mouth or purchase intention? Does the content of the adbust moderate consumers' response? In investigating the impact of adbusts on ad awareness, brand perceptions, and subsequent brand intentions, we turn to the Hierarchy of Effects (HOE) model as our conceptual framework (Lavidge & Steiner, 1961). Rooted in a systematic progression of advertising effects on consumers (Smith et al., 2008), the HOE delineates a sequence encompassing cognition (e.g., attention and awareness), affect (e.g., brand perception), and intentions (e.g., word‐ of‐mouth, purchase intentions). The HOE model offers distinct advantages in unraveling the nuanced dynamics of advertising impact that go beyond more granular theories of persuasion. One central advantage lies in the HOE model's systematic approach, enabling the identification and exploration of key MAIER and MAFAEL | 941 components of advertising processing sequentially and empirically (Barry, 2002). This sequentiality aligns with our research objective, facilitating a nuanced examination of adbust effects across various stages of consumer response. The HOE model's structured framework allows for the systematic study of relationships between cognition, affect, and intentions, providing a comprehensive understanding of how adbusting influences consumers' perceptions. Moreover, the flexibility inherent in the HOE model permits the inclusion of additional moderators, offering a nuanced and adaptable analytical tool (Barry, 2002). This flexibility is particularly advantageous in the context of studying adbusting, where the content of the adbust may act as a potential moderator of consumer response. By incorporating additional moderators, the HOE model accommodates the complexity of real‐world advertising scenarios, enhancing the robustness of our investigation. In essence, the HOE model's systematic progression and flexibility distinguish it from more granular theories of persuasion, making it an invaluable framework for dissecting the multifaceted effects of adbusting on consumer responses to advertising. Figure 2summarizes our conceptual framework. When an adbust occurs, it first needs to generate ad awareness to inform consumers' response to the adbust. Specifically, we argue that when an adbust occurs, it increases ad awareness through increased elaboration, since consumers need to reconcile the adbust with their expectations towards the focal brand's advertising. Second, the adbust influences consumer's brand perception through increased awareness. Whether the adbust has a stronger (vs. weaker) negative effect on brand perception depends on the content of the adbust (brand vs. social/ political issue). Third, depending on consumers' brand perception, they will adapt whether they will share positive or negative word‐of‐ mouth with other consumers and whether they intend to purchase the brand's products. 3.1 |The effect of adbusting on ad awareness To conceptualize how adbusts influence consumers, we derive our formal expectations from schema theory and the literature on advertising processing. Adbusts constitute an unexpected (i.e., schema‐incongruent) stimulus, “a skip on a record that the needle passes over with a minor interruption”(Gilman‐Opalsky, 2013, p. 3). Thereby, the adbust increases awareness, defined as consumers' recall of branded advertising (Heath & Nairn, 2005), and influences subsequent downstream consequences associated with brand ads (e.g., recall, word‐of‐mouth). Schema theory suggests that memory is organized in knowledge structures known as schemata that serve as a reference frame for individual judgment (Aronson et al., 2012). For example, empirical and conceptual research on branding frequently conceptualizes brand knowledge as a schema that advertising messages reinforce (Park et al., 1986). Information acquired from external stimuli can either be congruent or incongruent with existing schemata. Schema incongruity occurs when incoming information is not compatible with existing knowledge and expectations (Fiske, 1982). Prior research suggests that incongruent ads motivate more extensive cognitive processing and stronger evaluative judgments than congruent advertisements (Goodstein, 1993) because schemata reflect consumers' expectations of brands' advertising communication (Loef, 2002). Building on this argument, we propose that when consumers observe adbusts, they activate additional elaborative resources to reconcile the incongruent stimulus with their brand schema. Specifically, the use of an existing brand's recognizable communication cues a familiar schema, while the alteration (i.e., the adbust) provides an unexpected event that requires reconciliation (Alden et al., 2000). The increased elaboration of the incongruent stimulus facilitates ad awareness (Smith et al., 2008). This initial awareness FIGURE 2 Conceptual framework and studies. Dotted lines mark main effects, hypothesized to be moderated by the adbust target. 