🤖 AI Summary
This study investigates how aesthetic features (dominant hue, textual sentiment) and structural macroeconomic variables (GDP, population, obesity prevalence) jointly shape consumer engagement with global food brands on Instagram, and how these effects vary across economies. Employing multimodal analysis—HSV color space extraction and VADER sentiment scoring—alongside hierarchical regression modeling, it is the first to systematically integrate visual, linguistic, and macro-level predictors. Results reveal distinct cross-national patterns: in developing economies, beige–green palettes correlate with higher engagement, and GDP positively predicts interaction; in developed economies, population size enhances engagement, whereas GDP negatively moderates attention. Obesity prevalence exhibits significant regional heterogeneity in its effect on likes and comments. The findings uncover nonlinear and directionally opposing moderation effects, advancing theoretical understanding of digital marketing localization and offering empirically grounded guidance for region-specific campaign design.
📝 Abstract
Instagram has become a key platform for global food brands to engage diverse audiences through visual storytelling. While previous research emphasizes content-based strategies, this study bridges the gap between content and context by examining how aesthetic elements -- such as dominant image colors and caption sentiment -- and structural factors like GDP, population, and obesity rates collectively shape consumer engagement. Using a multimodal analysis of Instagram posts from major food outlets across developed and developing countries, we assess how color schemes and sentiment influence key engagement metrics. We then extend this analysis with regression modeling to evaluate how these macroeconomic and demographic variables moderate engagement. Our results reveal that engagement patterns vary widely across regions. In developing countries, color combinations like off-white and green significantly enhance interactions, and GDP is a strong positive predictor of engagement. Conversely, in developed countries, a larger population boosts engagement while higher GDP correlates with reduced user attention. Obesity rates show a mixed influence, moderately enhancing likes in some regions while lowering comments in others. These findings highlight the critical need for localized digital marketing strategies that align content design with structural realities to optimize audience engagement.