Search results

The purpose of this study is to address the surging reliance on influencer marketing in evolving business models, focusing on a novel approach – the influencer e-commerce storefront. This study investigates various influencer advertising disclosures, social media activities and their impact on consumer engagement and sales within the influencer e-commerce storefront.

Secondary data was collected on 734 influencers from an e-commerce website based on “influencer” storefronts, and the influencer’s social media activity and content were collected from Instagram. Two-stage seemingly unrelated regression model was used to examine the research model.

Influencer social media use, encompassing daily posts, story posts and average comments, positively influences consumer engagement and sales on influencer e-commerce storefronts. Notably, the study reveals that different advertising disclosure languages yield varying effects. Unclear disclosures (e.g. branded Highlights) positively impact engagement and sales, while obvious disclosures (e.g. “Sponsored Ad”) negatively affect both.

The study contributes to Persuasion Knowledge Theory, examining influencer e-commerce storefronts and revealing the persuasive impact of undisclosed language in advertising. This study innovatively explores the effects of obvious and undisclosed sponsorship on coping mechanisms, offering insights into consumer reactions. The recommended use of undisclosed language suggests that ambiguity can enhance ad persuasion, guiding practitioners in crafting more effective messages. Moreover, the study extends co-creation theory and service-dominant logic by underscoring the significance of influencers’ social media engagement in co-creating value for consumers. Influencers’ active engagement on social media fosters co-creation, strengthening connections and boosting consumer loyalty.

Conceptual and empirical research over the past 20 years has moved the social media (SM) literature beyond the embryotic stage to a well-developed academic discipline. As the lead article in the special issue in the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing on Cutting-Edge Research in Social Media and Interactive Marketing, this review and agenda article has two key goals: (1) to review key SM and interactive marketing research over the past three years and (2) to identify the next wave of high priority challenges and research opportunities.

Given the “cutting-edge” research focus of the special issue, this review and research agenda paper focused on articles published in 25 key marketing journals between January 2021 and March 2024. Initially, the search request was for articles with “social media, social selling, social commerce” located in the article title, author-selected key words and journal-selected keywords. Later, we conducted searches based on terminology from articles presented in the final review. In total, over 1,000 articles were reviewed across the 25 journals, plus additional ones that were cited in those journals that were not on the initial list.

Our review uncovered eight key content areas: (1) data sources, methodology and scale development; (2) emergent SM technologies; (3) artificial intelligence; (4) virtual reality; (5) sales and sales management; (6) consumer welfare; (7) influencer marketing; and (8) social commerce. Table I provides a summer of key articles and research findings for each of the content areas.

As a literature review and research agenda article, this paper is one of the most extensive to date on SM marketing, and particularly with regard to emergent research over the past three years. Recommendations for future research are integrated through the paper and summarized in Figure 2.

Consumer welfare is one of the eight emergent content areas uncovered in the literature review. Specific focus is on SM privacy, misinformation, mental health and misbehavior.

Self-presentation is an important aspect of influencer marketing. Drawing upon self-presentation theory and source credibility theory, this study aimed to unravel how the self-presentation strategies of a layperson, opinion leadership and micro-celebrity influence source credibility (i.e. trustworthiness, expertise, physical attractiveness and social attractiveness) and how source credibility, in turn, affects brand responses.

An online experiment among female participants (N = 229) was conducted. Participants were shown a sponsored blog in which the influencer presented herself as either a layperson, an opinion leader or a micro-celebrity.

The study demonstrated that the presentation strategy of a layperson was more persuasive than a micro-celebrity presentation because of higher levels of (1) trust and (2) social attractiveness. In addition, opinion leaders were perceived as having more expertise than laypeople and, therefore, positively enhanced brand responses.

The current findings provide relevant insights into the theoretical mechanisms (i.e. expertise, trustworthiness and social attractiveness) that explain the effects of self-presentation strategies on brand responses.

Our findings imply that credibility perceptions determine the persuasiveness of the SMI. This study showed that layperson and opinion leadership self-presentation strategies are relatively more persuasive.

