Top Research Papers on Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing initiatives require firms to select and incentivize online influencers to engage their followers on social media in an attempt to promote the firms’ offerings. However, limited research considers the costs of influencer marketing when evaluating these campaigns’ effectiveness, particularly from an engagement elasticity perspective. Moreover, it is unclear whether and how marketers could enhance influencer marketing effectiveness by strategically selecting influencers, targeting their followers, or managing content. This study draws on a communication model to examine how f...

Abstract Online influencer marketing (OIM) has become an integral component of brands’ marketing strategies; however, marketers lack an adequate understanding of its scope, effectiveness, and potential threats. To fill this gap, this article first describes the phenomenon’s background, defines OIM, and delineates its unique features to set the conceptual boundaries for the new concept. Drawing insights from practitioner and consumer interviews, and in line with social capital theory, the authors propose that OIM can be understood as leveraging influencer resources (including follower networks,...

The authors find that in some ways, an AI influencer can be as effective as a human influencer and suggest that there may be a spill-over effect from consumer experiences with other AI recommendation systems, meaning that consumers are open to AI influencers recommendations.

Purpose This study aims to gain insights into the rise of virtual social media influencers and identify the significant theories governing virtual influencers’ (VIs) interaction with followers on social media platforms. Studies on VI being scarce in marketing literature, the authors attempt to propose a theoretical model to understand the acceptance of VIs by social media users (SMUs). Design/methodology/approach Using a structured literature review and a case study approach, a conceptual model is developed and propositions are offered. Findings Parasocial interaction (PSI) between the SMU and...

Stablecoins are digital currencies that are pegged to non-volatile assets. As alternatives to fiat currencies, they constitute an important aspect of cryptocurrency markets. We analyze returns of cryptocurrencies around 565 stablecoin issuances events for seven different stablecoins between April 2019 and March 2020. Our event study reveals market downturns in the week before issuance and positive abnormal returns in the twenty-four hours around the issuance. Effects differ and remain insignificant for some stablecoin subsamples and issuance size does not significantly affect the abnormal retu...

https://openpolicyfinder.jisc.ac.uk/id/publication/5670

Is it already the end of the influencers' era? More specifically the human influencers' era? Indeed, AI-powered digital avatars called "virtual influencers" are replacing them as marketing influence partners with the biggest brands, such as Prada, Gucci, and Louis Vuitton. By this choice, they avoid associating their business with the names of influencers who could have a very bad reputation overnight. This research aims to understand the incredible popularity of certain virtual influencers among consumers as well as their limits. This article explores this emerging phenomenon using a mixed qu...

This study aims to integrate the literature on social media influencers into a framework that classifies (potential) social media influencers and highlights their features. Previous classifications mainly focused on the measurable characteristics of social media influencers as determined either by scholars or consumers. In reality, though, the social impact of an influencer evolves as an interaction between his/her own goals and motivations and audience's perceptions and attributions. This study proposes a conceptual classification that combines the characteristics of social media influencers ...

Explosive growth in the number of users on various social media platforms has transformed the way firms strategize their marketing activities. To take advantage of the vast size of social networks, firms have now turned their attention to influencer marketing wherein they employ independent influencers to promote their products on social media platforms. Despite the recent growth in influencer marketing, the problem of network seeding (i.e., identification of influencers to optimally post a firm’s message or advertisement) neither has been rigorously studied in the academic literature nor has ...

Influencers increasingly provide sources of information and innovation to followers. Grounded in balance, cognitive dissonance, and congruity theories, the current article highlights how a congruence psychological mechanism, leveraged in influencer marketing campaigns, can contribute to the success of this novel form of persuasive communication. To understand consumers’ behavioral intentions when they encounter product recommendations from fashion influencers on Instagram, this study addresses the congruence among the three inherent contributors to any influencer marketing campaign: the influe...

Drawing upon the source credibility theory, interactivity theory, gratification-opportunities, with the overarching theory of belief-attitude-behavioral chain, this study investigates the antecedents (i.e., mobile convenience, interactivity, and influencer credibility) that shape one’s attitudes toward social media influencer and advertised product or service, as well as how these attitudinal outcomes lead to actual purchase. Additionally, the moderating role of gender is examined. Interestingly, the results indicate that interactivity is playing negative direct and indirect roles in attitudin...

The study finds that greater availability of information in video titles is negatively associated with video views, whereas intensity of negative emotional sentiment in video title is positively associated withVideo views.

Virtual influencers (VIs), digitally created characters with a significant presence on social media, are progressively engaged to promote products and brands. Understanding the impact of these influencers' anthropomorphic design is crucial to their marketing effectiveness. Drawing from anthropomorphism literature, this research evaluates the effect of four types of anthropomorphism—namely, appearance, moral virtue, cognitive experience, and conscious emotionality—on followers' perceptions of VI credibility and parasocial relationships, as well as their purchase intention. The results of a surv...

