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Influencer marketing trends

29 March 2024

Buzzfactory Ukraine shares a study of global trends in the field of influencer marketing during the crisis caused by the COVID-19 epidemic.

During a crisis, when people are in a bad mood and need positive emotions, they pay more and more attention and follow influencers who inspire trust. There is a shift in focus from classic digital advertising to influencer marketing and bloggers, so collaborations with them become more popular. According to statistics, 80% of influencers report an increase in the level of involvement of their subscribers since the beginning of quarantine. Bloggers play an important role during this period, urging their readers to stay at home, keep social distancing, take precautions, avoid crowds etc.

Among the key trends in the field of influencer marketing are the following:

Challenges as a way to fight with the boredom. A record number of challenges of all kinds have been launched, from social challenges to help doctors and patients to sports. Challenges on social networks help people deal with bad moods, maintain communication, look at the situation, with humor and have fun. Among the most popular is #pillowchallenge, when girls (and sometimes boys) post a photo with a pillow instead of a dress. Or the #fliptheswitch flashmob, which gained popularity on TikTok and Instagram, with paired dress-up. It was supported by such celebrities as Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, US Senator Elizabeth Warren, Nastya Kamensky and Potap, Volodymyr Dantes and Nadia Dorofeeva and others.

Live broadcasts. Bloggers talk about how they conduct their quarantine, celebrities give live concerts, fitness trainers organize live broadcasts with training, psychologists advise how to stay in harmony during the crisis. In the future, it is predicted that such broadcasts on social networks will be used by some business segments as a tool for direct sales.

The vector of popularity of categories of influencers has shifted. The category of food bloggers will increase as people start cooking more at home, ordering less food in restaurants and cafes, and will not immediately start going to restaurants after the quarantine is over. The popularity of fitness and beauty influencers is also growing. Many people, despite the opening of beauty salons, are still afraid to do a manicure or dye hair outside the home. As for those influencers who will lose their popularity in the next six months — travel bloggers and photographers. It will be difficult to travel, photos from around the world will still cause nostalgia.

From my point of view, the influence marketing industry in the post-Soviet countries has huge potential for growth. The market is slowly but surely structuring, building an industry vertical between specialized digital-PR agencies, specialized media agencies, blogger promotion agencies and blogger platforms. If we analyze the markets of Europe and the United States, we will see that the future of influencer marketing around the world will depend on technology and data analysis of the audience of bloggers. After the COVID-19 pandemic, brands will pay even more attention to the influencer marketing channel, because the world will no longer be the same: many of us will avoid a lot of social contacts, communication and activity in social networks will grow throughout 2020. Due to this concentration, brands will advertise the benefits of their products with the help of influencers”, — comments Maryna Bakhmat, Executive Director of Buzzfactory Ukraine.