942 | MAIER and MAFAEL orients consumers' cognitive resources toward processing the adbust and reconciling the existing incongruence (Halkias & Kokkinaki, 2014). Schema incongruity, indicative of pronounced misalignment between incoming information and established schemas, triggers heightened cognitive disruption and demands increased processing efforts to resolve the incongruity (Mandler, 1982). An adbust constitutes an incongruity that takes effort to resolve (Jhang et al., 2012) and should be harder to resolve than seeing a (schema‐ congruent) regular advertisement. An adbust requires consumers to update their schema based on the information communicated in the adbust and, therefore, is directly related to an increased number of cognitive steps to achieve resolution (Alden et al., 2000). Due to these reasons, we expect that, compared to a regular brand advertisement, an adbust will increase ad awareness. H1. Adbusting (vs. brand advertising) increases ad awareness through higher elaboration. 3.2 |The effect of adbusting on brand perception and the moderating role of content focus Being exposed to an adbust will not only increase awareness of the ad but also lead consumers to adapt their perception of the brand depending on the information conveyed in the adbust. When an advertisement does not match an existing brand schema, consumers are likely to evaluate the claims made in the ad and reevaluate their perceptions of the brand (Yoon, 2013). We argue that this re‐ evaluation depends on the content focus. Adbusts usually either criticize the brand or use the brand's advertising to draw attention to a social/political issue. For example, criticizing a fashion retailer for the labor conditions in its production facilities directly targets the brand (e.g., Figure 1: Volkswagen “Drive cleaner. Or just pretend to.”), while commenting on the unrealistic look of models in fashion ads draws attention to a nonbrand‐related social/political issue (e.g., Figure 1: H&M). When the adbust criticizes the brand's activities, this negatively influences brand perception as the consumer's brand schema requires reconciliation with the negative information. However, if the adbust uses the brand's communication as a vehicle to promote a social/political issue independent of the brand, the adbust may have a less negative impact on brand perceptions. Specifically, when the brand's communication is simply used to promote awareness of a wider social/political issue (e.g., sexism in advertising) the unexpected message contained in the adbust is easier to reconcile with an existing brand schema, as the message does not attack the brand. Consequently, it should be easier for consumers to reconcile the brand's established image and advocacy for a social/political issue. In addition, resolving the incongruency is easier because no specific updating of the brand schema is necessary, as consumers' processing can inform their assessment that the focus of the adbust is on promoting a social/ political issue (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). We argue that adbusts that focus on a social/political issue are less likely to harm brand perception, yet, one could argue that these adbusts also have the potential to harm the brand. More specifically, adbusts are per definition not under the control of the brand. This implies that activists who leverage the brand's communication to promote a social/political issue might focus on issues that do not align with the brand's established values, potentially causing confusion and discord among consumers who identify with the brand (Chauhan & Sagar, 2021). Similarly, consumers may perceive the association of the brand with a social/political issue as misaligned with their values, causing polarization in brand perceptions (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). For example, when Nike took a stand supporting the Black Lives Matter movement, many consumers felt alienated and distanced themselves from the brand (Hsu, 2020). However, we reason that the incongruency resulting from the adbust will trigger increased elaboration, which should help consumers detach the brand from the social/political issue, and thereby mitigate these potential negative consequences. In summary, we propose that the extent to which the adbust exerts a negative influence on brand perception depends on its content focus: An adbust targeting a brand (vs. a social/political issue) is more difficult (easier) to resolve (Halkias & Kokkinaki, 2014), offers negative (no negative) information about the brand and, therefore, results in a more (less) negative response. H2. The content focus of an adbust moderates the effect of an adbust on brand perception, such that the effect of an adbust on brand perception is less negative if the adbust content focuses on social/political issues than when it targets the brand. 3.3 |The effect of adbusting on brand intentions and the moderating role of content focus Depending on consumers' perception of the focal brand they will adapt their behavioral intentions towards the brand. In the context of this research, we conceptualize consumers' brand intentions as engaging in more positive (vs. more negative) word‐of‐mouth about the brand and their intentions to purchase from the brand. Following our previous argument, we propose that the content focus of the adbust moderates its effect on brand intentions. 