Leveraging Influencer Relations Professionals for Sponsorship Disclosure in Social Media Influencer Marketing

Abstract

This research investigates the role played by influencer relations professionals—also known as influencer intermediaries—in driving upfront and compliant disclosure of sponsorships in influencer marketing. Using semistructured interviews with 21 influencer relations professionals in Canada, the research identifies how influencer intermediaries can support sponsorship disclosure in three areas: (1) legal contracts and statements of work, (2) formal and informal content vetting processes, and (3) intermediary knowledge transfer. Using Bourdieu’s sociological theory of field as a theoretical lens and analytical tool, the findings identify how these intermediaries have access to forms of social, cultural, and technical capital that can influence best disclosure practices. This research has implications for theory and practice by contributing to research in influencer relations management and by suggesting sponsorship disclosure solutions that emerge directly from the perspectives of influencer relations professionals.

Keywords:

• Compliance
• influencer marketing
• influencer relations
• social media influencer
• sponsorship disclosure

Social media influencer (SMI) marketing is growing dramatically by capitalizing on the online popularity and self-branding power of social media influencers and web personalities to enhance brand awareness, endorse brand products, access niche consumer segments, and influence consumer purchasing decisions (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019; Enke and Borchers 2019; Khamis, Ang, and Welling 2017; Lou and Yuan 2019). Budgets for influencer marketing are growing as influencers have shown the ability to drive sales through more personal, relatable, everyday user–generated content (Jiménez-Castillo and Sánchez-Fernández 2019; Martensen, Brockenhuus-Schack, and Zahid 2018; Siekierska 2019). In a survey of almost 5,000 brands, agencies, and industry professionals, 75% indicated that they planned to have a dedicated budget for influencer marketing (Geyser 2022). As early entrants in an emerging career, these influencer relations professionals—also known as influencer intermediaries—work as liaisons between influencers and brands on social media campaigns (Stoldt et al. 2019). The advent of influencer marketing programs at the corporate level, within traditional marketing and public relations departments, has led to the need for influencer intermediaries who are capable of developing frameworks for effective influencer relationship management in the largely uncharted world of digital advertising (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019; Gallagher 2020; Stoldt et al. 2019). These trends illustrate brands’ and corporations’ growing reliance on influencer marketing to expand their reach to niche consumers and their need for professionals who can help them build influencer relationships in the ever-evolving social media environment.

Social media helped transform the digital consumer experience, but they also enable the spread of deceptive and misleading marketing practices. Influencer marketing–based promotion can be deceptive or misleading when influencers fail to conspicuously disclose any material (monetary or nonmonetary) relationships with sponsoring brands (Ad Standards 2020; Competition Bureau Canada 2022a). Such sponsorship disclosures are necessary to ensure that consumers can easily recognize the advertising intention. This is particularly important in user-generated content that lacks the clearly visible advertising markers seen in traditional advertising (Bladow 2018). In many countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada, disclosures that are difficult to recognize are prohibited, as they do not pass formal regulators’ “upfront is best” philosophy (Ad Standards 2020, p. 7). The recurrence of sponsorship disclosure breaches has prompted both formal regulators (governments, self-regulatory agencies) and informal regulators (everyday consumers) to pay closer attention to the nature, adequacy, and even placement of disclosures in branded or sponsored social media content (Abidin 2021). In recent years, formal regulators around the world have examined how applicable laws are understood and applied in the influencer industry (International Consumer Protection Enforcement Network (ICPEN) 2016).

