Whose audience is it anyway?

Scrolling through my phone seeing cats, memes, and ads I come across a post from a guitar player I befriended recently announcing he has been sponsored by a guitar cable company and that he recommends them to anyone looking to get reliable cables for a fair price.

I was quite amazed to see that this young musician had reached a level where he was now getting sponsored. However, when talking to Steven (the musician) I found that he was not thinking about getting a sponsorship at all and that it just happened. He was focused on making music and playing with the best musicians that Philadelphia had to offer. So far he had been reaching that goal and was happy with his progress.

His account remain the same with him playing covers or of him playing his own music. Since his followers are fewer than that of Mateus Asato, I couldn’t see if his post of his gear were persuading anyone of his followers to go out and invest in the cables. His account did resemble that of Mateus in that he was posting images of his gear on his account but both were for different reasons. Steven was posting the gear he had just to keep new content on account while Mateus would post guitar pedals and amp as a way to promote them to his followers.

Steven himself was actually influenced by Mateus Asato in the purchasing a guitar from the guitar company Gretsch. “The sound he gets out of the guitar is so bright that I just had to buy it” (Steven). It would seem that marketers how learned to use social media as a method to promote their products.

It seems to be the Two-Step flow in action, since Steven didn’t really go to the website of the guitar company until after he heard it from Mateus Asato. The fact that a well know Instagram musician had more of an influence that the guitar company shows that people do tend to listen to their idols more than they would an ad.

Seeing that Mateus Asato had this guitar that not only looked nice but also sounded amazing was enough for Steven to go out and buy the guitar in order to achieve the same sound that Mateus was achieving. There are a couple of ads that promote Gretsch guitars but I think that the guitar company decided to put their marketing on the famous Instagrammers to promote their product.

If it worked on Steven it can work on others including myself. I am always interested in what type of guitar effect both Steven and Mateus are using and also what type of guitar and what type of amp they use. Examining myself, I see that I am very much more influenced by both Steven and Mateus than I am in a Guitar Center ad. Even in my small group of friends I sometimes influence them, although they are being indirectly influenced by Steven and Mateus.

It would seem that everyone has someone above them and the ones who influences Mateus would have to be the company that sponsors him with guitars and guitars pedals to promote in his account.