3.3.1 |Word‐of‐mouth Schema incongruity may stimulate conversations about the brand due to increased awareness of the brand's communication efforts (Dahlén & Lange, 2004). For example, Berger and Milkman (2012) study the likelihood that readers email news articles to others and find that surprising content is more likely to be shared. Content is perceived as surprising when it contains elements that are unexpected in the context of the message (Mafael et al., 2021), such MAIER and MAFAEL | 943 as when an adbust contains unexpected claims that are incongruent with the brand's typical communication. In turn, the valence of word‐ of‐mouth depends on the emotions and opinions elicited by the adbust's content (Berger, 2011). When the adbust targets the brand's actions, this highlights negative aspects of the brand and, therefore, increases the likelihood that consumers would share that negative sentiment with others. In contrast, when the adbust content focuses on a social/political issue, it merely uses the brand's advertising as a platform to promote the issue. As a result, consumers are less likely to associate negative emotions with the brand and might even engage in positive word‐of‐mouth because they may perceive the brand as engaging with the issue (Kim et al., 2015). 3.3.2 |Purchase intention Theimpactofadbustingonconsumersismanifoldanditseffecton consumers' brand perceptions and behavioralintentionsislikelyto depend on the content focus of the adbust. Advertising messages influence consumers' purchase intentions in part through their effect on brand perceptions (Pechmann & Stewart, 1990). Critically, advertising is more likely to enhance purchase intentions when it promotes favorable brand perceptions, while it is more likely to decrease purchase intentions when it leads to negative perceptions of the brand or its activities (Spears &Singh,2004). Thus, in cases where the adbust targets the brand and highlights negative aspects of the brand, the adbust negatively affects brand perceptions and, in turn, decreases purchase intentions. In contrast, when the adbust highlights a social/political issue using the brand's advertising as a vehicle, it may exert a less negative effect on brand perceptions and, in turn, purchase intention. In summary, we derive the following hypothesis: H3. The content focus of an adbust moderates the effect of adbusting on (a) word‐of‐mouth and (b) purchase intention, such that the negative effect of adbusting is mitigated (vs. amplified) when the adbust content focuses on a social/ political issue (vs. the brand). 4|OVERVIEW OF STUDIES A pilot and four experimental studies provide empirical evidence for the effects of adbusting. Table 2provides an overview of all studies, the corresponding hypotheses, and the main findings. Specifically, in our Pilot Study, we explore the influence of real‐world adbusting events on ad awareness, brand perceptions, word‐of‐mouth, and purchase intent for 29 adbusts to provide initial evidence for the relevance of this phenomenon. In Study 1 (experiment), we replicate the effect of adbusting on ad awareness by providing evidence that consumers exhibit increased elaborative processing when seeing an adbust. Study 2 (experiment) details the increased elaboration process, highlighting that adbusts lead to a higher perception of schema incongruity and lower ease of resolution. In Study 3 (experiment), we investigate the influence of adbusting on brand perceptions and word‐of‐mouth intentions. Finally, in Study 4 (experiment), we study the effect of adbusting on word‐of‐mouth and purchase intentions. 5|PILOT STUDY: EVIDENCE FROM REAL‐WORLD ADBUSTS 5.1 |Data and measures We collected data on 46 adbusting events that occurred in France, Germany, and the UK between 2015 and 2019. For more details on the data collection, modeling, and results, see Supporting Information S1: Web Appendix A. For dependent variables, we relied on data from the market research firm YouGov. YouGov monitors about 1500 brands by surveying more than 4000 consumers daily; respondents are randomly drawn from a panel of up to 2 million adults (Luo et al., 2013). For each brand and country, we used indicators for ad awareness, brand impression (as a proxy for brand perception), positive word‐of‐mouth, and purchase intent as our dependent variables (Hewett et al., 2016). As the focal moderator, we assessed the content focus of the adbust as either a social/political issue or the brand itself. We excluded cases for brands or institutions where no brand metrics were available from YouGov, retaining 29 adbusts. For each of the adbusts, two coders independently classified the content focus of the adbust as either “social/political”or “brand”(κ= 0.85, cases reconciled after discussion). As advertising effects are subject to the influence of a large number of unobservables (e.g., overall advertising volume) and demand effects (e.g., before Christmas), we conducted a difference‐in‐difference analysis where we analyzed the dependent variables relative to the focal brand's main competitor in the market where the adbust happened (Liaukonyte et al., 2015; identified in a separate pre‐study [n=16]). All subsequent analyses were based on differenced data (absolute differences) for 60 days before and after the adbust (we determined the date of the adbust based on the first [social] media mention; see Supporting Information S1: Web Appendix A,TableA.3fornon‐differenced results). This resulted in a sample size of 29 (adbusts) × 60 (days) × 2 (pre vs. post adbust) = 3480 observations. 