How Do Observers React to Companies’ Humorous Responses to Online Public Complaints?

The current research examines the way that observing consumers react when companies use humor to address online public complaints on social media. Drawing on, first, a field study using companies’ humorous responses on social media and, second, on two main scenario-based experiments, we use benign violation theory to capture simultaneously the unfavorable effect (i.e., inferred negative motives) and the favorable effect (i.e., humor appreciation) of employing humor in a public complaining context. The results reveal that online observers respond more favorably (in terms of likes, retweets, and purchase intentions) when firms use affiliative humor (e.g., laughing with the complainer) rather than aggressive humor (e.g., laughing at the complainer). Also, affiliative humor and an accommodative recovery (e.g., apologies and compensation) provide equal results in terms of observers’ purchase intentions. Because observers infer more negative motives of companies, affiliative humor compensates over an accommodative recovery by being funnier. Finally, our last study presents a reversal effect depending on brand personality; while sincere brands should always favor affiliative humor, aggressive humor elicits higher purchase intentions when performed by exciting brands. This research gives managerial insights about observers’ reactions to humorous responses to online complaints and the importance for humor to fit with brand personality.