Despite efforts to use legislation and formal industry guidelines to encourage voluntary compliance, many influencers are not implementing disclosures in accordance with current rules and regulations (Gürkaynak, Kama, and Ergün 2018; Langford 2020). Recent research into the use of written disclosure hashtags (such as #ad, #sponsored, or #gifted) on Instagram reveals that more than three-quarters of influencer adverts on that platform have hidden disclosures (Langford 2020). Some scholars posit that influencers’ inability to meet the standards of disclosure set by regulators may be due to conflicting symbolic and legal perceptions of what constitutes ethical conduct in the influencer industry. Wellman et al. (2020), for instance, assert that influencers tend to use authenticity as an ethical metric for their content creation or disclosure decisions. This approach, which upholds brand identity and audience perception (Wellman et al. 2020), is vastly different from formal regulators’ view of ethics in the influencer industry as being a largely economic matter requiring targeted legal and governmental oversight (Abidin 2021; Asquith and Fraser 2020). As a result, formal regulators in Canada and the United States have issued warning letters directly to noncompliant influencers, advising them of the applicability of advertising laws to influencer marketing and on the use of best disclosure practices (Boerman 2020; Competition Bureau Canada 2019; Gürkaynak, Kama, and Ergün 2018). In Canada, the Competition Bureau’s targeting of brands and marketing firms was an opportunity for it to emphasize that compliance with applicable legislation (the Competition Act) is a shared responsibility that rests on influencers and any businesses that collaborate with influencers (Competition Bureau Canada 2019). This means that both businesses and influencers may be held liable for misleading or deceptive marketing practices (Competition Bureau Canada 2019). Although influencer relations professionals are not directly mentioned as being potentially liable, their involvement in disclosures for influencer campaigns and their affiliations with the types of businesses targeted by the Competition Bureau substantiate why they share responsibility for regulatory and legal compliance.

Studying the shared nature of legal and regulatory disclosure requirements in the influencer industry is critical, as it allows a deeper evaluation of the compliance responsibilities of other actors in the influencer-brand relationship and how these responsibilities can be met. Prior scholarly research suggests that influencer intermediaries may have some leverage over how influencers and their clients understand and apply disclosure rules and guidelines (Bladow 2018). However, there is a gap in the understanding of what tools and mechanisms these intermediaries can utilize to support disclosure. For example, research suggests the need for a deeper investigation into the process of securing proper sponsorship disclosures (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019) to reduce the risk of clients and influencers being legally penalized for noncompliance. This research analyzes how influencer relations professionals can encourage reasonable, adequate, and consistent levels of compliance by leveraging the power they possess within the influencer-brand relationship. Specifically, the research asks: What role do influencer intermediaries play in encouraging compliant sponsorship disclosure in SMI marketing?

Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological theory of field (and the subconcepts of capital and cultural intermediaries) serves as the theoretical framework for this research. Bourdieu’s field theory provides an appropriate theoretical tool for conceptualizing influencer relations professionals as intermediaries who coexist with various actors (influencers, brands, and consumers) in a sociocultural field we define as the SMI field. This framing of the influencer marketing industry as a field is inspired by Bourdieu’s concept of social life as a domain comprising different cultural fields (Lareau, Adia Evans, and Yee 2016). Within these fields, intermediaries and other actors or institutions compete for various forms of social, cultural, economic, or technical power or capital (Abidin 2018, 2021; Warren and Dinnie 2018; Wolf 2007). Backed by the precedent of using field theory to assess field dynamics in different sociocultural domains (e.g., Angers 2017; Bathmaker 2015), this research relies on Bourdieu’s theory to conduct a theoretically sound investigation of the potential impact of power dynamics within the SMI field (through the leveraging or harnessing of certain types of capital) on actors’ level of regulatory compliance and how certain actors (intermediaries) can encourage compliant sponsorship disclosure. Within our framing, sponsorship disclosure requirements result from the SMI field converging with what we call the regulatory field. The SMI and regulatory fields overlap at the point of laws and guidelines applicable to influencer marketing.

This research contributes to theory and practice by centralizing the lived experiences of influencer relations professionals to proffer grassroots solutions for achieving and maintaining conspicuous and compliant disclosure in the influencer industry. Additionally, this work contributes to a niche and less researched area of influencer advertising by concentrating on the perspectives of industry professionals who work closely with influencers (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019; Lou and Jin 2021).

Literature Review

SMI Marketing and Influencer Relations

In strategic communications, influencer marketing is often described as an electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) strategy that optimizes social media influencers’ popularity to expand brand recognition and affect consumer buying behavior (De Veirman, Hudders, and Nelson 2019; Lou and Yuan 2019). Brands and companies often pay influencers to promote their products or services in social media campaigns (Jacobson et al. 2019). The growth and corporatization of influencer marketing have ushered in new core business functions dedicated to influencer relationship building. Influencer relations, or influencer relationship management (IRM), is a strategic process of building, managing, and preserving relationships with relevant content creators and internet personalities who have meaningful social media clout (Gallagher 2020; Holt 2019). Influencer relations is a key component in the influencer marketing ecosystem. Influencer relations professionals (1) identify influencers who align with the strategic objectives of the campaign, (2) liaise between brands and influencers with balance and fairness, (3) build long-standing relationships with influencers and brands, and (4) manage branded influencer campaigns with efficiency and transparent communication (Holt 2019). Although the industry has grown large enough to accommodate professionals dedicated solely to influencer relations work, some public relations, social media management, talent management, and marketing roles have expanded to incorporate IRM in traditional strategic communication departments (Gallagher 2020).