5.2 |Results Model‐free evidence supports our assertion that adbusts exert a brand effect (see Figure 3). Comparing the month before to the month after the adbust shows that ad awareness for the “busted”brands increases relative to their main competitor, but more strongly if the adbust targets a social/political issue (+21%), compared to when it targets the brand (+9%). Similarly, the issue‐focusedadbustresultedinamorefavorablebrand impression (+31%) compared to the brand‐targeted adbust (+13%). Positive word‐of‐mouth increased for both adbust content types (+31% and +28%). Purchase intent, however, was negatively affected if an 944 | MAIER and MAFAEL adbust's content targeted a brand (−33%), but positively affected if the adbust focused on a social/political issue (+36%). The results of a series of random‐effects models provide empirical support for our hypotheses. For more details on the modeling results, see Supporting Information S1: Web Appendix Aand Table A.2. In summary, an investigation of real‐world adbusts provides initial evidence for the effect of adbusts on brand awareness (H1), brand perceptions (H2), and, in turn, brand intentions (H3) moderated by the content focus of an adbust (social/political vs. brand‐targeted). Importantly, the pilot field study provides an aggregate (vs. an individual) perspective, where the overall effect of an adbust on a brand might be more positive compared to the individual‐level effect. Specifically, increased ad awareness and buzz around a brand are likely to create even more ad awareness among consumers—which in turn is going to increase ad awareness further and, in turn, may improve brand perception. The field study, thus, does not contradict our hypothesized effect. The subsequent four studies, however, employ an individual‐level experimental approach to investigate the underlying consumer process of being confronted with adbusts. 6|STUDY 1: THE EFFECT OF ADBUSTINGONADAWARENESS Study 1 establishes the awareness effect of adbusting in an advertising setting with different ads. Specifically, participants saw the target ad and the corresponding adbust as part of a series of other advertisements because advertisements typically are embedded in a context of multiple ads which may influence consumer processing. 6.1 |Participants, method, and design As focal stimuli, we developed adbusts based on several original ads from well‐known consumer brands (e.g., Apple, McDonalds, Starbucks, and Under Armour; see Supporting Information S1: Web Appendix Bfor details on the stimuli). For each brand, we created two ad versions: the original brand ad and the adbust. Two adbusts targeted the brand and two focused on a social/political issue. We selected the four ad stimuli used in the main study from a set of eight brands (and adbusts) based on a pretest (N= 161, M age = 37.9 years, 44.9% female): The manipulation worked as intended, as the brand adbusts had lower perceived favorableness of the claim for the focal brand (Under Armour: M adbust, brand = 3.42 vs. M original = 5.27, p< 0.001; Starbucks: M adbust, brand = 3.55 vs. M original = 5.77, p< 0.001 for details on the items, see Supporting Information S1: Web Appendix B, Table B.1), while the social/political adbusts did not (McDonald's: M adbust, social/political = 3.95 vs. M original = 4.53, p= 0.18; Apple: M adbust, social/political = 4.95 vs. M original = 5.59, p= 0.15). Further, participants correctly recognized the social/political (vs. brand) issues in the two social/political adbusts (e.g., “exploitation of labor”for Apple M= 5.85 vs. other social issues M= 2.38; “animal welfare”for McDonald's M= 5.71 vs. 2.37). Respondents correctly identified TABLE 2 Overview of empirical studies. Study Pilot 1 2 3 4 Focus Adbusting effect in actual cases (external validity) Effect of adbusting on ad awareness Effect of adbusting on ad awareness Effect of adbusting on brand perception and brand intentions Effect of adbusting on brand perception and brand intentions Type Field study Experiment Experiment Experiment Experiment Data and design n= 3820 29 (adbusts) × 60 (days) × 2 (pre vs. post) Differenced to main competitor n= 192 3 adbust (yes: social/ political issue vs. yes: brand target vs. no: original ad, between) 4 brands and 11 filler ads n= 279 3 adbust (yes: social/ political issue vs. yes: brand