Hiring an influencer has become a really popular way for growth-hack minded brand or business to make the most of the kind of product or service they might be trying to offer. However, the profit that many have seen in the influencer industry has led to a real boom in the number of people that are trying to focus on getting in on this kind of profession.
This has led to concerns about a saturation point being reached because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up consumers would end up trusting influencers a lot less frequently than might have been the case otherwise. However, it is important to note that a survey from Slicktext has actually revealed a lot of important data about the level of trust that consumers currently place in influencers that they might see online.
One trend that was seen in this survey was that an excess of sponsored posts for the most part made consumers feel like a particular influencer might be behaving somewhat disingenuously with them. There was also quite a bit of variance with regards to the kinds of platforms that people trusted when it came to the influencers that were active on said platforms. Answers also varied based on the demographic that was answering the survey questions.
Respondents from the ages of 16 to 24 stated that Instagram was their most trusted platform for influencers followed closely by TikTok. 31.69% of these respondents placed their trust in Instagram and 28.17% voted for TikTok. Answers were different when they came from people above the age of 25. For these respondents, Facebook based influencers appeared to be the most trustworthy for them with 32.25% saying that the platform had the influencers that they could trust the most.
Instagram did fairly well in this demographic as well, receiving 17.38% of votes. An interesting thing to note here is that TikTok only got 6.07% of votes from people 25 and older which means that the platform has a bit of a reputational and trustworthiness issue for people that are above a certain age.
Another really important thing to take stock of is what activities and behaviors might make an influencer appear to be more or less trustworthy in the eyes of consumers. Over a third of all respondents, 34.43% to be precise, stated that unbiased reviews were the biggest thing that could make them trust an influencer more. 27.12% said that follower interaction boosted their trust in an influencer and 23.56% said that insights into their personal lives made them appear more trustworthy. Interestingly, only 9.04% of respondents said that an influencer looking like them was a major factor in how much they trusted them.
When it came to questions that talked about an influencer appearing to be less trustworthy, 31.07% of respondents said that an excess of sponsored posts caused them to lose trust in any given influencer. This means that influencers should try their best to balance out sponsored posts with legitimate content as well. However, these influencers might want to try their best to steer clear of any kind of political content since over 17% of respondents said that this made influencers less trustworthy in their eyes.
Stereotypical influencer behavior such as using specific influencer language as well as the use of highly edited photos made influencers less trustworthy to consumers as well. These are things that should be taken into account because they can be used to make it so that consumers would be more likely to trust any given influencer. There are a lot of industries that rely on these individuals and they should optimize their services wherever they can. Take a look at below charts for more insights:
Read next: How does the world spend its time on the internet?
This has led to concerns about a saturation point being reached because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up consumers would end up trusting influencers a lot less frequently than might have been the case otherwise. However, it is important to note that a survey from Slicktext has actually revealed a lot of important data about the level of trust that consumers currently place in influencers that they might see online.
One trend that was seen in this survey was that an excess of sponsored posts for the most part made consumers feel like a particular influencer might be behaving somewhat disingenuously with them. There was also quite a bit of variance with regards to the kinds of platforms that people trusted when it came to the influencers that were active on said platforms. Answers also varied based on the demographic that was answering the survey questions.
Respondents from the ages of 16 to 24 stated that Instagram was their most trusted platform for influencers followed closely by TikTok. 31.69% of these respondents placed their trust in Instagram and 28.17% voted for TikTok. Answers were different when they came from people above the age of 25. For these respondents, Facebook based influencers appeared to be the most trustworthy for them with 32.25% saying that the platform had the influencers that they could trust the most.
Instagram did fairly well in this demographic as well, receiving 17.38% of votes. An interesting thing to note here is that TikTok only got 6.07% of votes from people 25 and older which means that the platform has a bit of a reputational and trustworthiness issue for people that are above a certain age.
Another really important thing to take stock of is what activities and behaviors might make an influencer appear to be more or less trustworthy in the eyes of consumers. Over a third of all respondents, 34.43% to be precise, stated that unbiased reviews were the biggest thing that could make them trust an influencer more. 27.12% said that follower interaction boosted their trust in an influencer and 23.56% said that insights into their personal lives made them appear more trustworthy. Interestingly, only 9.04% of respondents said that an influencer looking like them was a major factor in how much they trusted them.
When it came to questions that talked about an influencer appearing to be less trustworthy, 31.07% of respondents said that an excess of sponsored posts caused them to lose trust in any given influencer. This means that influencers should try their best to balance out sponsored posts with legitimate content as well. However, these influencers might want to try their best to steer clear of any kind of political content since over 17% of respondents said that this made influencers less trustworthy in their eyes.
Stereotypical influencer behavior such as using specific influencer language as well as the use of highly edited photos made influencers less trustworthy to consumers as well. These are things that should be taken into account because they can be used to make it so that consumers would be more likely to trust any given influencer. There are a lot of industries that rely on these individuals and they should optimize their services wherever they can. Take a look at below charts for more insights:
