Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-9-2023

Abstract

The term “influencer” has become widely recognized in the realm of influencer marketing, which refers to a form of social media advertising that capitalizes on the credibility of popular social media influencers to effectively reach a large target audience while maintaining an aura of authenticity. However, despite the significance of this concept, there is a noticeable lack of articles that have delved into the conceptual and theoretical development of an influencer model. Therefore, this study aims to address this research gap by adopting a classic grounded theory approach to identify and explore the common factors that contribute to the emergence of social media influencers. Furthermore, this study aims to illustrate three key elements of a theoretical influencer model. By employing a grounded theory approach, this study delves into the multifaceted phenomenon of social media influencers. Through an in-depth analysis and coding process, it uncovers the defining characteristics that enable individuals to ascend to the status of influencers. The identified factors shed light on the strategies and traits that contribute to the success and influence of these individuals on various social media platforms.

Comments

© 2023, Young Joon Lim.

This is an open access journal, and articles are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as appropriate credit is given and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms.

Publication Title

Journal of Communication and Management

DOI

10.58966/JCM2023231

Included in

Communication Commons

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