Influencer marketing is when individuals with dedicated social media followings are sought out by brands to utilize their position on certain platforms to endorse a brand’s products and be compensated through payment or merchandise. I will be looking at the concept of trust when it comes to influencer marketing alongside the Fogg Behavior Model. Used to evaluate an individual’s behavior in the decisions making process, The Fogg Behavior Model bases itself in a persuasive environment by focusing on three key elements: motivation, ability, and trigger. When utilized in collaboration with influencer marketing, these elements together could have a strong effect on driving consumer behaviors. I utilized one of the most recent and popular social media platforms, TikTok, known for its short-form mobile videos, to explore these behavioral elements in action. Like any other media platform, TikTok influencer marketing requires a high amount of trust between the consumer and influencer to be successful and efficiently persuade the target market. I collected primary research by surveying opinions on trust and buying behaviors based on three different videos. One video had a hidden partnership disclosure in the caption, the second had a plainly visible partnership disclosure, and the third had a plainly visible partnership disclosure and verbally disclosed the relationship between the brand and the influencer. The analysis showed that participants felt a higher degree of trust towards the video which contained a verbal disclosure of the influencer’s partnership with the brand. The results lacked specificity on whether this perception of trust would successfully lead to a purchase, which could be adjusted for in future research; however, it did show there was motivation through the Fogg Model to look further into the product presented. I recommend influencers be as transparent and genuine as possible to earn the trust or their followers, as well as ensure all three factors of Fogg are present to increase their persuasive abilities over consumers completing a purchase.

Influencer marketing is when individuals with dedicated social media followings are sought out by brands to utilize their position on certain platforms to endorse a brand’s products and be compensated through payment or merchandise. I will be looking at the concept of trust when it comes to influencer marketing alongside the Fogg Behavior Model. Used to evaluate an individual’s behavior in the decisions making process, The Fogg Behavior Model bases itself in a persuasive environment by focusing on three key elements: motivation, ability, and trigger. When utilized in collaboration with influencer marketing, these elements together could have a strong effect on driving consumer behaviors. I utilized one of the most recent and popular social media platforms, TikTok, known for its short-form mobile videos, to explore these behavioral elements in action. Like any other media platform, TikTok influencer marketing requires a high amount of trust between the consumer and influencer to be successful and efficiently persuade the target market. I collected primary research by surveying opinions on trust and buying behaviors based on three different videos. One video had a hidden partnership disclosure in the caption, the second had a plainly visible partnership disclosure, and the third had a plainly visible partnership disclosure and verbally disclosed the relationship between the brand and the influencer. The analysis showed that participants felt a higher degree of trust towards the video which contained a verbal disclosure of the influencer’s partnership with the brand. The results lacked specificity on whether this perception of trust would successfully lead to a purchase, which could be adjusted for in future research; however, it did show there was motivation through the Fogg Model to look further into the product presented. I recommend influencers be as transparent and genuine as possible to earn the trust or their followers, as well as ensure all three factors of Fogg are present to increase their persuasive abilities over consumers completing a purchase.

This thesis analyzes the evolution of social media and video marketing, as well as offers advice on how local restaurants can capitalize their marketing efforts on social media platforms using video. Due to the ever-changing social media trends and algorithms, it is vital for a local restaurant to understand the channels in which consumers are getting information, the influencing factors of the varying algorithms for each social media platform, and the topics consumers would like to hear about in order to market effectively. In order to test the research I have collected, I have produced four high-quality videos, which can be found in Appendix A, of menu items from the local restaurant Ingo’s Tasty Food and posted them on the restaurant’s Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok accounts. These videos range from 15 seconds to one minute and have been posted on different days of the week. My findings determined that the quality and length of a video does not have consistent effects on the engagement received on these three platforms, nor does the day of the week in which these videos are posted. Based on these results, I recommend that a restaurant focus on the content of its videos, rather than the quality, length, and day of the week posted.