Influencer Marketing, Native Advertising, and Implications for Disclosure in Canada

Influencer marketing is often likened to native advertising (Boerman 2020; Campbell and Grimm 2019; De Veirman, Hudders, and Nelson 2019), which is a form of covert promotion “where a brand or a product is marketed in a way that is similar to the editorial content on the platform it is presented” (Gürkaynak, Kama, and Ergün 2018, p. 17). If disclosures are not made appropriately, native promotion can hide the advertising intention from consumers, thus diminishing their ability to make informed purchasing decisions (Boerman 2020; Gürkaynak, Kama, and Ergün 2018). Disclosures are written or verbal notices that help consumers easily identify when social media content is sponsored through financial compensation or gifting (Ad Standards 2019; Kay, Mulcahy, and Parkinson 2020). Influencer marketing is often compared to native advertising because brand-sponsored content can mimic an influencer’s regular content and editorial aesthetics.

In Canada, there have been calls for greater transparency in native advertising and online influencer marketing since Ad Standards began to assess and settle disclosure breaches in 2010 (Asquith and Fraser 2020). Ad Standards (2022) is a not-for-profit self-regulatory body that monitors the advertising industry in Canada and administers the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards. Although some scholars have demonstrated the existence of various algorithmic challenges to applying sponsorship disclosure standards to influencer marketing (Musiyiwa and Jacobson 2023) and suggest that the narrow focus on the economic implications of influencer marketing is one drawback of the current top-down approach to industry regulation (Abidin 2021; Asquith and Fraser 2020), disclosure compliance has some benefits for influencers and businesses. First, compliance reduces the risk of being targeted by regulators and subjected to protracted governmental enforcement actions and/or financial penalties. In Canada, individuals and corporations can be asked to stop publishing misleading content, issue corrective notices, and/or reimburse buyers of the product or service in question (Competition Bureau Canada 2022b). Individuals and larger corporations can also be court-ordered to pay fines, have their assets frozen, or even be sentenced to prison for aggressive violation of the criminal provisions (Competition Bureau Canada 2022b).

Second, industry research has found that sponsorship disclosure increases the credibility of influencers and enhances ad transparency—particularly from the perspective of everyday consumers. Truthfulness, fairness, and accuracy are key principles of Canadian advertising and drive the mission of formal regulatory bodies such as Ad Standards (2022). Research commissioned by Ad Standards has investigated how consumers feel about advertising transparency in influencer marketing. Its consumer research report revealed that the vast majority of Canadians who are aware of influencer marketing strategies “strongly or somewhat agree that there should be transparency about sponsored ads” (Ad Standards 2018, p. 21). Seventy-two percent of surveyed Canadians agreed that there should be penalties for regulatory noncompliance. The research also indicated that most people’s brand perceptions would improve with greater transparency about advertising intentions (Ad Standards 2018). These industry findings substantiate formal regulators’ focus on disclosure breaches in influencer marketing.

Theoretical Framework

Bourdieu’s Theory of Field and Forms of Capital

To understand how power can influence or change behaviors in cultural fields, this research applies Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of field to the influencer industry. Bourdieu’s (1992) sociological theory of field describes social life as a domain comprising many fields (Lareau, Adia Evans, and Yee 2016). Fields are dynamic and socially networked spaces where the “modification or conservation of…power relations” is negotiated by actors and institutions within those fields or external to (but overlapping) them (Wolf 2007, p. 134). Bourdieu posits that although cultural fields have some autonomy in how they operate, their proximity to overlapping fields can affect how field actors behave or coexist (Bathmaker 2015; Lareau, Adia Evans, and Yee 2016). Additionally, similar to a game, actors compete in the field under a set of rules. Actors and institutions within (or external to) the field negotiate and often struggle to decide the rules of the game. In this same process, the resources and benefits at stake in the field are defined (Bathmaker 2015; Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). The game analogy also points to the notion of strategy within fields. Field actors have to devise strategies to “win” sought-after resources or maintain their power through capital accumulation (Bathmaker 2015; Corciolani, Grayson, and Humphreys 2020). Field actors often compete to gain or maintain power in the form of capital (Bathmaker 2015; Wolf 2007).

