Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine relationships among S NS influencer' characteristics, trust in influencer, self-congruence with influencer and purchase intention. Moreover, this study attempted to examine the mediating effects of trust in influencer and self-congruence with influencer. Research design, data, and methodology: A online survey was conducted in Korea and 432 sample was collected. First, a confirmatory factor analysis was performed to test validity of the measures. Second, descriptive statistics and correlation analysis and reliability test was conducted. Finally, it tested hypotheses suggested by research model in this study, applying structural equation model. Results: First, it was found that professionalism, interactivity, and intimacy of influencer was positively related to trust in influencer. Second, it was also found that attractiveness and interactivity of influencer was positively related to self-congruence with influencer. Third, trust in influencer and self-congruence with influencer was positively related to purchase intention. Finally, trust in influencer and self-congruence with influencer mediated the effect of influencer characteristics and purchase intention. More specifically, trust in influencer mediated the effect of professionalism, interactivity, and intimacy on purchase intention, and self-congruence with influencer mediated the effect of attractiveness and interactivity on purchase intention. Implications: This study expanded the findings of previous studies, by examining the relationship among influencer's characteristics, trust in influencer, self-congruence with influencer, and purchase intention. In particular, this study contribute to previous studies, since it found that there were different influential processes of influencer's characteristics on purchase intention. Based on the findings of this study, companies which attempt to use influencer marketing need to consider the characteristics of influencer.
Zhang et al. (2023) studied this question.