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this podcast is brought to you by
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knowled of
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warten brands have long used celebrities
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athletes and social media influencers to
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pitch their products now they're getting
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endorsements and driving sales in a
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different way no humans required virtual
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influencers these are computer created
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personalities and they are gaining
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immense popularity around the world I'm
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Angie basini and I'm here today with
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Wharton marketing Professor Jonah Burger
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he's bringing us some of his research on
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Virtual influencers and what he
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discovered companies are doing that
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actually boost the effectiveness of
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these avatars Jen welcome back thanks
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for having me let's just jump right into
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this what is a virtual influencer why
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are they so popular and why would a
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company choose to use one is in as
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opposed to a real person what's the
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advantage yeah so a virtual influencer
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they really started out um as almost
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online abot and some right so uh think
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about an image of someone it's a it's
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not actually real person a a fabricated
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image of someone that looks real uh
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maybe initially they might have taken a
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real person's body but put uh
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superimposed a face on top of it that
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would have been consistent across images
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this isn't an actual human being it's a
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sort of an online avatar that is run
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potentially by a design company or by a
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brand or by a media company um and uh
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influencers are interesting right lots
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of interest in this space obviously
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companies want to get people to share
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word of mouth about the products and
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services and ideas um and so many
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companies organizations started paying
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traditional human influencers to do this
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um but there's some challenges working
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with human infl right you may not be
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able to find uh someone who has the
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exact mix of characteristics that you're
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looking for maybe you're looking for
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someone who's from a particular country
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and has a certain set of hobbies or a
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certain set of interests um and has some
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other set of characteristics and finding
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that masch between geography and uh and
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demographics and sort of psychographics
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and interests might be might be
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difficult to do um and second uh working
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with these virtual influ really gives
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companies organizations a lot more
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control right when you work with a human
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influencer you get some say and exactly
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what they say about the brand uh but you
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don't always get full complete sign off
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on everything that they do they may have
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some leeway in what they get to say or
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you may be concerned you know maybe if I
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work with celebrity and they get in
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trouble in the future is that going to
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hurt or have some blowback on the brand
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uh and so the benefit of working with
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these virtual influencers is Media
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companies or the individuals that run
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them have a much more control over what
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these influencers virtual influencers
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say and do obviously they're not going
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to get in trouble with the law because
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they're not real people and and so that
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ability can uh diffuse Word of Mouth uh
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and influence in a different and know
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way I know there's something I I saw in
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your paper about that regarding that and
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it said that you know people consumers
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don't necessarily believe that a real
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social media influencer has tried the
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product but you're sort of disabused of
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that notion when it's a virtual
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influencer you already know that's not
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possible so you sort of you get past
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that worry yeah I mean what's also
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changed so much in the past few years
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even the time we've been working on this
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paper is the way the virtual influencer
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space has changed right originally it
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might have been an image superimposed on
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a a real person's face um someone else's
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face imposed on their phase but now
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think about everything going on with
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llms and all these different models
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things going on now they can create
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images and create videos and uh and do
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things through AI that were not possible
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uh two three four five years ago and so
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we're not just seeing images now or
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seeing more things with video and other
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things and so there's going to be a lot
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of more content that's created by people
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other than humans um already some of
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it's going on and there's only going to
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be more in in the coming years you had
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some great stats in your paper I want to
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share with our audience uh you had that
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58% of American consumers follow at
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least one virtual influencer that 40% of
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American consumers have purchased
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something that was promoted by a virtual
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influencer and that VI Market is going
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to reach 11 billion do this year which
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is huge so is the message that if you're
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a brand or a company just make an avatar
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stick it online watch the money roll in
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well I think there's there's not just
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one choice there's a couple choices
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brands have right one is should we
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create our own virtual character I think
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the challenge there is they can't just
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like any sort of uh online sort of thing
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they can't only post about you right
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most people probably wouldn't want to
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follow a virtual influencer if they only
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talk about I don't know coca colola or
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Delta Airlines or Nike all the time um
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and so one reason people want to follow
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these virtual influencers they seem like
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regular people right yes sure they do
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some collaborations with Brands but they
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also post some unbranded content they
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also might talk about someplace they're
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going this weekend or show a picture of
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them doing something with friends that
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has nothing to do with brands that makes
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them seem more like a real person as
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we'll talk about in a couple minutes and
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so for Brands to create one that may not
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be the thing that most brands want to do
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I think many brands that are considering
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might want to work with one they want to
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collaborate with virtual and lots of uh
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big brands have started collaborating
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with virtual influencers just like they
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might with a regular human influencer um
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and I think the question that really
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becomes is it going to work right so
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just like as you work with a regular
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influencer is working with this person
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is paying them right this is a form of
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paid media after all is paying them GNA
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have that return on investment or we get
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more from working with this person than
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doing something else with our with our
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marketing dollars there is a main
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takeaway in your paper that I would like
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for us to talk about and that is the
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presence of virtual influencers online
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and what boosts their effectiveness
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let's talk about that yeah sure so just
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I think this nicely ties to the question
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we just talked about right but the
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question is not just should I work with
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a virtual influencer but what makes
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virtual influencers effective right if
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you look at their posts some of them get
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a lot of attention uh get a lot of likes
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get a lot of comments get a lot of
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shares others not so much right some get
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a lot of Engagement some don't why and
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you could say the same thing about
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regular influences as well right certain
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posts get more engagement certain don't
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why as we talked about already though
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it's really important in this space of
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virtual influences is trust and it's
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it's already important in the space of
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influences more generally but
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particularly true in this virtual
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influencer phase because uh a virtual
