Social Media Influencers – Current Dynamics and Future Prospects

Social media influencers have emerged as a highly salient topic of discussion. Given their crucial role in consumer decision-making, this paper aims to illuminate the concept and key characteristics of social media influencers and unveil future prospects for researchers and practitioners. Although there is a consensus regarding the role of social media influencers, the understanding and categorization of social media influencers in the contemporary business landscape warrant further deliberation. As recent studies have mostly focused on the structure of social media influencers from a broad perspective, we advocate shifting the research paradigm towards synthesizing the dimensions of “engagement style” and “level of expertise” in order to take into account the unique characteristics and thematic focus of influencers. By transcending traditional metrics, this paper seeks to provide more insights and nuances about social media influencers and marketing strategy. Future research should further explore the behavioral patterns of social media influencers in the evolving legal and regulatory environment, evaluate the impact of regulation on their communicative efficacy and behavior, and investigate how the emergence of virtual influencers changes consumers’ emulative behavior and responsiveness to digital marketing channels.