How do German YouTubers/Vloggers influence, through product placement, the buying behavior of beauty products of teenagers, aged 12-18 years, in the German part of Switzerland? Bachelor Project submitted for the degree of Bachelor of Science HES in International Business Management by Angela-Katharina KURTZ Bachelor Project Advisor: Timothy CONNERTON, Professor Geneva, 04.06.2018 Haute école de gestion de Genève (HEG-GE) International Business Management Declaration This Bachelor Project is submitted as part of the final examination requirements of the Haute école de gestion de Genève, for the Bachelor of Science HES-SO in International Business Management. The student accepts the terms of the confidentiality agreement if one has been signed. The use of any conclusions or recommendations made in the Bachelor Project, with no prejudice to their value, engages neither the responsibility of the author, nor the adviser to the Bachelor Project, nor the jury members nor the HEG. “I attest that I have personally authored this work without using any sources other than those cited in the bibliography. Furthermore, I have sent the final version of this document for analysis by the plagiarism detection software stipulated by the school and by my adviser”. Geneva, 04.06.2018 Angela-Katharina KURTZ How do German YouTubers/Vloggers influence, through product placement, the buying behavior of beauty products of teenagers, aged 12-18 years, in the German part of Switzerland? i Angela-Katharina KURTZ Acknowledgements First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor, Professor Timothy Connerton, who has dedicated his precious time throughout this last year giving me valuable feedbacks and advice. It has been a pleasure for me to work with you during this year. Furthermore, I would like to thank all the teenagers that participated through the online survey and the schools that have forwarded my E-mail to their students. Especially, I would like to thank the Kantonsschule Schaffhausen. Also, I would like to thank the teenagers and the only parent that agreed to be interviewed. Without these people, it would not have been possible to create any analysis for this report. I would like to thank Estelle, Catherine and Ana. Thank you for all the support and motivation, we shared many ups and downs in this semester, but we made it. Finally, I want to thank with all my heart Enrico and my family. Their support has been fundamental to accomplish this project. Thank you for all the support you gave me, thank you for all the motivation, thank you for all your time and thank you for simply being always by my side. There are no words to express my gratitude to all these people that made part of this project with their support and valuable advice. Thank you. How do German YouTubers/Vloggers influence, through product placement, the buying behavior of beauty products of teenagers, aged 12-18 years, in the German part of Switzerland? Angela-Katharina KURTZ ii Executive Summary This research aims to demonstrate that young teenagers aged 12-18 years in the German part of Switzerland are influenced in their buying behavior by famous German YouTubers and Vloggers. For this research, the focus is on the two most famous ones in Germany, BibisBeautyPalace and Dagi Bee. These two YouTubers are used to have a reference point to do this research, to illustrate how they are influencing their followers and which strategies and tools they use. The aim of this project is to develop a better understanding on how these YouTubers and Vloggers are able to manipulate the mind of their young audience, to understand what is convincing these young teenagers to spend their money on something they have discovered through these YouTubers and to learn what kind of relationship they share. The analysis of the gathered data through an online survey and personal interviews, confirms that there is an influence on teenagers aged 12-18 years in the German part of Switzerland by German YouTubers. However, there is a trend visible in the findings that defines that the age range from 12-16 years gets more influenced than the age ranges from 16-18 years. Young aged teenagers do not understand immediately that YouTubers are using different practices to influence them. Teenagers have the impression to be fundamental to YouTubers, as they are asking for their advice, for their feedbacks and for new video ideas. Furthermore, as YouTubers/Vloggers are giving so many insights in their private life, there is no reason for young teenagers why they should not trust them and believe their words. Especially, when considering that teenagers have the impression to know everything about these YouTubers, and the YouTubers do not know them. As of the gathered data, it has been collected in two ways, through an online survey and personal interviews. The online survey, with 507 answers has delivered many information, while the 22 personal interviews have given a deeper insight into this topic, revealing facts that did not emerge from the online survey. However, the interviews with the parents have not been enough, as only one has accepted to be interviewed. How do German YouTubers/Vloggers influence, through product placement, the buying behavior of beauty products of teenagers, aged 12-18 years, in the German part of Switzerland? iii Angela-Katharina KURTZ Contents How do German YouTubers/Vloggers influence through product placement the buying behavior of beauty products of teenagers aged 12-18 years in the German part of Switzerland? .................................................................................................... 1 Declaration .................................................................................................................... i Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................... ii Executive Summary ................................................................................................... iii Contents...................................................................................................................... iv List of Tables .............................................................................................................. vi List of Figures ............................................................................................................ vi 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Research question and aim ..................................................................... 4 2. Literature review ................................................................................................... 6 2.1 Para-social relationship on the Internet .................................................. 6 2.2 YouTube .................................................................................................... 7 2.2.1 Evolution of YouTube ....................................................................... 8 2.3 Blogs ......................................................................................................... 9 2.4 Vlogs ........................................................................................................ 10 2.5 Product Placement ................................................................................. 11 2.6 Conclusion of literature review .............................................................. 15 3. Introduction to chosen YouTubers for this research ....................................... 16 3.1 BibisBeautyPalace .................................................................................. 16 3.1.1 Transition from UGC to PGC ......................................................... 17 3.1.2 Community..................................................................................... 19 3.1.3 bilou ............................................................................................... 20 3.2 Dagi Bee .................................................................................................. 21 3.2.1 Transition from UGC to PGC ......................................................... 22 3.2.2 Community..................................................................................... 24 3.2.3 Dagi-shop ...................................................................................... 25 4. How YouTubers are influencing their audience ............................................... 26 4.1 e-WOM ..................................................................................................... 26 4.2 Para-social Relationship and para-social interaction .......................... 27 4.3 Communities ........................................................................................... 30 4.4 Clickbait and Thumbnails....................................................................... 31 4.5 Promotion code ...................................................................................... 33 4.6 Hype ......................................................................................................... 35 4.7 Forced interaction .................................................................................. 37 4.8 Giving insights in their private life ........................................................ 38 4.9 Collaborations with other famous people ............................................. 40 5. Interest from sponsors ......................................................................................