Are you being influenced?

Influencer marketing has recently become a mainstream strategy in public relations and marketing. This exploratory study focuses on the Austrian fashion and lifestyle sector and investigates the nature and the components of the collaborations between bloggers and brands. Fourteen in-depth interviews were conducted with fashion/lifestyle bloggers and communication professionals working in public relations agencies. As a lot of companies do not maintain an in-house marketing department dedicated to influencer marketing and blogger relations, agencies often take the role of consultants and collaboration managers. Therefore, they are considered highly experienced when it comes to influencer marketing strategies. The findings of the research indicate that fashion and lifestyle blogs can no longer be perceived solely as user generated content, as they have matured into professional advertising platforms used for marketing and public relations purposes. The distinctive characteristics and assets that were detected in blogs and serve for influencer marketing purposes are authenticity, transparency, storytelling and cocreation. These components are usually encountered among collaborations for maximizing the effects of influencer marketing strategies. Creative freedom and personal contact also seem to be crucial for a collaboration’s success. In reference to the Austrian industry, influencer marketing does not seem to have reached its peak yet and is still conforming to foreign examples. Lastly, within this Master Thesis, implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.