Exploring the major themes of JUUL-related promotional and organic posts on Instagram

Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis: Using evolving social media channels, tobacco product and electronic nicotine delivery system (ENDS) marketers and vendors employ innovative methods of “social selling’, including influencer promotion, sponsored word-of-mouth, viral user-generated content, and affiliate marketing. Social marketing of these products has coincided with the rapid growth of use among American youth. JUUL-a novel “nicotine salt”-based pod system or vaporizer has become increasingly popular since its launch in 2015, currently representing 73.8% of e-cigarette market. The number of youth using JUUL is alarming and raises serious concerns that the product could be an entryway to nicotine addiction and that proliferation of nicotine-related promotion could perpetuate social acceptance of nicotine use and dependence.

Prior research on addiction marketing identified facilitative and preventive marketing cues that can impact user progression along the addictive products consumption continuum—moving through the pre-addiction phase towards (and away from) addiction. We aimed to identify JUUL and JUUL-compatible product-related messages on the Instagram social media platform featuring promotional strategies targeting users by stage of nicotine addiction (recruitment, addiction, cessation).

Methods: Hashtag-based keyword rules were used to collect JUUL-related posts from the Instagram API in March-November 2018. Posts were classified as commercial and organic and characterized as featuring new user appeals, addicted user appeals, and cessation-related appeals using a combination of machine learning methods, keyword algorithms, and human coding.

Results: Keyword filters captured 50, 817 relevant posts, with41% of retrieved messages being commercial. New user-related posts constituted 72.5% of the total post volume and91% of promotional content contained new/non-addicted user appeals (e.g., posts connecting lifestyle references with tobacco use; paid product placement or endorsements; sampling; giveaways; event sponsorship); 64% of organic messages contained new user references Nearly 71% of promotional content featured addiction-related cues, including loyalty programs to encourage more frequent purchases; honoring loyal users/shout-outs; larger unit packaging, while 23% of organic posts contained addiction-related content. Finally, 23% of promotional content contained appeals to users trying to quit tobacco products. There were no posts featuring appeals to users trying to quit ENDS products.

Conclusions: The present study sheds light on the marketing strategies of JUUL and JUUL-compatible product promotion on Instagram-a major youth medium of expression. Findings revealed that new user targeting is a key promotional strategy and there is no emphasis on promoting ENDS cessation.

Implications for research and/or practice: Posts featuring JUUL-related hashtags and marketing can increase exposure to pro-ENDS imagery and messaging and promote addictive product use among susceptible novices and youth. Stronger regulations are needed to prevent social marketing to new users. Tobacco marketing surveillance efforts should include JUUL and JUUL-compatible products promotion on digital media.