How Influencers are Shaping our World Today
Listen to our podcast here:
For this LEAP 2 project both Anaisy and I answered the how social media is reshaping people’s decisions about who and what to trust. We chose to answer this in the style of an informative podcast geared towards college-educated adults ages 23–45.
Our partnership immediately started off on the right foot when we agreed on a topic and shared that we are both organized and on top of our school work. We both also have upcoming trips so we made sure to work hard to start early and finish our project a few days before the official deadline.
We first discussed how we were going to approach the project. We immediately agreed about not wanting to use the print form of media as we believed writing was neither of our strongest suits. We then were settling between video and audio. Anaisy suggested the possibility of putting together a screencast, similar to the last LEAP project we did individually, and at first it was what we settled on. Then, Madison suggested a podcast Q&A. We both agreed that this would be a nice way to keep our audience engaged by formatting as a question and answer but would also help enhance our purpose which is informing people. The idea would allow us to work together on finding sources for our project and creating a rough draft or “script” and then each record our own parts and then collaborate and piece them together to complete the full podcast.
The next step of our project was probably the hardest part. We both found ourselves at first lost as to what to search and use for sources. We were not sure where to begin or what specifically we wanted to address. We used the Courageous RI website as a starting point to learn more about the Influencers topic and give ourselves some ideas. Within no time we were quickly able to begin searching for sources. We created a sort of master list of questions and topics we wanted to address that we could use to guide our research. Some keywords we chose to search for were influencers, social media, trust, persuasion, influencer marketing benefits, and pros and cons of influencers.
Our goal for the project was to create both an informative and relatable podcast. We wanted our audience to understand not only how persuasive influencers have such a grip on society today but also why they do it and how it may be harmful to us as consumers. Anaisy had the idea of addressing beauty guru Mikayla Nogueira and her scandal regarding a mascara brand she was supporting but not necessarily using herself. She instead was using a different product, false eyelashes, to get the desired effect consumers were actually looking for. It definitely kept us engaged to look at topics and examples we are familiar with and brought a new level of passion to the project on both of our ends. As we kept going along it became easier and easier to find ideas and know what we were looking for. We kept texting back and forth and suggesting things to each other. The project did initially start off a little disorganized and was a document full of jumbled ideas and important information we believed we wanted to create. We then worked together to organize our sources and create an outline and before we knew it the script for our podcast was beginning to take form.
One of the biggest challenges we faced completing this project was having busy schedules to work around. We were in constant communication from the moment we decided to enact our partnership, however we both have other classes, jobs, and commitments so we really had to work together and do what we could to get it done in a timely manner. In particular, we both had upcoming trips planned and other major mid semester assignments to complete aside from this one so it took a lot of trust and dependability to agree that we would both complete our shares of the project on time and to the best of our abilities.
Recording the actual audio for our podcast was probably the most exciting part of this whole process. Once we agreed on a time to meet we were able to quickly start and definitely think that while it was outside of our comfort zones to record ourselves it was a lot of fun. We were able to make it a little quirky and fun but also interesting and engaging enough to inform our target audience while still capturing their attention. Overall, the partnership we created was effective and successful. We feel that although it did take a lot of time and effort we benefited from compromising and working together to get our LEAP project done on time and create a product we are proud of.
Interested in where we found the information? Look below!
Cheong, C. (2023, July 20). Inside the meteoric rise of Mikayla Nogueira, the TikTok mega-influencer whose reputation for authenticity may soon come crashing down. Business Insider. https://www.businessinsider.com/mikayla-nogueira-background-controversy-feud-mascara-2023-1#shortly-after-nogueira-was-accused-of-wearing-false-eyelashes-in-a-sponsored-post-igniting-a-huge-wave-of-backlash-as-other-influencers-weighed-in-on-the-drama-14
Chugh, S. (2023, October 27). What is Social Media influencers’ impact on society? do they matter? Emeritus Online Courses. https://emeritus.org/blog/social-media-influencers-impact-on-society/
Maheshwari, S. (2023, September 12). TikTok popularizes products. can it sell them, too?. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/12/business/tiktok-shop-e-commerce.html
Petkovska, M. (2023, November 29). Why influencer marketing is tough to trust. Employee Advocacy Blog. https://blog.gaggleamp.com/why-influencer-marketing-is-tough-to-trust
Smith , N. (n.d.). The alix earle effect: How the gen Z influencer took TikTok by Storm. Digital Voices. https://www.digitalvoices.com/blog/the-alix-earle-effect-how-the-gen-z-influencer-took-tiktok-by-storm
Social Commerce is here and it’s reshaping how we buy. Shopify Plus. (2020, March). https://www.shopify.com/enterprise/social-commerce-is-here-and-its-reshaping-how-we-buy
Spunout. (2023, October 19). Can you trust a social media influencer?. spunout. https://spunout.ie/life/privacy-security/social-media-influencer/#:~:text=Authenticity,audience%20is%20their%20real%20life
Waude, A. (2017, July 20). Social Influence: Why we conform in groups. Psychologist World. https://www.psychologistworld.com/influence/social-influence
