As the 2020 presidential race continues, some candidates are turning to social media influencers to spread their messages and garner support for their campaigns. It was reported that former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg recently partnered with popular Instagram accounts to create meme content for promoting his candidacy, called the Meme 2020 project.

eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson and junior analyst Blake Droesch recount their experiences interviewing 16 social media creators about how they approach brand partnerships, which platforms are working for them and influencers' role in the purchase process.

Younger generations are more likely to buy products based on influencer recommendations, as well as consider them reliable. However, these demographics still see influencers as less trustworthy than other sources.

In this year’s Key Digital Trends report, we identify what changes are coming to the digital media and technology landscape in 2020 and why they matter to marketers.

Mobile video viewing habits are evolving, and along with that comes a variety of opportunities for creators and publishers to monetize their content—and, in turn, for marketers and advertisers to reach audiences.

Creators are all over the news, but are they different from influencers? While it’s easy to say yes, it’s hard to say why. For our latest report, “Video Ads in Social Media 2019,” we explored how the two are differentiated.

Video-sharing app TikTok was the darling of VidCon this year. The media latched onto its low-fi approach of seeding creators all over the conference, where fans could easily interact with them. By contrast, YouTube creators were often cordoned off into formal presentations and meet-and-greets.

Measuring attribution and return on investment remains a key challenge when marketing with influencers—which means that it can be hard to quantify the merits of utilizing them. But neuroscience research from the UK, showing cognitive responses to traditional marketing vs. influencer posts, may provide some answers.

Scrolling through social media, it’s hard not to be influenced by influencers. Do you need another carry-on bag? Probably not. But do you have to have it after you saw an influencer capturing its essence on the hills of Santorini, and you suddenly saw yourself there? Of course you do.

eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson discusses the influencer shift toward authenticity, and why influencer marketing may soon become regulated. She also assesses Facebook’s mind-reading program, a TikTok smartphone and Apple’s new credit card.

Consumers can be super picky about shopping. Some will spend hours looking for the right deal, only to back out at the last-minute because of shipping costs. Others won’t consider a product unless it’s accumulated enough positive ratings and reviews—or unless their closest confidants personally recommend it.

We forecast that US retail ecommerce sales of health, personal care and beauty products will surpass $53 billion this year, up 18.6% from 2018, making it the second-fastest growing category among those we track—slightly slower than food and beverage.

Social commerce is on the rise as visual platforms like Pinterest and Instagram fill a need for product discovery. By developing an effective social commerce strategy, brands and retailers can drive awareness, affinity, consideration and conversion.

Measuring influencer attribution is already an issue for marketers, and the recent privacy updates on browsers like Apple’s Safari and Google Chrome aren’t going to make things easier.

According to a January 2019 survey from influencer marketing agency Mediakix, 61% of US marketers agreed that it’s difficult to find the right influencers for a campaign. And more than one in four US marketers said that brand safety and alignment was a challenge when it comes to influencer marketing.

According to a survey from Simmons Research completed in August 2018, an average of 27.4% of parents said they were more likely to buy products they see used or recommended by friends on social sites. This is higher than one-fifth of total adult respondents who said the same.

In the latest episode of "Behind the Numbers," eMarketer principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson discusses how marketers are using influencer marketing successfully and getting past some of the issues holding the tactic back.

Despite industrywide calls to combat fraud, fake followers are still a top concern among influencer marketers.

There are now more than 500,000 active influencers operating on Instagram alone, according to a study by InfluencerDB. That’s 39% of all Instagram accounts with more than 15,000 followers. And among this group of active Instagram influencers, 81% have followings between 15,000 and 100,000.

We may believe we’re each living in our own social media bubble full of like-minded folks, but new survey data suggests that some of us are being persuaded to change our minds thanks to social posts.