target vs. no: original ad, between) 1 brand and 4 filler ads n= 141 2 adbust (yes vs. no/ original, within) × 2 adbust target (brand target vs. social/ political, between) 1 brand n= 321 3 adbust (yes: social/ political issue vs. yes: brand target vs. no: original, between) 2 brands (between) Country France, Germany, UK United States United States Germany United States Dependent variables Ad awareness Brand perception Word‐of‐mouth Purchase intention Elaboration intensity Recall Ease of resolution Recall Brand perception Brand perception Word‐of‐mouth Brand perception Word‐of‐mouth Purchase intention Hypotheses H1: ✓ H2: ✓ H3: ✓ H1: ✓H1: ✓ H2: ✓ H2: ✓ H3: ✓ H2: ✓ H3: ✓ H3: ✓ MAIER and MAFAEL | 945 10 |GENERAL DISCUSSION This research develops a conceptual framework and corresponding predictions about the effect of adbusting on consumers and brands through ad awareness, brand perception, and brand intentions (here: positive word‐of‐mouth and purchase intent). We provide empirical evidence in support of our predictions using both field data (Pilot Study) and experimental data (Studies 1–4). Notably, our research does not investigate the legal and ethical issues associated with adbusting but treats it as an exogenous challenge to brands' communication practices. 10.1 |Theoretical implications Advertising is a key component of effective brand building. In particular, many successful brands develop a tightly controlled advertising identity that consumers can recognize everywhere. Yet, establishing a strong brand schema through advertising opens up the potential for third‐party actors to leverage brand advertising to promote their agenda—a phenomenon we refer to as adbusting. In contrast to related work that considers settings where the brand itself is the advocate for social/political issues (e.g., brand activism, Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020), we study a setting where the brand is not in control of its advertising efforts. In doing so, we contribute to the literature by exploring adbusting and its consequences for brands in three main ways. First, we relate adbusting activism to established types of advertising and brand activism to improve our understanding of the interaction between political activity and marketing strategy (Chisam et al., 2022). To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first attempt to investigate the effects of adbusting on brands. Our results highlight that adbusting provides an interesting challenge for brands: When the adbust criticizes the brand, it can threaten consumers' brand perception and subsequent brand intentions, even though it also heightens awareness of the brand. In turn, when the adbust merely draws attention to a social/political issue, brands may receive more attention, which is a common goal for marketers. These findings relate to existing research that studies how brand advocacy through advertising impacts consumers (e.g., Cristobal et al., 2022; Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020) and underscores the importance for brands to TABLE 3 Regression results for Study 3. Brand perception Word‐of‐mouth activity Negative Positive (1) (2b) (3a) Adbust (0 = original, 1 = adbust) −0.34*** 1.29** −1.40*** (0.06) (0.47) (0.40) Social/political issue (0 = brand, 1 = social) −0.21 −0.19 0.43 (0.17) (0.55) (0.38) Adbust × Social/ Political issue 0.30** −1.17 † 0.93 † (0.09) (0.68) (0.53) Attitude toward social/ political issues 0.04 0.24 0.16 (0.11) (0.27) (0.19) Attitude toward advertising 0.47*** −0.03 −0.10 (0.10) (0.24) (0.17) Intercept 2.98*** −2.85*−0.19 (0.50) (1.33) (0.87) N282 282 282 Number of participants 141 141 141 R 2 0.88 0.38 0.22 Note: Fixed effects model with subject fixed effects. Non‐standardized coefficients and standard errors. † p< 0.1. *p< 0.05; **p< 0.01; ***p< 0.001. FIGURE 7 Empirical results for Study 4. 952 | MAIER and MAFAEL consider the strategic implications of advocacy for social/political issues, even when their communications are used by activist groups. Second, we draw on schema theory and the literature on advertising processing to devise a nuanced understanding of the impact of adbusting, thereby contributing to the literature on brand management. Specifically, we provide empirical evidence in support of an HOE framework and illustrate how adbusting affects consumers' awareness, brand perception, and subsequent brand intentions. Our empirical application shows that adbusting exhibits consistent and substantial effects on brands. In particular, it positively influences consumers' brand awareness on an individual level (i.e., through more elaboration and recall), as well as across consumers through social media sharing of an adbust. We explain this increased awareness through increased ad processing from higher schema incongruity and lower ease of resolution of the adbust (Studies 1 and 2). This provides further evidence that not only brand‐initiated conversations can support brand development, but also communication from third parties (Korschun et al., 2020). Third, even though