Keywords

1 Introduction

Due to the global expansion of the “digital economy,” social media influencer marketing has gained a lot of attention and has become a ubiquitous practice and a crucial component of any company’s promotional efforts. In marketing, the influencer phenomenon is not new, as famous celebrities were the main drivers of consumer behavior even before the explosion of social media [1]. For example, for several decades, a well-established marketing communications’ tactic is to use Hollywood personalities and movie stars [2]. As stated by Brown and Hayes [3], influencer marketing is the act of an external person who influences the consumers buying choices. According to Lou and Yuan [4], “influencer marketing is defined as a strategy that utilizes the personal influence of important opinion leaders to increase consumers’ brand awareness and purchase intention”. Specifically, social media influencers are considered opinion leaders for their followers in the social networks in which they perform [5]. Along similar lines, Schwemmer and Ziewiecki [6] cite that these influencers act as catalysts in the informal communication process that piques a potential client’s interest. On the whole, research and applied evidence suggest that there is a relationship between influencers and consumers behavior. As a matter of course, influencer marketing is a form of social media marketing involving product placement and endorsements from influencers [7]. In order to measure the impact of Social Media Influencers, consumer behavior research is mainly focusing to the target market, i.e., the consumers. Nevertheless, the respective research upon the personalized communication media, the influencers, per se, is rarer. With this research we make an attempt to fill this void. Specifically, we focus on the influencers and examine their perceptions on how influencer marketing may affect consumer purchasing decisions. Indeed, influencers’ understanding of their role as intermediaries between the promoted companies and the target market is crucial, as their personalized communication behavior and performance may depend upon these perceptions. Moreover, it is crucial to examine, even at exploratory stage, the promoted companies’ choices and effectiveness to lean upon Social Media influencers, as intermediaries for their marketing communication strategies. This paper aims to examine whether: (i) Influencers’ personality, (ii) Followers’ engagement, i.e., through User Generated Content, and (iii) Followers’ performance risk minimization, may be related to consumer behavior.

2 Literature Review and Hypothesis Development

2.1 The Relationship of Influencer’s Personality with Their Followers’ Buying Behavior

The importance of role perceptions of human interface that lies between the boundaries of suppliers and buyers, has been the research subject of very rigorous research in the marketing literature. For example, in the realm of salesforce management, personality traits, aptitude, role perceptions and motivation were found to be important determinants of sales intermediaries’ performance [8]. In the realm of social media, one paradigm of the human interface between the company and the buyer is the social media influencer. Specifically, an influencer may be anyone, from a fashion blogger on Instagram to a travel blogger, or an academic expert, who tweets on Twitter. Academics have used a variety of definitions to describe social media influencers [9]. More recently, Dhanesh and Duthler [10] defined social media influencers as those who, through personal branding, develop and sustain relationships with their followers on social media and have the power to enlighten, entertain, and shape their followers’ opinions and actions. In this way, influencers successfully shape consumers’ perceptions towards products or services by posting videos, content, or pictures on their social media channels. Moreover, they could act as an independent third-party endorser who recommends and describes the products through the social media contents, which could influence the consumers’ opinions, behaviors, and attitudes towards a product [11]. One of the most crucial factors driving social media users to follow an influencer is the influencer’s personality. The relationship between social media influencers and their followers is built upon trust and the influencer’s unique personality [12]. The attractiveness of an influencer’s personality has a direct impact on how followers see them, influences how positively they feel about a brand [13] and is essential in developing consumers’ positive purchase intention towards brands and products [14].

Thus, we hypothesize: Η1: Influencers’ personality will be related to their followers’ buying behavior.

