Social Media Influencer Marketing Strategy On Clothing Brands

Question

Task: Conduct and in-depth analysis on the concept of social media influencer marketing strategy on clothing brands

Answer

Executive summary
The present study has been conducted to investigate the impact of social media influencer marketing strategy on different clothing brands. The first chapter introduction has covered the background and rationale of the study, which highlighted its significance. However, aims and objectives have also been derived in the present chapter. The second chapter literature review has dealt with the concept of social media influencer marketing strategy as well as their impact and trend for the clothing industry. Nevertheless, the chapter of research methodology has presented with the overall method outline for the way through which the present research needs to be conducted.

Chapter 1: Introduction 
1.1 Background of the research
As stated by Cooley and Parks-Yancy, (2019), social Media influencer is considered as a user of social media who can establish credibility for a particular industry. A social media influencer marketing strategy consists of access for a larger audience and can however, also persuade others through the virtue of authenticity as well as reach. These influential people are known to promote services and products for a brand within the networks of social media. The goal for each of the businesses seems to attract the experts for promotion regarding their products. Staying within the top of the social media cycle has been a necessity regarding the managers of the supply chain for clothing brands. The study lays emphasis on the consideration of technological changes; processes along with the corporate culture as well.

1.2 Overview of the industry
The clothing or fashion industry seems to encompass a wide range of garments and it also makes use of almost every type for being textile manufactured (Breves et al., 2019). This is considered to be subdivided within two of the categories such as clothing for boys and men along with young girls and women. It has been evidenced by the SelectUSA, which is a service of the federal government, the US textiles that involve the clothing industry, has been the most significant employer for the manufacturing sector. This has represented 2% of the US manufacturing workforce. The present study can be considered as an attempt for investigation of social media influencers for the clothing industry as it is known to be remarkably developed along with having witnessed.

1.3 Aim of the study
The aim of the study is to investigate the impact of social media influencer marketing strategy on the clothing brands. 

1.4 Research objectives

• To explore the conception of social media influencer marketing strategy and its influence on consumer behaviour as well as choice

• To analyse the trends in utilising social media influencer marketing strategy

• To investigate the impact of social media influencer marketing strategy on the clothing industry 

1.5 Research questions

• What is the concept of social media influencer marketing strategy as well as its influence on consumer behaviour and choice?
• What are the trends of utilising the social media influencers in marketing?
• How does social media influencer marketing strategy impact the clothing industry?

1.6 Rationale
As evidenced by Tabellion and Esch, (2019), the growth based on the internet along with a hyper-connected, hyper-mediated world is known to possess several challenges for the companies of customers' products. Brands are found to put their clothing within the magazines and the users are seen to consume the ideas through the inspiration of the social media influencers. Owing to the increasing number of people availing social media, for determining and cross checking their purchase intentions, influencers have started playing a significant role in swaying the consumer behaviour and their choice of products. Hence, the present study throws light for the conception based on the influencers of social media and their purpose for the clothing brand. This study can help in providing proper insights for the clothing brands on the implementation of social media influencer marketing strategy for the users. The research seems to be significant for the impact of influencers of social media for creating brand awareness in the clothing industry and within the customers. Summary

The present chapter has highlighted the facts related to the particular topic along with the significance of the study. It has mentioned the advent of making use of social media influencers for revolutionising the marketing purpose of the brands within the clothing industry. 

Chapter 2: Literature review
2.1 Introduction
The section of a literature review is referred to as a comprehensive summary for previous research on a similar study (Arora et al., 2019). It tends to survey books; scholarly articles; and similar other sources that are relevant to the respective area of study. Hence, the present chapter provides a theoretical base of the concerned research along with determining the nature based on the research.

2.2 What is the role of social media influencer marketing strategy as well as its influence on consumer behaviour and choice?
The fashion industry is considered to be one of the famous businesses where frequent changes are known to take place along with the use of social media and its concerned influencers which has become the most convenient option for the clothing brands to communicate and inspire their customers. As put forward by Kay et al., (2019), the emergence of social media influencers has transformed the whole world along with the entire functions related to clothing brands as well as bringing all the people closer.