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influenc can't have actually tried the
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product that they're talking about right
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because they're they're not real they
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can't have been to that restaurant they
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can't have gone to that soccer game they
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can't have worn the shoes um and so it's
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it's unlike that they actually engaged
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with that product and so why would you
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want to follow them why would you want
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to engage with them and so we started
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looking at this across a number of
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different projects we looked some of the
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language uh that influencers and virtual
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influencers use but we also started
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looking at the images um and there's a
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lot of interesting work going on in
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computer vision and other things in this
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space content analytics moving not just
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from text you I've talked about many
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times before and sort of analyzing
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language for insight but think about how
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to analyze images or video or audio
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feature other types of content Analytics
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for insight so we did here is we looked
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at a whole bunch of different
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influencers we looked at a whole bunch
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of posts they made and we analyzed
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aspects of the photos they posted to see
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what about those photos might increase
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engagement and what did you find yeah so
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we found something quite interesting so
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it turns out that appearing with someone
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else in an image so if you're a virtual
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influencer appearing in an image not
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just by yourself but with someone else
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particularly someone else who seems
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human is much like more likely to to
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lead to positive engagement on that post
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so post where I'm going to photo but
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it's not just me I'm appearing a photo
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with other people particularly those
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that look human get get more engagement
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and so whether it's you know being at a
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restaurant with some folks that look
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like your friends being at the gym with
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uh somebody it looks like that you know
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and and so on and so we dug deep but we
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found something quite interesting which
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is these posts essentially humanize the
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virtual influencer so as consumers when
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we look at posts online we're trying to
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figure should I trust this whether
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virtual influence or regular one should
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I trust this post and with virtual
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influencers trusted low to begin with
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one thing I I look for I'm trying to
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figure out do I trust them is well do
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they seem human because the more they
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seem human the more likely I am to say
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okay well this is more like a regular
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person I can trust what they're saying
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I'm gonna be more like we engaged with
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this post and so appearing with someone
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else appearing like you have a friend um
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a social tie a relationship with a real
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person um seeming like you do even
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though you're a virtual influencer makes
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the individual viewing that post go wow
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you seem more like a human you seem more
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anthropomorphic seem more like human you
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have human characteristics now I'm going
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to trust you more it as a result that
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post is going get so it's this idea that
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this Avatar is not really an isolation
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that it has a social network a community
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a tie um does it matter if the Avatar is
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appearing with other people that are
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also other characters that are also
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avatars or is it better that they appear
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with real people real humans yeah great
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question and I think I think the
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question is really we don't know as as
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viewers of these posts exactly who
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they're appearing with right um but but
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uh the more human that person seems the
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more human that image seems um if I'm
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appearing in a photo my face is there
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and there's another face more it looks
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like that other face is an actual real
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human being the bigger the impact is why
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because if I'm showing up with someone
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who looks like a cartoon or it doesn't
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really look like a real person then the
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consumer viewing is go wow this isn't
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really really a human and so if it's not
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really a human I'm not going to trust it
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and I'm not going to trust it I'm not
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going to engage with it and so um
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engagement is higher in these posts when
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it looks like that person you're
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appearing with is actually really a real
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human looks like a real human rather
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than some other Avatar that you might be
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connected yeah one of the the important
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threads I think that I read in your
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paper is that you really emphasize that
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customers consumers are smart they will
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not be duped into purchasing something
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just because there's a cute Avatar or
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puppy or what have you and I think that
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gets back to this issue of trust that
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you're talking about with with VI
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influencers so as we're moving deeper
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into AI generated content as we
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discussed before um how you see Brands
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dealing with that trust Factor you know
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it it's been interesting I mean I've
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been working in the word of mouth field
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now for probably almost 20 years
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thinking about sort of issues related to
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Word of Mouth and um uh initially um
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when work in this space St started
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people said wow we trust word of mouth
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because we know it's diagnostic we know
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that person's objective compared to
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let's say a piece of paid or owned media
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piece of earned media some friend
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telling me they like something that's
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really useful information they're not
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getting paid going to tell me they like
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it if it's actually pretty good and so I
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can trust them and that information is
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going to be more targeted and so it's
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going to have more impact as we Mig
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graded online that was still the case at
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least to some degree um but today things
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have gotten more complicated right not
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only is their AI content out there but
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there are influencers who may be getting
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paid to post things well should I trust
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that influencer or not and when should I
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trust them and when should I not trust
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them and what's going to make me be more
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likely to trust them and so I think this
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is a really interesting space both for
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consumers as individuals sort of
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thinking about how should I consume
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content uh online and what should I
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trust and what should I not trust and
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also for Brands Brands thinking about
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how do we get the word out about our
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products and services and ideas should
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we work with these online influencers
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should we work with regular Joe's and
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Janes and really have them sample the
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product that way that word of mouth is
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much more organic and probably more
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trusted maybe they don't have as big of
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an audience right um you know if I post
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about something online compared to an
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online lincer my post May as big reach
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as their post does but hopefully my
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friends and colleagues trust me because
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they know I didn't get paid and so maybe
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they're going to be more likely to
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listen to that message and so it's
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certainly an interesting space but with
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lots of interesting changes going on
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yeah it's definitely evolving because
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social media platforms themselves are
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evolving so who knows what they're going
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to look like in five to 10 years so
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definitely yeah interesting space to
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watch yeah thank you so much for being
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on with me your paper is titled what
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drives virtual influencers impact you
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can find it online along with all of
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Jonah's books and papers and content
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about persuasive communication uh his
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website is called Jonah it's Jonah
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burger.com I'm Angie B un for knowledge
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at Wharton thanks for joining us for
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more insight from knowledge at Wharton
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please visit knowledge. Warton up.edu
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