2.2 The Relationship of Followers’ Engagement with Their Buying Behavior

The role of customers’ engagement in companies’ posts, through interactive interfaces, i.e., through submitting their comments on online WEB pages and social networks has attracted researchers’ attention, long ago, with the introduction of WEB2.0 interactive technology, that enabled the user to upload her own content. For example, Karayanni and Baltas [15] have found a relationship between industrial buyers’ comments submission through companies’ Web Sites and other social networks (i.e., newsgroups, etc.) with salesforce performance. For one thing, when consumers have the ability to express their positive opinions on various marketing fora, i.e., the social media, they essentially become active advocators of the respective brand, which is an utmost branding goal. On the other hand, even if consumers submit negative criticism, this may be an opportunity for companies to identify the weak aspects of their brand, and to improve it, while they may also increase their brands awareness, at the same time. Indeed, Berger et al., [16] found that although companies and individuals often try to quiet negative publicity, in some cases, the later can actually have positive effects. Studies have shown that influencers’ content positively impacts consumers’ purchase intention [17]. This User-generated content (UGC), that influencers produce by highlighting the brand’s goods or services, is a common component of influencer marketing. Customers also utilize this technology to research businesses and their goods before making purchasing decisions. Additionally, they feel more comfortable expressing themselves because of the anonymity and security that social media offers, which enables users to express their true sentiments about the brands they interact with [18]. Stated formally, we hypothesize that: Η2: Followers’ engagement will be related to their buying behavior.

2.3 The Relationship of Followers’ Performance Risk Minimization with Their Buying Behavior

Perceived risk is the level and amount of uncertainty that customers feel when considering a purchase and worrying that something might not go as planned. It is described as the potential loss that consumers expect to experience as a result of purchasing a good, or service [19]. Perceived performance risk is very important as it is related to brand loyalty, thus to consumer behavior. Along the marketing literature we find extensive research on this relationship [20]. Influencers may have the power to arouse favorable feelings and persuade customers to make purchases, but they can also have the opposite effect [21]. Furthermore, Deshbhag and Mohan [22] recently showed how perceptions of risk influenced attitudes and intentions to purchase consumer goods. Thus, we hypothesize that: Η3: Followers’ performance risk minimization will be related to their buying behavior.

3 Methodology of the Study

The research design of this research is exploratory and in order to support our research hypotheses, we followed the guidelines of Churchill and Peters [23]. First, we delved into the pertinent marketing literature, as well as, on primary data selected from qualitative research, through personal interviews, from 10 key informants operating in the social media-marketing field. As a next step, we developed quantitative research instrument, by scratch, based on the literature review and the primary qualitative data for a convenience sample of 300 influencers.

3.1 Measures Operationalization, Reliability and Validity Assessment

All attitudinal measures were tapped by 5-point Likert scales, ranging from strongly disagree = 1, to strongly agree = 5. The rest measures capturing social media types, use intensity and influencer’s motives were categorical, dichotomous. Specifically, the measure ‘Influencer’s personality’ was tapped by two items, namely: (a) When followers feel familiar with me, then this would positively influence their opinion about the brand I represent, and (b) Influencers play a significant role to the diffusion of a new brand in the market. Two items measured ‘followers’ engagement’ and shared the common preposition: The following content types may have an impact upon your followers’ buying behavior: (a) Uploading followers and buyers’ comments on the influencer’s social media and (b) Uploading followers and buyers’ images on the influencer’s social media. The measure ‘followers’ performance risk minimization’ was tapped by four items that shared the common preposition: Social Media Influencers may help their followers, regarding the following buying decisions: (a) To decide upon issues for which they don’t have enough information, b) To minimize the information research time for issues of interest to them, (c) To minimize the risk of spending money for a product that might not worth it, and (d) To feel safer regarding the product quality of the product that they want to buy. Finally, for the ‘followers’ buying behavior’ measure, we used three items, all of which shared the common preposition: Every time that I promote a new brand to my followers, it is more likely that: (a) They would buy it, when I give information relative to the product, (b) They would buy it, next time that they would need it, (c) They would buy it when they see me to use it, in person.

As, a next step, in order to assess reliability and validity of the above measures, we followed the guidelines of Gaskin and Lim [24]. As a first step, we performed Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), for all four lists of items, reflecting the constructs: influencer’s personality, followers’ engagement, followers’ performance risk minimization and followers’ buying behavior, respectively. The EFA results depicted that all constructs met the discriminant validity criteria. All factor loadings were higher than 0.50 and Total Variance Explained was over 60% (sig < 0.000). Furthermore, the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy was higher than 0.80 and Bartlett’s test of sphericity was highly significant (p = 000) for all variables, which rejects the null hypothesis and shows that the described attributes are correlated within the population.

To assess construct validity, we performed reliability analysis which produced Cronbach alphas higher than 60% for all scale constructs, thus implying that our measures were valid and reliable, which enabled us to proceed to hypothesis testing.