Journal editors are often asked at ‘Meet the Editor’ sessions at conferences to identify what current hot topics in the field are. It is true that as editors, we have some inside information on wha...

The landscape of virtual influencer marketing is introduced, outlining the opportunities and dangers associated with using virtual influencers in social media marketing communications and offering a 2 × 2 taxonomy ofvirtual influencers, grounded in research on anthropomorphism and reality–virtuality.

Social networking in the form of online communities and social groups is a characteristic of social media communication that has profound implications on the identity dynamics and behavior of social media users. Drawing from social identity theory, this research brings the social identity construct (i.e., followers' perception of the self in relation to the influencer community) to the literature on influencer marketing and examines the effect of followers' social identity, along with their interest fit and the influencer's opinion leadership, on their purchase intention. This research also ex...

Purpose Social media, especially social media-based influencer marketing, has become an important factor in consumer decision-making. Studies have recently begun investigating how influencers affect consumer behaviour. Despite the increasing interest, the purpose of this study is to examine influencers’ evaluation impact on consumer behaviour are scarce. Design/methodology/approach An online study undertook research to gain further understanding. Specifically, the study examines the following: firstly, the impact of consumers’ perceived influencer credibility (IC), using the source credibility...

Over the last decade, influencer marketing has become one of the most important tools for companies and brands to increase awareness, sales, or image strength. Since consumers prefer brands and companies whose image is congruent with their actual or ideal self, we could expect that consumers tend to prefer influencers whom they can compare themselves with. Therefore, congruence between consumer and influencer is imperative in influencer marketing and may indicate whether the influencer will be able to promote products to the target audience in an appealing way. Using a quantitative empirical s...

Purpose Social media influencers (SMIs) have become an important source of influence that affects consumer behaviours in their decision-making processes. As such, this justifies scholarly attention in understanding how SMIs transfer their meanings to endorsed brands and drive consumers’ positive behavioural intentions. With the intention to fill this knowledge gap, this paper aims to examine the impact of SMIs’ credibility, as manifested by trustworthiness, attractiveness and expertise, along with the moderating effects of materialism, on followers’ purchase intention. Design/methodology/appro...

Abstract Consumer avoidance of brands and influencers is a widespread phenomenon, especially among Generation Z (Gen Z); however, influencer marketing literature lacks clarity about when and why Gen Z engages in such avoidance. Our experimental investigation, across four studies, reveals that Gen Z considers brands' control over influencers to be morally irresponsible and, thus, avoids both. We introduce a novel construct, influencer avoidance , and examine its drivers. Study 1 indicates that perceived brand control engenders avoidance; moderation evidence shows that macro (vs. micro) influenc...

Four key new-age technologies – the Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Blockchain – and their respective roles in marketing are examined in depth to understand their key elements, the domains in which they operate, and current use cases pertaining to these technologies.

Social media influencer marketing has recently received significant attention. Many studies have explored the parasocial relationship (PSR) formation between influencers and followers. PSR has not often been weighted against other widely used relationship marketing constructs, despite the multitude of PSR studies. This study developed a research model based on the theory of persuasion, which was constructed to investigate the relative weight of the PSR. The study considered three personal attributes (attitude homophily, physical attractiveness, and social attractiveness) and three characteriza...

Purpose This study examined how social media influencers create and leverage followers' attachment to deliver marketing messages by applying human brand theory and attachment theory. Design/methodology/approach An online self-administered survey by 490 US adults who are Millennials (27–40) or Generation Z (18–26) in 2020 and currently following any specific social media influencer was conducted and analyzed. Findings The results suggest that homophily, social presence and attractiveness create a greater attachment. Attachment enhances followers' loyalty to the influencer and advertising credib...

Abstract The increasing use and effectiveness of social media influencers in marketing have intrigued both academic scholars and industry professionals. To shed light on the foundations and trends of this contemporary phenomenon, this study undertakes a systematic literature review using a bibliometric-content analysis to map the extant literature where consumer behavior, social media, and influencer marketing are intertwined. Using 214 articles published in journals indexed by the Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC), Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS), and Web of Science (W...

The main element to generating a connection between avatars and followers, conferring credibility and authenticity, is the congruence of their posts with their lifestyle, personality, and narrative of their personal stories.

Influencer marketing appears to be an effective and cost-efficient marketing tool, as it is often not perceived by consumers as advertising and guarantees a wide reach to very engaged audiences. Many businesses harness social media influencers to promote their brands to target audiences. However, influencer marketing has mainly been adopted through a process of trial and error without in-depth insight into how social media influencers should be used strategically as a distinct tool in the marketing mix. In recent years, academic research on influencer marketing has been growing rapidly and off...

Influencer marketing furthers the goals of relationship marketing. Companies use influencers to advertise their products through social networks such as Instagram. This digital advertising is aimed at shifting the company’s goals from customer acquisition to retention and commitment. While several articles provide interesting advances analyzing social media and sustainability goals, research about influencer types and their impact on engagement preserving corporate sustainability is limited. Thus, the objectives of this study are: (1) Select general influencer traits as positive characteristic...

