I personally believe that using social media “influencers” is an effective way to market however, I don’t think you should 100% trust them to be honest. So it is best to take it with a grain of salt. For example, an influencer has to tell their followers when a post they’re doing is sponsored, it’s a law. However, this isn’t always followed.
“While actual paid influencers are required to make sure their relationships with the brands are “clearly and conspicuously disclosed,” according to the FTC and the Advertising Standards Authority, which released an “influencer’s guide” that must be followed, regulations around fake sponsorships currently do not exist.” (Ritschel, 2018) There have been influencers who have been rumored to have lied about their sponsored ads such as Mikayla (a beauty TikToker) who used false eyelashes when promoting a mascara, although she denies this.
What techniques do influencers use? Sponsored ads are just one technique, another is considering the 3 R’s of Influence. “REACH: This is a measure of audience size. Aside from possessing qualities that have the power to drive action, an influencer has an above-average number of followers in a specific niche or market. RELEVANCE: This is a measure of how relevant someone is to a topic that is relevant to you. If relevant keywords don’t “pop out” at you when you first visit an influencer’s website, the influencer will likely look at your brand and feel the same. And RESONANCE: This is a measure of how much activity an influencer generates by publishing content. Someone who creates content people crave and love to engage with will make a major wave with a blog post and gain a lot of traction with a single tweet, because the content resonates with fans and followers.” (Chicago, 2016)
As sad as I think it is, Influencers play a huge role in todays marketing. Especially since word of mouth is such a big deal, we listen to our friends do we not? We value their authenticity. So we’d trust them if we get told a product or service is good. There are some restaurants that I won’t go to simply because my friends don’t like the food, or had bad service. Same thing with cities. I value opinions of the people close to me, that is for sure.
Marketing perspective impacts is the different views of marketing, an electrician is going to see it differently than a makeup artist or restaurant owner. But, “If we combine all of these different perspectives with the current times in business today. Marketing is defined as the theory and practise of identifying the needs/ wants and leveraging distribution of goods and services in a competitive society.” (Boscoanthony, 2012)
While I don’t like Influencers as a whole, as someone who uses social media on the daily; I am swayed by some of their opinions. But, as stated above, take their words with a grain of salt.
References-
Boscoanthony. (2012). Marketing perspectives. Bosco Anthony — Business Growth Strategist. https://boscoanthony.com/marketing-perspectives/
Chicago, M. (2016). The 3 Rs of influence. Built in Chicago. https://www.builtinchicago.org/blog/3-rs-influence
Ritschel, C. (2018, December 19). Influencers are faking sponsored content to gain more credibility on Instagram. The Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/instagram-influencers-sponsored-content-fake-partnerships-ad-money-followers-a8690936.html
