Display advertising or social media post? The impact of endorsement execution form on the effectiveness of virtual influencers’ advertising endorsements

With the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) technology, an increasing number of brands are choosing to employ virtual influencers rather than human endorsers for marketing promotions. This transition is reshaping marketing communication strategies within the advertising industry. Unlike the single endorsement form discussed in previous studies, this research comparatively investigates different endorsement execution forms—display advertising versus social media post—used by virtual influencers. Through a pre-test and three main experiments, we confirm that the endorsement execution form of virtual influencers significantly affects their advertising effectiveness. Specifically, compared to social media post, endorsements by virtual influencers in the form of display advertising tend to have a stronger impact, as this form effectively reduces the perceived falsity of the endorsement. Furthermore, the impact of endorsement execution form on advertising effectiveness is more pronounced for products that emphasize proximal-sensory experiences (such as taste, smell, and touch) than for those that focus on distal-sensory experiences (such as vision and hearing). These findings not only contribute to the existing literature on virtual influencers and influencer marketing but also provide valuable design ideas and practical insights for the advertising and marketing applications of virtual digital humans in the era of AI.