Capital, another concept theorized by Bourdieu, signifies how societies “exercise judgements in taste, express aesthetic dispositions, and assign status and distinction towards different social behaviours” (Abidin 2018, p. 19). In Bourdieu’s thought, capital is usually economic, social, or cultural. Economic capital is conceptualized in terms of having access to assets, property, or goods with financial value (Abidin 2018; Wolf 2007). Social capital can be realized through the effective establishment and maintenance of “stable relationships between people, organizations, or institutions, through acknowledged membership within these groups” (Abidin 2018, p. 33). Cultural capital refers to the possession of highly valued personal attributes, qualifications, or thought leadership in a field (Abidin 2018; Wolf 2007). Abidin (2018, 2021) posits that social, cultural, and economic forms of capital function in the same way with influencers but adds the element of technical exceptionalism, which combines all three of Bourdieu’s types of capital. Technical capital, from the perspective of social media influencers, refers to power derived from possessing exceptional, extraordinary, uncommon, or expert skills that audiences admire (Abidin 2018).

Bourdieu’s theory of field and concept of capital are useful tools for conceptualizing how the SMI industry functions as a sociocultural field where forms of power flow among various actors (influencers, influencer relations professionals, brands, audiences). Field theory aids in the exploration of how SMI field actors can influence one another’s compliance behaviors, particularly in close proximity to the regulatory field (i.e., the rules of the field) relevant to influencer marketing. With respect to influencer relations professionals specifically, Bourdieu’s concept of capital provides a theoretical foundation for the kinds of influence these professionals may have access to and can leverage to encourage compliant disclosure per existing guidelines.

Cultural Intermediaries

Bourdieu’s field theory serves as the foundation for his writings on cultural intermediaries and the power they hold as influential agents within fields. Corciolani, Grayson, and Humphreys (2020) describe cultural intermediaries as “people and organizations who mediate between those who produce cultural products and those who are the target audience for these products” (p. 479). Their definition is built on Bourdieu’s deliberations about public myths and the emergence of what he calls a new class of petite “bourgeoisie” tastemakers (Bourdieu and Nice 1984). Bourdieu (1969) theorizes that the new petite bourgeoisie ascribes value to cultural products through the effective development of “public myths” about these products and the production process (p. 99). He adds that members of the new petite bourgeoisie occupy intermediary professions focused on both the creation and the distribution of public myths to audiences within fields (Corciolani, Grayson, and Humphreys 2020; Maguire and Matthews 2010). Similar to the Marxian petite bourgeoisie, which positions itself between the interests of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, Bourdieu’s cultural intermediaries are “ardent spokesmen” for the bourgeois directors and executives in the fields of cultural production (Bourdieu and Nice 1984, p. 310). Cultural intermediaries are often tasked with “selling [bourgeois] tastes as widely as possible” to other less influential individuals within the cultural field (Maguire and Matthews 2010, p. 407). Their role as sellers of cultural tastes and values is coupled with their pedagogic role as advisers and modelers of lifestyles defined by a culture of consumption—mostly for the purpose of influencing consumer buy-in and behavior (Bourdieu and Nice 1984; Maguire and Matthews 2010).

Some scholars challenge Bourdieu’s description of cultural intermediaries as extremely influential or powerful tastemakers. They contend that claims about the influence of intermediaries in cultural economies are often not empirically supported and are wildly overestimated (Moor 2008; Nixon and Gay 2002). Despite their debated power, cultural intermediaries do occupy an interesting position due to their proximity to key business executives, their ability to mediate between different actors, and their status as recognized tastemakers.