3.2 Sampling

The quantitative research instrument was uploaded to the University server and an email was sent to a convenience sample of 300 international influencers, operating on various social media, i.e., the Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest, politely urging them to volunteer in engagement of this research. The data collection resulted in 65 fully responded questionnaires, yielding 21.7% response rate, which compares favorably with similar response rates of Web-based marketing surveys [25].

3.3 Demographic Characteristics

Regarding their motivations for becoming influencers, 52.3% cited economic incentives, 30.8% mentioned seeking publicity, while the remaining 16.9% indicated interactivity and socialization as their primary reasons. These findings imply that the research participants have chosen to be influencers mainly for economic reasons, or publicity, which underpin their essential role as professionals in the realm of social media promotion. The most commonly used social media platforms were Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, with 95%, 89%, and 83% of participants citing them, respectively. In con-trast, Pinterest was the least popular social medium, mentioned by only 59% of the participants. YouTube and Twitter fell in between, with 69 and 45% of our sampled influencers reporting their use to support their promotional strategies. Finally, concerning the product types that these influencers cited to promote, the most commonly encountered category was traveling/entertainment, followed closely by the product category of clothing/footwear, as reported by 83% and 80% of the respondents, respectively. The remaining categories, including cosmetics, clothing accessories, nutrition/fitness, and technology products, were encountered by 59%, 57%, 40%, and 19% of the sample, respectively.

4 Findings and Discussion

Our research hypotheses were then tested using advanced statistics, and specifically, correlation analysis and regression analysis. First, we performed correlation analysis among all four measures, and specifically, followers’ buying behavior was correlated with influencers’ personality, followers’ engagement and followers’ performance risk minimization, at rates 0.43 (p < 0.001), 0.25 (p < 0.05), and 0.27 (p < 0.05) respectively. These findings encouraged us to proceed to regression analysis. Thus, in order to test Hypotheses 1–3, we regressed all three hypothesized determinants upon the dependent variable followers’ buying behavior. As shown on Table 1, all three variables had explanatory powers upon the determinant followers’ buying behavior, thus supporting our research Hypotheses.

Table 1 Regression of influencers’ personality, followers’ engagement and followers’ performance risk minimization upon followers’ buying behavior
Full size table

Specifically, an influencer’s personality appears to play a role in shaping their followers’ purchasing intentions. Consequently, when an influencer acknowledges the importance of their personality in influencing their followers’ buying choices, they may become more diligent in their promotional endeavors. This, in return, deepens the connection between the influencer and their followers, ultimately bolstering consumer behavior. Consequently, influencers must exercise caution, recognizing their role as potential role models who can impart specific principles and attitudes to their followers. Simultaneously, companies looking to collaborate with influencers should exercise care, not only evaluating product alignment with the influencer’s image, but also considering the values and principles conveyed by the influencer’s personality. Our research findings suggest that the latter can substantially influence the likes, dislikes, needs, and preferences of their customers and followers. Furthermore, our findings suggest a relationship between followers’ engagement and their purchasing intentions. Influencers believe that by encouraging followers to actively participate in their social media communication, by sharing user generated content, such as comments and images, they can turn them into advocates for the product. This, in turn, leads to increased brand loyalty and, consequently, to higher product sales. Third, our research findings affirm a relationship between followers’ risk mitigation and their purchasing behavior. When influencers believe they can effectively reduce their followers’ perceived performance risk, it leads to increased product sales. These findings underscore influencers’ recognition of the significance of their personality in influencing brand purchases. Moreover, our research findings suggest that influencers who actively keep their followers engaged with content may also influence their buying intentions. Likewise, as our study’s evidence implies, one repercussion of followers’ engagement is that it may lead to reduced product performance risk, which is related with higher sales. Eventually, companies that partner with influencers should consider the implication that they need to provide comprehensive information and training, covering not just the qualities and performance of the promoted brand, but also the company’s culture and values. This approach facilitates a more unified promotion strategy, increased engagement with their target customers, and improved alignment between the company and influencers, in terms of communication strategies and goals. Ultimately, this alignment may lead to company-influencer synergy that is interprets to increased product sales. Online brand communities for different products and services can be created [26,27,28].

5 Limitations and Directions for Future Research

This research is primarily exploratory in nature, and it is important not to generalize too far, based solely on the study’s results. To provide stronger validation for our findings, further research with a larger and more diverse sample is warranted.