Influencer marketing: impact of influencer marketing on small businesses

Abstract

As digital marketing is a strategy chosen by most, if not all, businesses in the world that wish to promote and advertise their products or services, recently, influencer marketing has grown rapidly in this field. In the following paper, we will discern the reasons why this branch of marketing has come about, what its positive and negative aspects are and whether it is in the interest of businesses to use this type of advertising for their products. The research question seeks to understand to what extent influencer marketing in digital marketing impacts the growth, consumption, and market dynamics of Greek small businesses. To accomplish this research objective, questionnaires have been distributed to 103 respondents with specific questions, which answer the above questions posed in the paper. The questionnaire measures the following variables: influencer marketing strategies used, experiences with influencer marketing, challenges faced with influencer marketing and the outcomes of influencer marketing (e.g., increased sales, brand awareness, customer engagement). Finally, the collected data were studied and analyzed with the help of SPSS and tests were completed in order to answer our research question. The most basic of these is that the largest percentage of respondents purchase from Greek businesses that collaborate with an influencer to promote their products. In addition, younger age groups, who have completed a study program, are more positive about the presence of an influencer in a product advertisement. Besides, as the research proves, they are the people who spend more hours on the internet and social media.