This study is the first to show that influencers’ self-presentation strategies determine how people respond to the brands that influencers promote. In addition, we show that these effects are explained by the influencers’ trust, social attractiveness and expertise.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the moderating effect of homophily between trust in social media influencers (SMIs) and credibility of the post in influencer marketing by incorporating the similarity attraction theory (SAT) and analysing the effect of trust in SMIs on online purchase intention and credibility of the post. This study also explored the mediating role of influencers’ credibility of the post between trust in SMIs and online purchase intention.

The data were collected from 417 respondents in Jaipur, India, using an online questionnaire via Google Forms. A convenience sampling technique was employed to collect the data. Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was used to test the proposed hypotheses with the help of SmartPLS version 4.

The results exhibit a positive and significant influence of trust in SMIs on credibility of the post and online purchase intention. Also, this study found a positive and significant relationship between credibility of the post and online purchase intention. Additionally, credibility of the post had a positive and significant mediation role in the relationship between trust in SMIs and online purchase intention. In addition, homophily positively moderated the relationship between trust in SMIs and credibility of the post.

The findings of this study can be used by marketing professionals working in the e-commerce industry to ensure their continued in success using the right influencers for their specific target audiences and help them create and implement more effective promotional strategies, increasing brand awareness, announcing sales, using them for creative content and so on.

Until now, there has been no study in the Indian context that has tested the moderation effect of homophily between the trust in SMIs and credibility of the post by incorporating the SAT, according to the researchers’ knowledge. Furthermore, this novel piece of research explored the relationship between trust in SMIs and online purchase intention with credibility of the post as a mediator.

The present study investigates the impact of opinion leadership and spirituality from three types of social media influencers (SMIs) on individuals’ intentions to conduct recycling. This research is driven by the opinion leadership theory demonstrated by influencer marketing.

This research applies a between-subject experiment to measure the impact of the proposed model. Each participant was exposed to a different influencer: an attractive influencer (Treatment 1, n = 101), an expert influencer (Treatment 2, n = 94), a religious influencer (Treatment 3, n = 99) and a control condition (Treatment 4, n = 102). An ANOVA post-hoc analysis was conducted to further assess the impact dynamics of each influencer based on different demographics such as age, income and level of education. More than 95% of the samples consist of Muslims.

Findings revealed the different dynamics of the effect of opinion leadership and spirituality on the intention to recycle from utilising different types of influencers. Samples derived from a high socio-economic background and exposed to the religious influencer (Treatment 3) have a relatively higher mean score. In general, younger participants with lower incomes and levels of education have less tendency to conduct recycling.

This research attempts to fill the gap in the impact of influencer marketing on green behaviour adoption with the inclusion of spirituality, which has been largely ignored in this context. It offers insights from the perspective of a developing economy that has one of the largest percentages of social media users in the world and from a country that regards a relationship with God as important.

The study examines how the three dimensions of homophily (attitude, background, and value) influence the perceived usefulness, credibility, and enjoyability of travel content and follower behavior (i.e. willingness to search for more information and intention to visit the destination and purchase the tourism product). Likewise, the study investigates how content perception influences follower behavior.

A sample of 621 Instagram users from generations Y and Z who follow at least one travel influencer and intend to travel in the next twelve months was collected through an online survey. Partial least squares structural equation modeling was adopted to examine the data.

Attitudinal homophily influences follower behavior, value homophily impacts content perception, and background homophily has a counterproductive effect. Likewise, content perceived as useful and credible induces the intention to visit and purchase the tourism product.

The generalization of the results must be performed with care, as the context of analysis is limited to a social platform and only includes Portuguese individuals.

The findings help managers better understand which homophily cues influence content perception and maximize influencer persuasion. Based on the results, they can better decide which travel influencers should endorse their tourism products.

Research on homophily has neglected the multidimensionality of the concept and its analysis in the tourism context. By using a consolidated approach to homophily, content perception, and follower behavior, this study contributes to the tourism marketing literature and expands influencer marketing research.

