Journal of Advertising Research

New Directions in Influencer Research

Influencer marketing has evolved from a niche social media tactic into a core component of contemporary brand communication strategies. During this time, research on influencer marketing has proliferated, helping to define and broaden our conceptualization of influencers (e.g., Campbell and Farrell 2020; Thomas and Fowler 2021), while providing key insights into how influencer marketing functions (e.g., Audrezet et al. 2020; Breves et al. 2019; Brooks et al. 2021; Lou 2022; Park et al. 2021), and situating influencer marketing more broadly within society (Scholz 2021; Thomas et al. 2025).

At the same time, the influencer marketing landscape is undergoing rapid transformation. Advances in generative AI, the emergence of synthetic and virtual influencers, evolving platform governance structures, and the increasing professionalization of creators raise important questions about whether dominant assumptions, frameworks, and empirical regularities continue to hold. Many widely cited findings were developed under technological, cultural, and platform conditions that are now shifting in fundamental ways.

As a result, the field faces an inflection point. While continued refinement of established effects remains valuable, there is a growing need for research that moves beyond incremental extensions and instead rethinks how influence operates, who influencers are, and how value is created and contested in contemporary influencer ecosystems. This includes revisiting core constructs, interrogating emerging managerial challenges, and introducing new theoretical lenses capable of capturing these changes.

In this special issue on “New Directions in Influencer Research,” we call on researchers to move beyond continued incremental contributions and instead to focus on broader questions and truly novel insights. Such insights – while not limited to these approaches – may be gleaned by examining influencer marketing through a new theoretical lens; considering how technological, societal, or cultural shifts have altered the influencer landscape; or exploring emerging managerial challenges and strategic implications that will alter how advertisers will utilize influencer marketing in the future.

We encourage authors to build on prior work while also critically revisiting core assumptions in the literature. At the same time, we caution against submissions that primarily replicate well-established findings (e.g., the role of attractiveness or expertise, or basic processes underlying parasocial relationships) without offering meaningful theoretical extension or new boundary conditions.

Accordingly, the Journal of Advertising Research invites proposals for a special issue on “New Directions in Influencer Research,” aimed at advancing theoretically grounded, methodologically rigorous, and managerially relevant insights into how influencers shape advertising and marketplace dynamics.

Topics of Interest

We welcome proposals that address emerging, underexplored, or theoretically generative questions related to influencer marketing, including–but not limited to–the following areas:

Evolving Influencer Ecosystems

• How are deepfakes and synthetic media altering how consumers process and engage with influencer marketing?
• How are influencers incorporating AI tools into content creation, audience management, and monetization, and how do these practices reshape influence?
• How do influencer collectives, creator economies, and platform governance structures reshape influence and value creation?
• What are the power dynamics that occur across influencer–brand–platform relationships?
• How has the influencer ecosystem changed, or how does it need to change, to address increased opportunities for influence beyond social media platforms or the use of AI tools to facilitate content creation?
• How is influence extending beyond traditional social media into commerce, entertainment, education, and hybrid digital physical spaces?

 Influencers as Marketers and Brand Owners

• How do influencers function as brands, entrepreneurs, and marketing organizations rather than merely as endorsers?
• What competitive threats do influencers face from other creators, platforms, AI generated content, or brand owned media?
• How do influencers adapt, reposition, or professionalize as their audiences, technologies, and revenue models evolve?
• How can influencers themselves be protected from exploitation, burnout, harassment, or reputational harm?

 Strategic and Managerial Implications

• How should firms design influencer strategies across different stages of the customer journey and across multiple platforms?
• How does influencer marketing effectiveness vary across cultural, geographic, and market contexts?
• What strategic trade-offs do firms face between reach, authenticity, control, and risk in influencer partnerships?
• How should brands evaluate influencer fit, performance, and spillovers in increasingly algorithmic environments?
• How do misinformation, manipulated content, and brand safety risks emerge and spread within influencer ecosystems?

Measurement and Methodological Innovation

• How can influence, engagement, and persuasion be more accurately measured in dynamic, algorithmically curated environments?
• How can field experiments and platform-based data be leveraged to enhance external validity?
• How can researchers capture spillover effects, halo effects, and cross-platform influence in influencer campaigns?
• What new metrics or analytical approaches are needed to study influence at scale and over time?

Revisiting Foundational Assumptions

• How should advertisers select influencers to fit their specific strategic needs?
• Are existing influencer typologies still relevant, or are new classification frameworks needed?
• Where do existing theories of persuasion, social influence, and communication fall short in explaining consumer–influencer relationships today?
• How should foundational theories be extended or revised to account for AI-mediated and platform-driven influence?

References

Audrezet, A., De Kerviler, G., & Moulard, J. G. (2020). Authenticity under threat: When social media influencers need to go beyond self-presentation. Journal of Business Research, 117, 557-569.

Breves, P. L., Liebers, N., Abt, M., & Kunze, A. (2019). The perceived fit between Instagram influencers and the endorsed brand: How influencer–brand fit affects source credibility and persuasive effectiveness. Journal of Advertising Research, 59(4), 440-454.

Brooks, G., Drenten, J., & Piskorski, M. J. (2021). Influencer celebrification: How social media influencers acquire celebrity capital. Journal of Advertising, 50(5), 528-547.

Campbell, C., & Farrell, J. R. (2020). More than meets the eye: The functional components underlying influencer marketing. Business Horizons, 63(4), 469-479.

Lou, C. (2022). Social media influencers and followers: Theorization of a trans-parasocial relation and explication of its implications for influencer advertising. Journal of Advertising, 51(1), 4-21.

Park, J., Lee, J. M., Xiong, V. Y., Septianto, F., & Seo, Y. (2021). David and Goliath: When and why micro-influencers are more persuasive than mega-influencers. Journal of Advertising, 50(5), 584-602.

Scholz, J. (2021). How consumers consume social media influence. Journal of Advertising, 50(5), 510-527.

Thomas, V. L., & Fowler, K. (2021). Close encounters of the AI kind: Use of AI influencers as brand endorsers. Journal of Advertising, 50(1), 11-25.

Thomas, V. L., Fowler, K., Taheran, F., & Mortazavi, A. (2025). Explication of the Virtual Influencer Ecosystem. Journal of Advertising Research, 1-23.