examples of activists altering brand communications abound, and brand protection agencies are tracking such activities to help brands understand their effects (Hesseldahl, 2007), empirical insight is limited (Thota, 2021). We not only investigate the effect of adbusting per se, but establish the adbust's content focus as an important moderating influence. Specifically, the effect of adbusting on consumers' brand perceptions and downstream brand intentions is negative when the adbust criticizes the brand, but this negative effect is mitigated when the adbust promotes social/ political issues (e.g., climate change). Thereby, our findings provide a detailed understanding of the impact of different content foci of adbusts on consumers and brands and open up this topic for future research. 10.2 |Managerial implications It is commonly assumed that adbusts pose a threat to brand perception (CNN/Monks, 2018). In contrast to initial fears that brand managers should “beware”of adbusting as “the smallest act can be massively amplified online”(MarketingWeek/Hammett, 2018), we find that digital amplification could constitute an opportunity for brand managers because their effect is not uniform but depends on the content focus of the adbust. On an aggregate level, our Pilot Study shows that ad awareness (+16%), brand perception (+23%), and positive word‐of‐mouth (+26%) increase after an adbusting incident relative to that brand's main competitor, but the positive effect is considerably stronger if the brand is not targeted itself, but a social/political issue is in focus. TABLE 4 Regression results for Study 4. Brand perception (difference) Word‐of‐mouth intention Purchase intention (1) (2a) (2b) (3a) (3b) Adbust −0.56*** −0.41 −0.28 −0.38 −0.11 (0.15) (0.26) (0.26) (0.25) (0.24) Adbust × Social/Political Issue a 0.31*0.49 † 0.42 0.44 † 0.29 (0.15) (0.26) (0.25) (0.24) (0.23) Attitude toward Social/Political issues −0.10 † 0.04 0.07 0.13 0.18* (0.05) (0.09) (0.09) (0.09) (0.08) Attitude toward advertising 0.07 † 0.67*** 0.66*** 0.45*** 0.42*** (0.04) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) (0.06) Brand perception ――0.23*―0.49*** (0.10) (0.09) Brand 2 Dummy 0.17 −0.15 −0.19 0.67** 0.58** (0.12) (0.21) (0.21) (0.20) (0.19) Intercept 0.29 0.37 0.31 1.57*** 1.43*** (0.33) (0.56) (0.55) (0.53) (0.51) N321 321 321 321 321 R 2 0.06 0.30 0.31 0.19 0.27 Note: Nonstandardized coefficients and standard errors. † p< 0.1. *p< 0.05; **p< 0.01; ***p< 0.001. a No main effects reported due to multicollinearity. MAIER and MAFAEL | 953 Purchase intent even declines after a brand is criticized, while the purchase intent increases if the content focus of an adbust is social. The experimental studies confirm that the effect of an adbust depends on its content focus: on an individual level, adbusts that target the brand negatively affect brand perceptions, word‐of‐mouth, and purchase intentions. This effect is partially or fully offset if the adbust focuses on a social/political issue. Thus, our research specifies political scientists' suggestion that “sporadic subvertising cannot jam a culture of constant accumulation”(Gilman‐Opalsky, 2013, p. 1), showing that adbusts can even support brands in their marketing efforts, as long as the brand is not the target. Brand managers, therefore, are well‐advised to closely evaluate specific adbusting incidents before they react. Our findings suggest that brand managers should worry about their brand perceptions when the adbust directly criticizes the brand and is likely to receive a large audience. In contrast, adbusts that criticize a social/political issue offer the opportunity of “free”increased ad awareness, while the negative effect of the abdust on brand perception is mitigated. This additional awareness is especially attractive in an environment where advertisers find it increasingly difficult to elevate their messages above the clutter of ad messages (Nelson‐Field et al., 2013). In such a situation, it may even be beneficial for the firm to endorse the adbust through its online channels to reach a larger audience and increase brand buzz (Hewett et al., 2016). The aforementioned example of a Coca‐Cola ad that was altered to promote a social/political issue highlights this: Because the adbust did not target the brand but a right‐wing political party, the company even decided to endorse it—which further amplified the media reaction to the adbusting incident. However, brands need to be morally competent for their actions to have a positive effect (Sibai et al., 2021). 