The Influencer Industry: The Quest for Authenticity on Social Media. A book review.

Decoding the Influencer Industry: Analyzing Structures, Impacts, and the Call for Regulation

The structures of influencer industry were established over a decade ago in the United States when the economic collapse forced many aspiring individuals in the media industry to become self-employed content creators on various platforms.

Media researcher Emily Hund provides a rich documentation of the birth of influencer industry in her new book, "The Influencer Industry: The Quest for Authenticity on Social Media."

Influencer marketing has transformed everyday life into a commodity and lifestyle into a product. Furthermore, it has shifted the focus from promoting goods and services to shaping thoughts and ideas. What are the implications of this shift for societal development? The researcher raises this question, offering political proposals and calling for industry regulation.

Hund's interest in the influencer industry was sparked by the rise of fashion bloggers, and she began her research in 2014 by interviewing these bloggers. Soon, the line between fashion and lifestyle became blurred. As the photo-sharing app Instagram, launched in 2010, gained prominence, Hund closely followed the platform's evolution and interviewed professionals from marketing communication agencies, casting professionals, and other industry players who together formed the new media sector.

With the increasing practise of maintaining a presence on multiple channels, bloggers began to be referred to as influencers, hence, the term Influencer Industry.

Hund’s research interest and argumentation in the book revolve around the notion of measured, commercialized authenticity, which conforms to advertisers' needs for efficiency, predictability, and replicability.

The emerging industry defined and operationalized

• brand personalities and personal brands,

• followers as assets,

• measurability and commercialization of influence, and

• the perception of authenticity.

In the industry's early stages, bloggers' influence was based on their relatability and their free expression of non-commercial, and thus, authentic, opinions. With the advent of affiliate marketing and commercial collaborations, influencers now have to work hard to maintain the perception of authenticity.

Regulation and unionization?

Regulatory measures are necessary because influencers are at the mercy of platforms.

By platforms, Hund refers to both social media platforms and technological tools, such as affiliate advertising tools and influencer marketing marketplaces.

The concentration of power is a result of corporate acquisitions and platform development.

Examples of corporate acquisitios are the acquitition of Hello Society, a specialist influencer agency for Pinterest marketing, by New York Times in 2016, or Twitter acquisistion of Niche in 2015 and Google acquisition of FameBit the same year.

An example of platform development bypassing third-party solutions is Instagram’s launching of in-app purchases without third-party services in 2019 and introducing the affiliate marketing tool in 2021 (Hund 2023, p. 157).

Influencer work is risky because platforms come and go, as exemplified by Vine, which was acquired, launched, and discontinued by Twitter.

According to Hund, regulation should increase platform governance transparency and mitigate the lack of power of those using the platforms to earn their livelihoods. The researcher, writing from a U.S. perspective, does not explicitly address whether the recent implementation of the Digital Services Act (DSA) and Digital Markets Act (DMA) in the EU constitutes sufficient platform regulation.

Secondly, Hund suggests that influencers should organize to defend their rights collectively. As an example, she mentions the establishment of the American Influencer Council (AIC) in the United States in 2020.

To protect the rights of ordinary media users, Hund proposes clarifying the role of influencers on platforms (p. 167). Even if a particular post is not a commercial collaboration, consumers should be reminded that influencers are not ordinary individuals; their actions are guided by the invisible commercial mechanisms of influencer industry.

The article was originally published in Finnish as Uutuuskirja tarkastelee vaikuttajia teollisuuden alana USA:ssa