Influencer marketing is a relatively new phenomenon in social media. Companies are still hesitant to adopt influencer marketing as a new element in their marketing mix, due to the overwhelming amount of potential social media influencer candidates for a given campaign and little knowledge about the underlying mechanisms. One core challenge for companies is the proper identification of influencers for a given campaign. The goal of our research is to provide a recipe on how to identify influencers and carry out a successful influencer campaign. We provide support for companies in choosing the right influencers to optimize the match between companies and influencers.

Authors: Jana Gross, Zhiying Cui and Florian von Wangenheim