10.3 |Limitations and further research There are limitations to our approach that may inform further efforts in this domain and contribute to a deeper understanding of adbusting. First, our set of studies highlights conditions that explain the ambiguous effect of adbusts. Future research could investigate how a company can effectively respond when confronted with adbusts. For instance, a company might simply increase its marketing spending to “repair”damages to the brand perception, similar to situations when it needs to overcome a negative publicity event (Gao et al., 2015). Additionally, companies might also relate to the adbust, either by responding (e.g., by a counter campaign) or even by endorsing the adbust if the latter targets a social phenomenon and not the brand (e.g., Coca‐ Cola's endorsement of an adbust against a far‐right party). This provides an opportunity to take a stance or to distance the brand from any social or political issues (e.g., Vredenburg et al., 2020) and would illuminate an important gap in the current literature (Siano et al., 2022). Second, our empirical studies focus on offline adbusts. We do so because press releases about adbusts typically refer to offline occurrences of adbusting, mirroring activists' aim to “reclaim public spaces”. Thus, the adbust occurs offline but is quickly disseminated online to increase reach and impact. Yet, this does not preclude activist groups from increasingly posting altered brand communication online to leverage brands as a platform for their messages, similar to rhetoric subvertisement of brand advertising on social media (Middleton et al., 2022). While our research investigates consumers' intentions to share positive or negative sentiments about adbusts, we do not study how they do so (i.e., whether they advocate the adbust or distance themselves from the message) and with how many people they would share such content. Future research could study these questions to provide a more nuanced perspective on the dynamics of social media activity after an adbust occurs. Third, the effect of an adbust might also depend on the interaction of the characteristics of the adbust with those of the viewer. Our manipulations used widely accepted social/political issues (e.g., gun violence, environmental destruction, stereotypical depiction of women), but even these are likely to interact with consumers' own opinions (e.g., some consumers deny climate change). Research on biased assimilation of opinions suggests that there may be an interactive effect of consumers' existing opinions and the influence of specific message claims on their brand evaluation because existing opinions influence the persuasiveness of contradicting claims (Mafael et al., 2016). Research on brand activism shows that audience alignment with advocated issues determines consumers' response to brand activism (Mukherjee & Althuizen, 2020). Further studies could systematically investigate whether similar effects emerge in the context of adbusting and whether such alignment effects are—at least in part—responsible for the effects observed in our empirical studies. In this, studying consumer emotions to adbusts that are in (non‐)alignment with the brand and/or consumers' existing option might help further explain consumer reactions. Fourth, our conceptual framework builds on the HOE model and focuses on consumers' cognitive processing in response to adbusting. Yet, other factors may be important in understanding the impact of adbusting, such as affective processes that inform consumers' response to the adbust's message. More specifically, and departing from our result that adbusts that criticize the brand affect consumers differently than adbusts that merely draw attention to a social/ political issue, it would be valuable to understand whether the two content foci of adbusting inform different emotional responses. For example, research on schema incongruity suggests potential ways in which emotions may determine responses to adbusts (Smith & DeCoster, 2000; Yoon, 2013). Initial emotional responses, such as anger or surprise, may result from incongruity between the adbust and existing brand schemata and facilitate subsequent cognitive processing of the ad (e.g., through heightened awareness). Here, it would be interesting to study whether the content focus of the adbust leads to different emotional responses and to what extent these responses drive subsequent processing. Finally, future research could explore implications of adbusting for laws around parody, intellectual property, freedom of speech, among others. 954 | MAIER and MAFAEL ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We thank YouGov, especially Sascha Raithel, who generously provided access to data from the YouGov BrandIndex syndicated brand tracking study. Katharina Lohmann and Laurence Lahaye were invaluable in their support in compiling the adbusting database. We are grateful to Florian Dost and Charles R. Taylor who provided helpful feedback on earlier versions of this paper. 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Journal of Advertising.https://www. tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00913367.2023.2217866 SUPPORTING INFORMATION Additional supporting information can be found online in the Supporting Information section at the end of this article. How to cite this article: Maier, E., & Mafael, A. (2024). Adbusting: How advertising altered by activists affects brands. Psychology & Marketing,41, 938–957. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21961 MAIER and MAFAEL | 957