The clothing brands consist of social media influencers due to their ability to create trends as well as encourage their followers for buying products, which are promoted by them. As evidenced by Schouten et al., (2020), these influencers consist of the powers to impact the buying decisions of the customers because of their knowledge; authority; position as well as the relationship with their audience. The social media influencer marketing strategy and its preaching about specific brands plays a major role in swaying the purchase intentions of the fashion-conscious customers, who relies on the views of the influencers for determining the current trends and concluding on brand values.

2.3 Trends in utilising social media influencers for marketing purposes
Within recent years, it has been evidenced that the industry of social media influencer marketing strategy has increased significantly. According to Silva and de Brito, (2020), 80% of the marketers are finding it effective along with nearly two-thirds who have experienced a hike in their budget for the present year. 

Figure 1: Trend of influencer marketing and it’s global spend
Source: (Lou and Yuan, 2019)

The concept of social media influencer marketing strategy in the recent year is known to launch collaborations for the products with the brand partners. Brands, nowadays, tend to feel much more confident through the positive ROI influencer that is generated for marketing and leading to the larger budgets as well. 89% of the marketers were found to report on ROI marketing influencer acts better in comparison with the other channels of marketing. social media influencer marketing strategy is known to depend on authenticity and trust within the influencer along with their audiences. As opined by Jin and Muqaddam, (2019), the nano-influencers from the influencer tiers are known to achieve through its nature based on an intimate relationship with the audience.

2.4 Impact of social media influencer marketing strategy on the clothing industry
Clothing and fashion industry has been the early adopter for the field of social media influencer marketing strategy. Here, the influencers are used frequently for marketing the products of different brands. As stated by Gan et al., (2019), the brands make these influencers to be the brand ambassador for influencing the behaviour of the target audience towards the product. According to different studies, it has been observed that word of mouth can lead to many sales, which are paid as advertisements consisting of 37% of the higher rate of retention.

Figure 2: Influencer marketing
Source: (Shan et al., 2019)

Besides a positive influence for social media influencer marketing strategy within the clothing industry, there are certain things, which need to be considered by the brands. For instance, the connection within a brand and an influencer need to be strong enough and be genuine otherwise, it can be a paid advertising and tends to lose its impact as well. Space needs to be provided to the influencers for being themselves with the brands and should consider the followers for the influencers. As evidenced by Sundermann and Raabe, (2019), this can result in being much more advantageous and effective for making use of micro-influencers who are responsible to reach the target customers precisely.

2.5 Literature gap
As per the above findings, a solid discussion has been conducted for the present study by reaching several secondary sources. Nevertheless, the respective sources consist of some loopholes related to the concerned topic such as change of the fashion industry through social media influencers; components and types of the social media influencer marketing strategy impacting the clothing industry has not been covered in the present discussion and the sources. This has created a gap for the above literature and has also allowed the scope for future research as well.

2.6 Summary
To summarize, the above chapter has provided useful insights regarding the present study which has covered the concept of social media influencer marketing strategy. However, trends of the social media influencers for marketing the clothing brands along with their impacts on the overall industry have also been highlighted in the present discussion.

Chapter 3: Research Design and Methodology 
3.1 Introduction
The present chapter provided in the study of social media influencer marketing strategy will highlight the use of specific procedures and techniques that are used for the purpose of identification; processing; selection as well as analysing proper information related to the present study. This will allow the reader for a critical evaluation regarding the overall reliability and validity of the study.

3.2 Research philosophy
According to Briggs and Coleman, (2019), research philosophy seems to be a huge topic, which deals with nature; source and development based on knowledge. It is a faith for the ways with which the data regarding a phenomenon needs to be collected; used and analysed. Positivism; realism and interpretivism are the three main types of research philosophies. For the present study, the researcher will focus on the positivism research philosophy as quantifiable observations can be obtained leading to statistical analysis.