Influencer Relations Professionals as Intermediaries in the SMI Field

Although influencers often occupy the prominent position of sharing branded content by being the face of a social media campaign or engaging directly with consumers online, they do not always develop independent working relationships with brands. Formalization of the practice has introduced intermediary organizations and practitioners that operate across “multiple regimes of mediation” (Cronin 2004, p. 357) to broker relationships not only between brands and consumers at large but also between brands and influencers. Cronin’s (2004) regimes of mediation extend Bourdieu’s original characterization of cultural intermediaries as individuals who mediate solely between the producers of cultural products and target consumers (Maguire and Matthews 2010; Corciolani, Grayson, and Humphreys 2020). This perspective becomes important when assessing how intermediaries between brands and influencers engage a “structured flexibility framework” (Stoldt et al. 2019, p. 2). This framework involves balancing “a brand’s need to accomplish specific campaign goals with an influencer’s commitment to authenticity and audience engagement” (Stoldt et al. 2019, p. 2). Achieving structured flexibility is about engaging in effective influencer relations and meaningfully mediating between various actors in the influencer field (Gallagher 2020). As such, intermediaries—like successful entrepreneurial influencers, talent managers, branding consultants, influencer marketing managers, or boutique agencies—have created job opportunities in a niche intermediary space (Scott 2017).

Some brands have expanded their public relations and communications departments to encompass influencer relations by adding employee functions or hiring new professionals to establish and manage influencer relationships. The field of influencer relations is gradually becoming specialized in strategic corporate communications because of the unique skills offered by influencer intermediaries; while drawing on traditional forms of marketing, advertising, and public relations, they are also creating new ways to conduct effective relationship management with niche consumer groups and online influencers. As Brooks, Drenten, and Piskorski (2021) maintain, the “days of influencer marketing being a niche do-it-yourself domain have passed” (p. 544). Influencer intermediaries not only design and coordinate influencer campaigns but also aid with contract development, creative direction, content creation, influencer discovery and talent scouting, recruitment, vetting, development of influencer payment schedules, audience research, impact analysis, and assessment of influencer relevance to clients (Brooks, Drenten, and Piskorski 2021; Gallagher 2020; Stoldt et al. 2019). Influencer intermediaries can be invaluable to the process of “winning” the influencer game. They can support brands and influencers by researching and strategizing how to achieve key performance indicators (KPIs) and optimize online visibility, labor, algorithmic preferencing, or authenticity. Brooks, Drenten, and Piskorski (2021) demonstrate that these competencies and unique skill sets challenge the notion that power within the SMI field lies only with influencers and audiences, as influencer intermediaries often play a crucial role in the influencer celebrification process.

Methods

The research uses semistructured interviews with 21 influencer relations professionals who work closely with influencers and brands in an intermediary capacity. To analyze the impact these professionals have on disclosure practices, the research focuses on the subjective and unique lived experiences of practitioners who are industry “experts” in the SMI field (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019). This status is based on several factors, including educational background, current influencer-related work, years of experience, overlapping industry experience, and other relevant background information. As such, this research is both qualitative and interpretive in nature. Bryman, Bell, and Teevan (2012) write that one of the core objectives of qualitative research is to see and understand a research inquiry “through the eyes of the people being studied” (p. 140). The subjectivity of qualitative research is what renders it interpretive, as interpretive studies often ensure that research is grounded in the participants’ points of view (Merrigan, Huston, and Johnston 2012).

Recruitment of Prospective Participants

After receiving ethics approval from the Research Ethics Board at the Toronto Metropolitan University, participants were recruited using purposive and network sampling techniques. Purposive sampling involves intentionally identifying and approaching potential participants in a target or relevant population (Merrigan, Huston, and Johnston 2012). Network or snowball sampling is an approach whereby participants enlist themselves or recruit other potential participants from their own networks (Merrigan, Huston, and Johnston 2012). These sampling methods were used to ensure that the research included professionals who were eligible to participate and able to contribute as a result of their relevant experience. An initial list of potential participants was compiled by consulting the list of influencer marketing agencies represented on the 2019 Ad Standards’ Influencer Marketing Steering Committee and then searching for publicly accessible names of relevant professionals from those organizations. A Google search of “influencer marketing agencies in Canada” was also used to access relevant agencies and professionals outside of this committee. A study recruitment flyer was posted to one of the researcher’s professional LinkedIn accounts. As the “world’s largest professional network on the internet” (LinkedIn 2022, para. 1), LinkedIn was a good way to directly contact professionals who would likely be eligible to participate in the research. LinkedIn was also utilized as a purposive sampling search tool to identify relevant professionals by searching the site for “influencer marketing,” “social media marketing,” “influencer marketing management,” or “influencer relations.” Snowball sampling was also used to recruit potential candidates from the networks of participating professionals; at the end of their interviews, participants were asked whether they knew any colleagues who met the study inclusion criteria. If they felt comfortable doing so, they were invited to share a digital copy of the recruitment flyer with those individuals.

