Influence of micro-influencers on consumer preference: A study of beauty bloggers

Abstract

Social media marketing has been on the rise and growing steadily for the past few years. Interviews with few females in the age group 20 to 30 years as well as literature review revealed the factors that influence the buying patterns of beauty products among these set of consumers. Almost 70% of these customers agreed that while celebrity endorsements were pleasing to the sight, they found it hard to believe the veracity of the claims made in these endorsements. In this rapidly changing world, where new technologies disrupt the tried and tested way of doing things, where Netflix and YouTube have disrupted the movie platform, blogging has found quite an audience. People aspire to be more refined in their tastes and look up to these bloggers, who break it down for them into simple, easily followable steps like but this product, use this makeup. In this study, we found a resonance to the above fact. Even when external factors like familiarity with product, attitude towards the product and endorsement and endorser were controlled, the result was quite clear. Micro-influencer endorsements have more influence on consumer preference, which reflects in their purchase intention, than celebrity endorsements. This variation in influence is partly due to but not limited to the amount of trust these people have in the beauty bloggers, compared to celebrities, because unlike celebrities who have multiple sources of income and avenues to build their brand image, these beauty bloggers depend on how well their recommendations work on people. So, they are careful with what they endorse.