Influential media partners - How media firms can incentivise professional social media influencers to generate value for them

During recent years, a more interactive internet caused for a digital equivalent of opinion leaders to emerge: influencers. Influencers are understood to have the ability to influence a particular group of people through social media or blogs. They are different from the more traditional concept of celebrities where influencers could also be everyday people, who use the internet to reach their accumulated following through the visual and textual narration of their personal lives and lifestyles. Simultaneously along the rise of the concept of influencers, businesses also developed interest to work with them because they are considered to be the main channel of electronic word-of-mouth marketing. Existing literature on influencers primarily had an exploratory focus on including them in marketing and advertising strategies, with no attention to the principles of co-creation. Additionally, academic co-creation literature primarily resolved around firms working with consumers or other stakeholders. At the crossroads of these two gaps in the current literature, this study aimed to determine how media firms could incentivise professional social media influencers in order for them to generate value. Hence, this study carried out a qualitative research whereby twelve semi-structured expert interviews were conducted. The results derived from thematically analysing the interviews shows that companies need to incentivise influencers on the partnership creation level and on the implementation level. Noteworthy, currently firms primarily work with influencers in a more traditional way, slowly moving towards cocreation. In the partnership with professional social media influencers, it is important to determine the goals of the firm, select the right influencer, maintain the relationship, discuss the goals and compensation, inspire the creative process and monitor the results. To ensure the quality of the co-created value, firms should ensure trust is built, authenticity remained and creative freedom is ensured.