Leveraging social media influencers allows companies to provide information on their products in a more social and interactive way. Yet, scholarly research on the implications of the effect of influencers on consumer trust, their interest and the purchase decision process is still in its infancy. This study proposes a theoretical model to explain how perceived brand control over an influencer’s post and the perceived commercial orientation of such a post affects consumer trust in influencers. Results show that trust of the influencer is reduced more by the post’s perceived commercial orientati...

This work examines the determinants of the success of influencer marketing on the youth-focused TikTok, the fastest growing social network. It analyses the effects of influencers' account characteristics (originality, quality, quantity and humor) on their followers' hedonic experience and perceived opinion leadership, and how these impact on their intentions to follow influencers’ accounts and advice. A survey of followers of a popular Spanish TikTok influencer showed that originality and opinion leadership play important roles and that, because TikTok is distinctive, humor increased the effec...

This paper is the first empirical study of the link between investor attention and the green bond market performance. Using daily data of investor attention and green bond indexes, we find that investor attention can influence green bond returns and volatility, however, this relationship is time varying. Our results are relevant for investors as they shed light into the newly developed and fast growing green bond market. Our findings also emphasize the importance of appropriate information and attention for directing financial flows towards sustainable investment.

Influencer marketing is the practice of compensating individuals for posting about a product or service on social media. Influencer marketing is on the rise, and many marketers now plan either to start using influencers or to increase their use of them in their media mixes. Despite such growth, relatively little strategic or academic insight exists that is specific to influencers. In this article, we describe the roots of influencer marketing and the many different types of influencers that now exist. We identify influencers’ three functional components: the audience, the endorser, and the soc...

The content of captions and photos contained in Instagram influencer posts was examined in order to examine the content strategies used by social media influencers and provide empirical information regarding influencers’ usage of persuasive narratives.

The current study aimed to examine pricing strategies as a determining factor in influencing consumer behavior. The present research applied quantitative research method via adapting questionnaire from academic sources. The sample size for the current study is 162 which gathered via random sampling method. The results show that Penetration Pricing has significant positive influence on consumer behavior at 5% level. The results show that Price Skimming has significant positive influence on consumer behavior at 5% level. The results show that marketing sharing sites has significant positive infl...

Despite the increasing interest in celebrity influencers as a marketing communication tool, much remains to be explored to understand how influencer credibility combined with brand credibility affects consumers’ perception toward the influencer promotional post. Moreover, there are growing concerns around whether sponsorship disclosure on influencer promotional posts encourages consumers to critically process the advertising message. Thus, this study examines the effects of disclosure types (explicit/implicit/no disclosure), influencer credibility (high low), and brand credibility (high/low) o...

The literature on influencer marketing has identified opinion leadership of influencers and parasocial relationship with influencers as two focal constructs affecting followers' purchase intention; yet they are only studied in isolation. This research aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the effects of the two key constructs by combining and comparing them in a model with the moderators of post characteristics, namely post type and correspondent inference. Empirical results from 409 online followers of two Instagram accounts confirm the complementary effects of opinion leadership a...

Given the rise in influencer marketing on social media, this paper explores how homophily between influencers and their audiences affects customer value co-creation behaviour, resulting in increased expected brand value and purchase intention. A sample of 910 respondents from the United States completed an online investigation. The results indicate that homophily positively influences customer value co-creation behaviour as well as positively correlates with expected brand value and purchase intention. Customer value co-creation behaviour plays a multi-mediating role. Para-social relationship ...

Social media influencers are widely employed as a marketing strategy as they successfully attain trust from followers. Applying the social exchange theory and its principle of reciprocity, this study investigated whether the source characteristics of an influencer (i.e., expertise, authenticity, physical attractiveness, homophily) can function as relational resources in the formation of follower trust. Whether followers' trust in the influencer leads to their loyalty to the influencer and desirable marketing outcomes (i.e., product attitude, purchase intention) was also examined. Results revea...

Women largely dominate the influencer business, and previous studies often either have focused on female social media influencers, or else matched the influencer's gender with the participant's gender in experimental research, as it is assumed that same-gender endorsements may increase persuasion. However, no empirical research is available yet that examines how the influencer's gender affects the persuasiveness of sponsored content posted by this influencer. Therefore, this paper reports on the results from an experimental study (N = 241) testing whether a sponsored post leads to more engagem...

This work chose an exploratory qualitative design to explore the advantages and disadvantages of using fictional characters as a marketing strategy, and compared the appeal of humanized versus animated virtual influencers.

Influencer marketing represents a $10 billion industry in 2020 and is becoming of increasing relevance for many firms, especially those operating in a business-to-consumer environment. Few firms in the fashion, beauty, travel, food, or beverage industries are running marketing campaigns these days that do not include, at least to some share, a collaboration with popular users on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. However, many marketing managers still have a less than adequate understanding of those platforms compared with their knowledge of more traditional media channels and often find ...