Social media influencers in strategic communications: how influencers' credibility persuades and manipulates brand strategies to build brand equity

Abstract

The term “influencer” symbolizes prevalence and fame that stem from having ample biased followers. They commonly convey tastes and pieces of information to their followers in diverse fields, including beauty, fashion, daily life and especially product reviews. In addition, social media influencers are becoming progressively more significant in persuading consumers to participate in corporate CSR activities. Hence, this study (1) identify the components of influencer credibility (including expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness, authenticity) and their influence on the factors of CSR engagement, Attitude toward advertising, Brand Credibility, and Influencer-brand congruence, and Brand Equity; (2) examining the mediation of brand credibility in the linkage between influencer credibility and brand equity; (3) determine the link between influencer credibility and follower engagement in CSR campaigns (CSR Engagement) and its effect on brand equity and (4) determine the impact of influencer-brand congruence on brand equity, in both cases with and without the role of the mediating variable Attitude towards the ad. The data was collected through an online experiment with 409 young consumers in Vietnam, and data were analyzed through structural equation modeling with the help of SmartPLS version 3.0. The study explored that SMIs with higher credibility will help brands enhance their brands' equity, not only directly but also indirectly through other mediating variables such as CSR engagement, attitude towards the ads. In addition, research shows that CSR engagement plays a full mediation role in the relationship at a higher degree than the remainder. Although influencer-brand congruence shows no direct impact on brand equity, its indirect role through mediators such as attitude towards the advertisement and influencer credibility is approved. We found that brand credibility does not have any direct or indirect impact on brand equity. Overall, the study enhances understanding of influencer marketing in Vietnam’s cosmetics sector, helping brands choose effective social media influencers for CSR initiatives, advertising and other marketing campaigns