Redefining the role of social media influencers in strategic marketing communication

For leveraging influencer marketing to shape the consumers’ purchasing decisions, the effectiveness of influencers’ performance must be evaluated. The study aims to identify significant factors affecting the followers’ intention towards the influencers’ performance. Further, by applying hierarchical and k-means cluster analysis, profiling of respondents was done based on psychographic factors. EFA results unveiled five underlying dimensions of influencers namely perceived homophily, hedonic value, influencer uniqueness, emotional attachment, and opinion leadership. Hierarchical and k-means cluster methods have segmented 182 respondents into three different groups namely: Constructive Indifferent, Aficionado and Gremlin. Thus, each cluster ascribes varied importance to each factor. The paper contributes useful influencer marketing-based strategic implications for practitioners and brands to effectively target these diverse segments.