Sparking conversations on Facebook brand pages: Investigating fans' reactions to rhetorical brand posts

On Facebook brands create pages to facilitate interaction with their (potential) customers, or fans. Brands publish content on these pages which often contain rhetorical figures. Facebook's technological affordances allow fans to respond to these posts leading to multiple participation framework levels that were initiated and can be seen by the brand, but may – at some point – no longer involve the brand. In this study, we uncovered how brands initiate interaction by posting content in an artfully divergent way by collecting 62 Dutch Facebook posts from 12 brands and fans' reactions they evoked. Using a mixed-methods approach, the posts' rhetorical figures and how fans responded to them were analyzed. The results showed that brands' posts often contain a deviation in meaning which enabled fans to respond in various ways: they responded to the actions posts generated, such as answering questions, but also responded by evaluating the brands. Despite the post's rhetorical type (trope or scheme), format (visual, verbal, or verbo-pictorial), or relevant next action projected, rhetorical posts on brand pages secure responses and thus participation from fans. •Characterization of fans' responses to rhetorical posts on Facebook brand pages.•Combining rhetorical analysis of the post and interactional analysis of fans' responses.•Posts often contain a deviation in meaning which enable fans to respond in various ways.•Rhetorical posts on brand pages secure responses and thus participation from fans.