How much influence do bloggers have over their readers?
There has been some debate about the impact influencers have on their followers in recent weeks. Here Lorraine Murphy shares the results of a survey of more than 12,500 blog readers about issues including sponsored content, which devices they use, and would they want to meet their favourite blogger?
Google Analytics tell us a lot in terms of online activity for the blogs we represent. But they fall far short of telling us about the attitudes and habits of their communities. We wanted to get more of an understanding of who these readers were, why they read, how they feel about brands on their favourite blogs, and where they shop.
What we did
Statistics say that 63% of claimed responses is just that….claimed behaviour, not actual.
What you don’t need stats for is to know that BS sells, and the best BS is some random stats
When you start from the false assumption that special influencers actually exist then anything can happen.
Some narrower qualitative depth would be a good area for further study depending on the type of blog as well as who the blogger is.
For example take someone who blogs on Hollywood industry, goes for industry news, behind the scenes stuff, perhaps occasionally mentions a game they like. They likely influence their readers attitudes about different brands/studios etc. – but how that impacts on consumer behaviour will be a bit harder to predict/fluctuating from post to post, and based of course on events outside the bloggers control.
Now take someone who runs a similar blog and also reviews new releases and recommends to their readers….do or don’t got to this movie as its good/it sucks…..the impact on consumer behaviour (if the blogger is well trusted, which usually only comes when they are vociferously pr-consumer and willing to give full disclosure of their relationships with brands) will probably be pretty obvious and consistent.
Great information – not mind-blowingly unexpected, but a great reminder of why we’re choosing the content we choose to research, write and present and how. The need to reflect on what value it has for individuals AND groups and who those people really are is vital to quality and loyalty.
Simply asking ‘do you read branded content?’ is fraught with issues.
Not only is it reliant on claimed behaviour (see @cyber above), but is also poor wording. I’m assuming that the people surveyed were consumers not marketing/advertising bods. In which case a fare whack of respondents probably have no idea what ‘branded content’ even means – it’s marketing speak not a term your average consumer is familiar with. Even if the question was followed by examples / description of what is meant by ‘branded content’, other issues arise…the respondent would still have to recognise what you mean exactly, then recall if they’d seen something that fits the description in the past, and then give you an answer. I’d be worried about the accuracy of the responses.
And then there’s the question of what you mean by ‘read’, and whether the respondent means the same thing…
You asked “Do you read branded content?” – so on what do you base your statements that readers “trust the influencer to bring them information that they would be interest in” or “don’t differentiate between regular and branded content”..? Or was there a second part of the question which you didn’t share with us?