Abstract
Social media, based on user-generated content, connectivity, and participation, have become a new environment for brands to capture attention and build lasting relationships with customers and fans. Participating in these platforms demanded a paradigmatic shift in branding and brand communication, which became more focused on listening to consumers and fans, interacting and collaborating with them, and nurturing mutually beneficial relationships. Digital influencers act as mediators between brands and their followers and play a pivotal role in social media marketing strategies. The COVID-19 pandemic, confinement periods imposed in many countries, and a reconfiguration of daily routines in post-confinement or deconfinement periods, had a profound impact on businesses, on consumption, and on branding. Many brands, unable to produce and market their products or offering their services for a considerable period, focused on their communication, on remaining relevant or becoming more relevant for their fans and customers. Brand communication on Instagram has changed during this short period, and our exploratory study sets out to map the main changes and to understand how brands, influencers and users perceive them, in the specific context of Portugal. This article presents results from an online survey to a purposive sample of 160 instagrammers, addressing their perceptions about the impact of these changes on their relationship with brands and influencers. We complement the perspective of users with interviews to 25 other relevant agents, namely Instagram influencers, marketing agencies and brands with relevant presence on Instagram.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
- 2.
- 3.
- 4.
- 5.
- 6.
References
Carah, N., Shaul, M.: Brands and Instagram: point, tap, swipe, glance. Mob. Media Commun. 4(1), 69–84 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1177/2050157915598180
Garfield, S.: Handbook of Community Management: A Guide to Leading Communities of Practice. Saur Verlag & Co., Berlin (2020)
Giles, D.: Twenty-First Century Celebrity: Fame in Digital Culture. Emerald Publishing Limited, New York (2018)
Kornberger, M.: Brand Society: How Brands Transform Management and Lifestyle. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2010)
Kotler, P., Kartajaya, H. Setiawan, I.: Marketing 4.0: Moving from Traditional to Digital. Wiley, New Jersey (2017)
Levin, A.: Influencer Marketing for Brands: What YouTube and Instagram Can Teach You About the Future of Digital Advertising. Apress, Stockholm (2019)
McCorquodale, S.: Influence: How social media influencers are shaping our digital future. Bloomsbury Business, London (2019)
Phua, J., Jin, S.V., Kim, J.J.: Gratifications of using Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Snapchat to follow brands: The moderating effect of social comparison, trust, tie strength, and network homophily on brand identification, brand engagement, brand commitment, and membership intention. Telematics Inform. 34(1), 412–424 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tele.2016.06.004
Quivy, R., Campenhoudt, L.: Manual de Investigação em Ciências Sociais, Lisboa, Gradiva (1992)
Heggde, G., Shainesh, G. (eds.): Social Media Marketing. Springer, Singapore (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5323-8
Zuboff, S.: The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. Profile Books, London (2019)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
Andrade, J.G., Dias, P. (2022). Brand Communication on Instagram During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Portuguese Context. In: Rocha, A., Adeli, H., Dzemyda, G., Moreira, F. (eds) Information Systems and Technologies. WorldCIST 2022. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 470. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04829-6_54
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04829-6_54
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-04828-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-04829-6
eBook Packages: Intelligent Technologies and RoboticsIntelligent Technologies and Robotics (R0)