YouTube vloggers’ popularity and influence: The roles of homophily, emotional attachment, and expertise
Introduction
Social networks are witnessing a rapid growth of video blog (hereinafter referred to as vlog) advertising which refers to the paid sponsorships of vloggers to review and promote upcoming products (e.g., beauty products and apparels) or services (e.g., hotel brands) (Hill et al., 2017). Vlogs are often broadcast on social media platforms like YouTube. Vlogs have become more important since the foundation of YouTube in 2005 (Thomas, 2014). YouTube is a content community that allows users to upload, view, share, and comment videos on the site. Vloggers create, record, and upload videos about their personal life and products (brands) or services (Hill et al., 2017; Lee and Watkins, 2016).
Many YouTube users create vlogs that have amassed a large following (Lee and Watkins, 2016). Some of them have reached more than 100 million subscribers to become YouTube celebrities (Lee and Watkins, 2016). One of the most popular forms of vlogs is beauty vlogs (Gannon and Prothero, 2018). In 2015, beauty videos on YouTube were watched over 45 billion times with an impressive growth of 50% between 2014 and 2015 (Beauty on YouTube, 2015). In the same year, beauty vloggers and other beauty content creators generated around 97% of conversations on beauty products whereas beauty brands generated only 3% of content (Cosmetics, 2015). Indeed, vloggers hosted 10 times more video content on YouTube compared to branded content (Cosmetics, 2015). Several beauty vloggers are superstars with millions of followers and fans. For instance, vloggers Yuya, Zoella, and Sara (SaraBeautyCorner) had 23.3, 11.9, and 9.7 million followers, respectively, on their YouTube page in January 2019 (Statista, 2019a). These vloggers are considered “Beauty Gurus” and are seen as the new opinion leaders of the Web 2.0 (Mardon et al., 2018). They become important –with their celebrity– for marketers and brands targeting the US cosmetics industry, which represented a revenue of over 62 billion dollars in 2016 (Statista, 2019a). According to the US BEA (Bureau of Economic Analysis), cosmetics’ expenses in the USA increased by 34% between 2009 and 2016 (US BEA, 2017).
Social networks have presented beauty brands with many new opportunities to connect with consumers. It is more entertaining and engaging to create a video tutorial on YouTube for a beauty product than to do the same for functional products such as computer hardware. In this social media, beauty brands are increasingly embracing the influence of vloggers (Coursaris and Van Osch, 2016), who represent new tools for beauty brands to attract female consumers with a rich content. Beauty vloggers have the ability to offer abundant information to female consumers through tutorials and tips. They are considered authentic sources of information within a large social network and have the ability to influence consumers’ choices and preferences for beauty products (Hill et al., 2017; Tynan and McKechnie, 2009). This encourages beauty brands to develop associations with these new internet celebrities such as the one developed between Lancôme and Michelle Phan since 2010, which is lucrative for both sides (Munnukka, Maity, Reinikainen, & Luomo-aho, 2019).
Although vlogs have been around for quite some time, the increasing interest in vlogs in marketing is quite recent and their influence on consumer decisions is relatively unexplored compared to other social media tools such as blogs (Hill et al., 2017). Despite many similarities between vlogging and blogging, there are also differences: in particular, social features are more pronounced on vlogging platforms (i.e., video content on YouTube, Instagram or Facebook) than those on blogging platforms (i.e., written or pictographic content on blog portals) (Hill et al., 2017). Studies on vlogs explored the antecedents of parasocial interaction with vloggers and the impact of popularity on vloggers' expertise and credibility (Sakib et al., 2019; Hill et al., 2017). They also highlighted the influence of vloggers' credibility on brand awareness and consumers' buying intentions (Munnukka et al., 2019). However, gaps remain concerning what influences vloggers' popularity and its effect on viewers' purchase decisions (Hill et al., 2017). Indeed, the importance of the beauty market and the attractiveness of beauty vlogs put forward the relevance of examining the beauty vloggers’ influence, which is an unexplored area of academic research.
The current study tries to address this gap by setting the following objectives: (1) to examine the factors that explain vloggers' popularity for beauty products; (2) to examine the influence of vloggers' popularity on viewers' purchase of recommended beauty products. Based on the literature on social media (e.g., blogs and vlogs) and celebrity characteristics and influences (Hill et al., 2017; Hsu et al., 2013; Lin and Kao, 2010; Sakib et al., 2019; Munnukka et al., 2019), there are three prominent drivers of vlogger popularity: the vlogger's expertise, the homophily between the vlogger and viewers, and the emotional attachment of viewers toward the vlogger. Homophily is a relatively less studied concept in marketing and social commerce; it reflects the perceived similarity between the vlogger and viewers on attitude, values and morals, appearance, and background.
Section snippets
Social media marketing
Kaplan and Haenlein (2010, p. 61) define social media as “a group of internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of web 2.0, and allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content.” Social media include various platforms such as social networking, weblogs, social blogs, micro blogging, podcasts, video, pictures, rating, and social bookmarking (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010). The fast development of gadget technology leads to the rapid and
Sample
A survey was conducted through Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk). Many studies support the validity of this method for recruiting participants and even its superiority to in-person data collection, recruitment via social media, and the use of professional panels (e.g., Casler et al., 2013; Kees et al., 2017).
A sample of 501 US women, who are following popular beauty vloggers on YouTube, participated in this study. We focused on women as they are more concerned with beauty advice and that most
Results
The measurement items for the seven constructs (attitude, background, value, appearance, expertise, vlogger's popularity, and emotional attachment) are subject to an Exploratory Factor Analysis. Table 3 reports the results, indicating that seven expected factors emerged, explaining 71% of the total variance. All the items loaded on their intended constructs. The loadings are all higher than .6. The Cronbach's alpha estimates range from .814 to .961 (Table 3), which confirms the reliability of
Discussion
The last decade has witnessed a rise of new types of ‘online’ celebrity groups, such as bloggers, vloggers, and ‘Instafamous’ personalities (Chahal, 2016). These people have become famous through online media usage such as Instagram, blogs, and YouTube (Djafarova and Rushworth, 2017; Nouri, 2018). Social media have become a platform of incomparable value to both traditional celebrities and online celebrities (Chung and Cho, 2017). Social media have drastically changed the way consumers look for
Conclusion
The rise of social media is accompanied by the development of different types of online celebrities such as famous bloggers, vloggers, and instagrammers. Little research has been pursued to examine what affects their popularity and how they influence audiences' preferences and purchase decisions. This research focuses on beauty vlogs and examines the determinants of perceived vloggers' popularity and the purchase of beauty products featured in the vlog. The study sheds light on the role of
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