This study aims to reveal the knowledge structure of social media influencer marketing literature by performing science mapping analysis through a state-of-the-art bibliometric approach to determine the current and future trends. Social media influencer marketing is one of the most effective approaches to presenting a brand and offering value to consumers via social media.

This study evaluates the knowledge structure to uncover the emerging trends and future predictions in social media influencer marketing through bibliographic coupling and co-word analysis. In total, 917 journal publications were retrieved from the Web of Science database and analyzed using VOSviewer software.

The central theme in social media influencer marketing reflects digital engagement between influencers and followers and communication between influencers and followers. The theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

This study unleashes the knowledge structure according to the fundamental literature of social media influencer marketing and the underlying themes related to the phenomenon.

This study aims to investigate the rising trend of virtual influencers – digitally created characters with human-like attributes. It aims to evaluate and compare their effectiveness with human influencers in terms of brand attitudes and purchase intentions. It uncovers the mechanisms underlying the differences in effectiveness observed between virtual influencers and their human counterparts.

The research uses a 2 (influencer type: human vs virtual) × 3 (product type: functional vs symbolic vs experiential) between-subjects design. Through a pilot study (n = 334) and a main study (n = 352), the research examines the interactive effects of influencer and product type on brand attitude and purchase intentions. Hypotheses were developed and tested using moderating mediation models centered on authenticity and product–endorser fit.

Virtual influencers are perceived as less authentic than human influencers across all product types, negatively influencing brand attitude and purchase intention. However, the extent to which influencer type affects brand attitudes and purchase intentions, mediated by product–endorser fit, varies based on the product type.

This research emphasizes two key mechanisms – authenticity and product–endorser fit – influencing the effectiveness of virtual influencers. It suggests that aligning virtual influencers with suitable product types can offset their perceived authenticity deficit, significantly affecting their endorsement effectiveness.

Explore what popular food influencers among Flemish emerging adults portray in their Instagram recipe posts in terms of (1) references to food literacy, (2) nutritional value, (3) rational and emotional appeals and (4) the relation between the nutritional value and rational/emotional appeals.

A content and nutritional analysis of Instagram recipe posts from seven food influencers (N = 166).

Findings reveal that food influencers rarely embed references to food literacy in their recipe posts, especially regarding meal planning, food selection, meal consumption and evaluating food-related information. Only in 28.9% of the posts information was given on how to prepare a recipe. Second, 220 recipes were included in the 166 recipe posts, of which the majority (65%) were main course meals that met at least six of the 11 nutrient criteria for a healthy main meal (67.2%). Finally, food influencers promote their recipe posts as positive narratives, focusing on the tastiness (66%) and convenience (40.9%) of meals.

This is the first study to evaluate what food influencers post nutritionally in their Instagram recipes, as well as how they promote these recipes. Health promotors should note the influential role of food influencers and seek ways to collaborate to provide information on how food literacy cues can be embedded in influencers' communications and provide insights into how influencers' recipes can be optimised.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the negative impact of social media influencers (SMIs) (human vs virtual) on customer well-being. Additionally, it aims to explore how the fear of missing out (FOMO) mediates and regulatory focus moderates this relationship from the social comparison theory lens.

In the first study, text mining and machine learning were employed to measure the level of followers' well-being in response to 40 SMIs (human vs virtual) posts on Instagram. In the second study, a randomized between-subjects experiment was conducted with three groups (human vs virtual vs control) and a sample size of 412 participants to confirm the results of the first study and investigate how FOMO mediates and regulatory focus moderates the relationship between SMI beauty product endorsement and consumer well-being.

The findings from text mining indicate that SMIs have a greater impact on consumers well-being, which is higher for virtual than human influencer. Additionally, the result of the experimental study shows the mediating role of FOMO in their relationship between SMIs and well-being. The moderator analysis reveals that there is a moderating effect of regulatory focus in the model.

The findings inform marketing managers about the differences between virtual than human influencer in their impact on customer well-being in endorsing beauty product, especially among the younger generation.

This paper is among the first research studies that examine the dark side of SMIs, which diminishes their follower's well-being through social comparison theory lenses.