3.3 Research design 
Research design is considered as a framework for the research methods as well as techniques that are chosen by the researchers. This allows honing the methods that can be suitable for subject matter along with setting up the studies for success (Jekel et al., 2019). Exploratory, explanatory and descriptive are the major research designs which are used for a research project on social media influencer marketing strategy. The researcher will make use of explanatory research design as it can help in explaining different aspects of the study in a detailed way.

3.4 Research approach 
As stated by Xu et al., (2019), the research approach is considered as a procedure and plan which involves the steps based on a broader assumption for detailed methods related to analysis; data collection as well as interpretation. Inductive; deductive and abductive are the three major research approaches, which are utilised for completing a research project successfully. Hence, for conducting the present study, the researcher will choose the appropriate use of deductive research approach as it comprises the possibility for explaining several casual relationships within the variables and the concepts and can also measure the concepts qualitatively and quantitatively as well.

3.5 Data collection
This is referred to as the process for measuring and gathering information, evaluating the outcomes and testing the hypothesis as well (Pheng and Hou, 2019). There are two major methods responsible for collecting data in a research project such as primary data and secondary data. For the present case, the researcher will emphasize the use of a primary data collection method, which involves quantitative and qualitative analysis. The use of primary data can help the researcher in gathering the original data from the participants and interpret accordingly. On the other hand, secondary research might have the possibility to gather the used materials which may not be original and can also be biased as well. However, the use of this research might have provided with an opportunity to gather many new information. Qualitative and quantitative data gathering is the primary focus for the present study, which will be conducted with structured interviews of open-ended questions and close-ended questions for the survey questionnaires.

3.6 Data analysis method for social media influencer marketing strategy

There are two types of data analysis methods that are the qualitative data analysis and quantitative data analysis methods. The quantitative data analysis method is applied in research for the analysis of the numerical data whereas the qualitative data analysis methods are used for non-numerical data.In the proposed research both the data analysis methods will be utilized as both numerical and non-numerical data would be collected. For quantitative analysis, measures of central tendency such as mean, media and standard deviation will be used as statistical tool. On the other hand, transcript analysis process will be used.

3.6 Population and sampling
As evidenced by Kogan et al., (2019), the population is considered as a set of individuals through specialized characteristics along with a sample to be a subset for the overall population. Thus, population sampling is referred to as the process for taking a subset for the subjects, which are the representatives for the overall population. There are two types of sampling techniques such as probability and non-probability sampling. In probability sampling, each and every individual gets an equal chance to participate within the research and on the other hand, non-probability sampling does not provide an equal chance to each individual. This considers having sufficient size for warranting a statistical analysis. The sample size of the present study will be 53 where 3 managers of different clothing brands will be interviewed and 50 followers will be surveyed. Hence, for the present study it considers both the use of probability and non-probability sampling techniques. Survey questionnaires are considered in the probability sampling and interview process falls under the non-probability sampling technique.

3.7 Expected findings

The expected findings of the proposed research would relate to the existing relationship between the sales, reputations, brand awareness of the clothing brand. The research can identify a positive relationship between the two variables. The research will identify the factors that influence the customers of the clothing brands to follow the social media influencers. The impact of the social media influencer marketing strategy on the buying decisions of the customers will be recognized as an outcome of the research.

3.7 Ethical considerations
Ethics are the accumulation of the values along with the principles that are able to address the questions for classifying the good and bad in research, which needs to be maintained while conducting the study by the researcher (Boyd et al., 2019). Informed consent is yet another ethical consideration where the researcher will inform about the cause of conducting the study within the participants along with ensuring the maintenance of confidentiality for each of the data gathered. 

3.8 Summary
To summarize, the present chapter has provided with an outline of the research method that needs to be covered and considered while completing the research project. It has mentioned about the research philosophy; research design and research approach along with its proper justification for the study.

3.9 Time deliverables and Gantt chart

Table 1: Gantt chart
Source: (Developed by the Learner)

3.10 Budget table

Table 2: Budget
Source: (Developed by the Learner)

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