Social media serves the purpose of delivering information supported by text and visuals to large audiences in a short time. In this way, people can communicate with many people; but in this case, some people are followed more than others and are more interested in what they do. When this is the case, the issue of 'influence' arises. These people become the focal point of the information they share on social media and are followed by more people every day. This creates the influencer culture. Influence can be defined as having power over something or having the power to change things. Influencer culture is; this is how it is on social media. In other words, it is a social media trend created by some people who can easily reach large audiences thanks to their number of followers and become 'influencers' by using this sphere of influence they have.
While influencers emphasize their lifestyles and touch on various topics such as art, food, travel and make-up; at the same time, they have become a part of advertising campaigns by creating collaborations. This immediately raises the question: Do influencers really have an impact on the real world?
In this article, we will try to find the answer to the question in Europe, which hosts some of the largest digital advertising markets in the world.
Thanks to the digitalization of today's world; we see that companies have started to allocate a large share of their marketing budgets to influencer collaborations. This clearly reveals that influencers have a great impact on consumer behavior. It is clear that collaborations provide greater returns, especially in this field where persuasion skills are used. Considering the regional differences and cultural values in Europe, it is possible to say that people follow other people they define as closer to themselves and try to adapt their lifestyles to themselves, and influencers direct them. Since this situation leads to changes in consumers' behavior; brands have started to increase their profits by working with more influencers. For example, Khaby Lame. In the last three years, he has gained more than 160 million fans with his broadcasts on TikTok without saying a single word, and he attracted the attention of companies when people started to follow him. In this way, he created a fortune for himself and was included in the Forbes list. Companies that want to cooperate with Italian TikToker are starting to line up; stating that he had to turn down many offers, Lame explained that the reason for this was that he wanted to set a good example because many children followed him and did not cooperate with companies such as alcohol and cigarettes. This situation shows that influencers tend to use their influence correctly by choosing the companies they will work with based on their follower base.
As a result, influencers, who have expanded their sphere of influence in Europe as well as all over the world, have shown that they are effective in the real world by increasing their share in the market and ensuring that brands allocate budgets for them, and that they are also impressive role models by emphasizing that they make choices among brands that are suitable for their target audience.
