The Role of Fashion Influencers in Shaping Consumers’ Buying Decisions and Trends

Abstract With the rise of social media, influencers have gained an important role in the marketing strategies of companies. Their constant presence in social media, determined by the creation and posting of content as well as their permanent interaction with the consumers, has created them a great advantage and credibility in the eyes of consumers. The fact that they are not perceived as a form of marketing, increases their credibility and ability to influence their followers. In this article, we present the results of a research about the consumers’ perception towards fashion influencers depending on age category. Our results show that fashion influencers have the ability to influence the fashion style adopted by the consumers, but not necessarily the buying decision. The fashion style of young consumers is more likely to be shaped by influencers, while people with ages between 25-40 years are least impressed by influencers. In a surprising way, even consumers older than 40 years shape their fashion style based on influencers, but are not influenced directly in their buying decision.