Persuasive Strategies on Social Media: A Case of Malaysian Social Media Influencer Asma Nasarudin

Abstract

Social media influencers, or SMIs are on the rise in this age of ubiquitous Internet. SMIs as independent third-party endorsers utilise platforms such as social media, blogs, etc. to influence the attitudes of their audiences. SMIs have a powerful role in promoting or demoting a brand and/or organization to their followers as they can influence perceptions and even the purchasing power of their audiences. This phenomenon is obvious from the resonance of social media users with SMIs reviewing products, services and social trends on their social media accounts.  SMIs document or visually narrate what they do in their daily life via photo and video-sharing applications in social networking sites (SNS) such as Instagram and YouTube. In order to become a ‘micro celebrity’, the influencers embed commercials and celebrity culture into their postings. This study aims to investigate the persuasive devices used by one Malaysian social media influencer through her social media postings using the five elements in the Electronic Eloquence Model (EEM). A thorough qualitative analysis was conducted to identify the strategies implied within the embedded media content of Malaysian SMI Asma’ Nasarudin.  The data selected for analysis were gathered from her Instagram and YouTube video postings from October 2018 to December 2018. A total of five postings were carefully selected. Textual and visual analyses were conducted to investigate the persuasive strategies and devices. Findings demonstrated that all five elements of EEM appeared in the social media postings.