Research pick: Who are the influenced? - "Which people are loyal followers of influencers? An exploratory study"

An area of increasing importance in digital marketing is the role of the influencer. Influencers are individuals with some degree of fame online, a large and loyal following, and great reach, usually across a number of social media platforms, such as Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube in the International Journal of Information and Communication Technology has looked at how personality traits shape an individual’s attitudes towards influencers.

Influencers have gained a lot of prominence in industries such as fashion, beauty, technology, and food and the biggest can affect public attitudes to brands quite significantly. Indeed, many people are reliant on these modern-day celebrities to guide their purchasing decisions and follow closely their favourite influencer’s advice on brands. Brands know this and invest vast sums in influencer marketing to encourage the influencers to help them sell their products and services.

In the current research, a survey of almost 400 people from Colombia and Spain was conducted in order to fill the knowledge gap with regards to what leads to someone being “influenced”. The team used the statistical approach partial least squares analysis, to help them identify cause and effect relationships in the data. They found that people with extrovert and disorganized personalities were more likely to have favourable attitudes toward influencers. That said, there was a gender gap: calm men and sympathetic women were particularly drawn to influencers.

The results suggest that the success of an influencer markting campaign may depend not only on the influencer’s content but also on the psychological makeup of their audience. Armed this knowledge marketers might craft more personalized and targeted campaigns. Such an approach could be particularly beneficial in highly competitive sectors where influencer marketing has become a near-essential part of brand promotion.

Future research in this area might look at the specifics of whether various personality traits and being influenced are associated with specific influence types, such as beauty influencer as opposed to tech influencer.

Sánchez-Torres, J.A., Roldan-Gallego, J.S., Arroyo-Cañada, F-J. and Argila-Irurita, A.M. (2024) ‘Which people are loyal followers of influencers? An exploratory study’, Int. J. Information and Communication Technology, Vol. 25, No. 1, pp.25–34.