University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2019 The Influencer Industry: Constructing And Commodifying Authenticity On Social Media Emily Dean Hund University of Pennsylvania Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Advertising and Promotion Management Commons, Communication Commons, Marketing Commons, and the Sociology Commons Recommended Citation Dean Hund, Emily, "The Influencer Industry: Constructing And Commodifying Authenticity On Social Media" (2019). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 3636. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3636 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3636 For more information, please contact
[email protected]. The Influencer Industry: Constructing And Commodifying Authenticity On Social Media Abstract The most buzzed-about figure in twenty-first century marketing thus far has been the “digital influencer,” industry vernacular for the bloggers, Instagrammers, Pinners, and other social media users who—against the backdrop of widespread economic and professional instability—deliver curated content to audiences on social media and earn income by collaborating with major brands. Driving the rise of this phenomenon have been (1) individuals who want to be recognized as persuasive online (2) advertisers who increasingly direct their budgets to social media, where influencers’ authentic,“ ” personality-inflected content has proven potent for selling product (3) social media companies whose tools and rules both advance and encumber these activities and (4) marketing agencies and other marketing-related entities, such as talent agencies and trend forecasters, that build metrics platforms to measure influence, select influencers for advertising campaigns, negotiate deals between influencers and etailr brands, and espouse the many benefits of expressing oneself “authentically” online in tandem with corporate sponsors.