The Role of Fandom Communities in Viral Advertising Diffusion on Social Media Platforms

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_9How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Fandom fans; Viral advertising; User-Generated Content (UGC); Cross-platform dissemination; Elaboration Likelihood Model

Abstract

With the development of social media, the advertising diffusion’s way changes from the brand one-way output to the multi node diffusion mode achieved by Platform interaction and content reproduction. As a highly organized group with high emotional mobilization ability, fandom fans have multiple identities of viral advertising, including consumer, communicator and content creator. This study, based on Xiaohongshu, Douyin, and Weibo, develops a hypothetical cross-platform dissemination model and uses the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) to examine how fan communities shape advertising diffusion. The analysis suggests that organized behavior on Weibo can quickly trigger public attention, while on Douyin, secondary creation interacts with algorithmic mechanisms to facilitate content diffusion. On Xiaohongshu, more in-depth User-Generated Content (UGC) tends to strengthen public praise and support conversion. At the same time, excessive organized behavior may undermine perceived authenticity, and idol-related controversies can lead to brand backlash. This study provides a theoretical reference for understanding the cross-platform dissemination role of fandom fans in viral advertising, as well as for brand marketing strategy design.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Jiudi Wu
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/09/04
TI  - The Role of Fandom Communities in Viral Advertising Diffusion on Social Media Platforms
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 3rd International Conference on Public Relations and Media Communication (PRMC 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 80
EP  - 87
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_9
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_9
ID  - Wu2026
ER  -