Media consumption: The spread of key opinion leaders (KOLs) in social media
Throughout these years, because of the social network development, a lot of Key Opinion Leaders (KOL) have drawn attention to social media platforms. Opinion Leader was meant to be a group of people with greater influence than the others in the early stages. The key opinion leader provided a product’s information to the public. It is easier to be accepted or have a high credibility by groups. In the modern age, KOL mainly creates accounts through online social platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, etc., and regularly posts to express personal opinions or feelings. Its influence will increase with the number of likes, shares, and subscriptions by the public or even worldwide Internet users. Many people in this industry are aware of the gripping of business opportunities. There are a lot of businesses set up to match KOL with brands and promote brands or products. The KOL manager company will first sign contracts with different KOLs, and then make a matching based on the areas that KOL is better at and the needs of businesses or brands that help to receive commissions.
From the perspective of consumers, when they need to consume in areas that they are not familiar with, they tend to consult others first to avoid loss. In this purchase decision process, KOL plays an important role and its opinions affect the purchase process or decision of different consumers with different degrees of involvement. When consumers buy expensive and complex products, the involvement of opinion leaders is relatively high, and consumers tend to spend more time collecting information.
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Main features of KOL:
1. Interpersonal Network
The first characteristic is that KOL generally has a good interpersonal network. KOL needs to have strong social skills and communication skills to help build a wider social circle and improve its visibility. As a medium for publishing brands or products, KOL is ideally able to have a well-connected network of connections. For example, the local lyricist and writer Lam Yat Hey(林日曦), who founded a media page毛記電視, and magazine 100 毛 and黑紙 respectively, his Facebook page has rewarded nearly 400,000 “like”. He covers a wide range of fields, including publishing, radio, music, movies, advertisement, etc. He has a vast connection network of contacts which is greatly enhancing his influence.
2. Knowledge and experience
The second feature is the KOL’s knowledge and experience of the category, most KOLs have their key areas such as beauty, technology, travel, food, etc. Take Elva Ni as an example, she originally developed her acting career in Hong Kong. After years of hard work, she terminates the long-term contract. She started to delve into beauty and makeup products, thus she has a full understanding of the brands and products in this sector. She was determined five years ago to give up her acting career and start being a KOL by sharing information on beauty, travel, and yoga on social media such as YouTube and Facebook with the public. Up to now, her Instagram accounts have accumulated up to 560,000 followers, and her YouTube Channel has nearly 150,000 subscribers.
3. Personal Trait
Finally, KOL needs to be open-minded and eager to accept new things. For example, the founder of the「金水」 Facebook page mainly satirizes current social news in the form of keen observation laughter, and scolding. His work has been praised by the general public, and his Facebook page has accumulated about 450,000 fans' likes and followers.
Now, I will discuss the KOL transmission phenomenon and analyze it at the individual and organizational levels.
On a personal level, most businesses want to cooperate with the well-known KOL, hoping to use KOL's 'comments' like their description of a product to strengthen the promotion of their brand or product, and even influence potential consumers' purchasing decisions to consolidate brand image or increase product sales. However, with the increasing popularity of KOL, consumers will also suspect that KOL is just following instructions by the brand, thus reducing trust in KOL.
Consumers originally referred to KOL's opinions based on the trust of KOL, hoping to gain from their opinions and avoid making wrong consumption decisions due to lack of information. However, when consumers are forced to accept information beyond expectations, the consumers are suspicious of KOL, and they tend to no longer trust KOL. In the past, many KOLs have also been kicked out and become thugs. They simply ignore the quality of the product and continue to recommend it to consumers to gain money which harms the relationship between consumers and KOL.
Moreover, at the organizational level, the trust and cooperation between individual consumers and KOL will also create conflicts. Last year, a KOL Elle Darby from the UK was preparing to travel to Dublin, Ireland; while planning her trip, she sent an email to invite the local hotel The White Moose Café to cooperate with her, saying that she would introduce the hotel on her YouTube channel with 95,000 followers and recommend her fans to help the hotel increasing popularity, in exchange for five days free accommodation. However, the hotel not only rejected KOL's request by directly posting on Facebook but also pointed out that the hotel's Facebook page has already attracted 186,000 followers, more than KOL's fans. The hotel claiming for compensation once triggered a battle between the merchants and KOLs online.
In brief, many KOLs try to develop other aspects based on the accumulated number of fans and reputation. For example, the Facebook page of '爵爵&貓叔' has accumulated a certain number of supporters in over six years and their status is not only for rewarding fame and income from social media but also for business opportunities. They opened a coffee shop in Taiwan Kaohsiung and last year they were invited by ViuTV to be the guest host of ' Glocal Villager ' to introduce Hong Kong and Taiwan's special tourist attractions. However, not all KOLs in the market have been able to develop rapidly. Many KOLs have stagnated or even regressed after accumulating a certain number of supporters and their reputation.
In conclusion, KOL plays an important role in today's marketing strategy, and believes that it has great potential for development in the future. KOL plays an important role in consumers' decision-making process through its unique characteristics, including its knowledge of specific areas, its extensive interpersonal network, and its willingness to try new things. However, there is a Boomerang effect in the development of KOL, which affects their credibility. In the long run, the Boomerang effect will continue to hurt the relationship between KOL and consumers. KOL needs to strike a balance between gaining consumer trust and earning revenue to ensure that its career can be extended. However, there are some potential problems in the cooperative relationship between KOL and the business investor, thus communication needs to be strengthened to eliminate the gap.
Reference:
- Ritschel.C.(2018). LUXURY DUBLIN HOTEL BANS ALL SOCIAL MEDIA INFLUENCERS. Retrieved from https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/hotel-bans-influencers-instagram-social-media-stars-elle-darby-the-white-moose-cafe-a8166926.html
- HK01(2018). 漫畫組合爵爵&貓叔：「創業開cafe不是浪漫事」. Retrieved from https://www.hk01.com/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E6%96%B0%E8%81%9E/206038/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E4%BD%A0%E5%B9%B8%E7%A6%8F%E5%97%8E-%E6%BC%AB%E7%95%AB%E7%B5%84%E5%90%88%E7%88%B5%E7%88%B5-%E8%B2%93%E5%8F%94-%E5%89%B5%E6%A5%AD%E9%96%8Bcafe%E4%B8%8D%E6%98%AF%E6%B5%AA%E6%BC%AB%E4%BA%8B
- 邱兆麟(2016). 什麼是KOL？ Retrieved from https://blog.etvonline.hk/blog.php?oldid=293
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