Participants

Ultimately, 151 prospective participants were contacted, and 21 professionals agreed to participate in the research (see Table 1). Based on extant research on the ideal sample size for qualitative interviews, 21 participants was an adequate number to reach data saturation. Data saturation is defined as the point at which data gathering and analysis produce no new information and can be discontinued (Guest, Bunce, and Johnson 2006; Hagaman and Wutich 2017). The point of data saturation in purposive and qualitative research is highly debated. However, 10 to 40 interviews is a consistent range in the relevant scholarly literature (Guest, Bunce, and Johnson 2006; Hagaman and Wutich 2017; Hansen and Machin 2019).

Table 1. Participant profiles.

Pseudonym	Scope of Work	Overlapping Industry Experience	Additional Background
Abigail	Talent management	Public relations
Belinda	Talent and social media management	Fitness
Cheryl	Influencer relations management	Radio, tourism
Dana	Social media management	Medical, digital marketing
Erin	Influencer relations management	Public relations, marketing, television, radio, industry research	Educator (college level)
Faye	Talent management	Beauty, publishing, education	Educator (college level)
Gale	Influencer relations management	Public relations
Hunter	Influencer relations management	Television
Issa	Influencer relations management	Blogging
Jade	Talent management	Global development, marketing, communications	Brand owner (small)
Keegan	Social media management	Blogging	Previous influencer, content creator, agency founder
Leslie	Social media management	Public relations, retail, education	Educator (college level)
Moira	Talent and social media management	Retail, banking, customer service, beauty and fashion, entertainment
Pat	Influencer relations management	Digital advertising (for children), gaming	Influencer, content creator
Robin	Social media management	Fashion, marketing
Sidney	Social media management	Advertising, fashion, retail, public relations	Previous influencer, content creator, agency founder
Tory	Social media management	Communications, public and media relations
Vincent	Influencer relations management	Digital marketing
William	Social media management	Television, entertainment, writing	Influencer, content creator
Xavier	Social media and marketing management	Fashion, marketing	Influencer, content creator
Zach	Social media management	Entertainment

Due to our focus on the Canadian regulatory and legal context, it was imperative to ensure that the participant pool was diversified by province, type of influencer-related work, organization type, years of experience, and other relevant background information. The recruitment process resulted in a participant pool consisting of relevant independent consultants or professionals who worked for talent agencies, social media management firms, brands, and digital marketing agencies in Ontario (n = 14), British Columbia (n = 4), Manitoba (n = 2), and Alberta (n = 1). Research participants were offered a $25 CAD honorarium to thank them for their time and willingness to participate in the study. Table 1 provides the participants’ profiles.

Interviews and Data Collection

Due to public health measures instituted during the COVID-19 pandemic, interviews were conducted remotely in a private setting of the participant’s choice. Most interviews were conducted by video conference on Zoom. Based on personal preference or technical difficulties, some participants chose to be interviewed over the telephone or using Zoom audio. All the interviews were recorded. The interview guide consisted of 16 main questions; as is typical of semistructured interviews, 11 possible follow-up questions were included in the guide for additional probing as needed (Bryman, Bell, and Teevan 2012; Merrigan, Huston, and Johnston 2012). Participants were asked questions about their professional backgrounds, day-to-day influencer relations and compliance practices, awareness of the applicability of the Competition Act, and regulatory compliance in an evolving social media environment. Based on a research pilot (Gani, Rathakrishnan, and Krishnasamy 2020), we expected the interviews to take approximately 1 hour. Overall, interviews lasted between 27 minutes and 1 hour and 31 minutes; the average interview duration was 54 minutes. Once the interviews were completed, the audio recordings were transferred to an automated transcription service, Temi. After verbatim transcripts were generated, the researcher conducted a quality check by comparing each transcript against its respective audio file to verify the transcript’s accuracy and to remove any personally identifiable information such as participants’ names, colleagues, past or present employers, clients, and colleges or universities attended. In total, 347 pages of transcripts were generated from the 21 audio files recorded during data collection.

Data Analysis

Interview data were analyzed using inductive and deductive approaches and thematic coding. Thematic coding is a type of qualitative analysis in which primary data are organized and condensed into thematic codes and categories for further analysis (Bryman 2016; Marshall 2023; Thomas 2003). NVivo, software that aids in the management, organization, analysis, and modeling of qualitative data, was used to code and analyze the interview data in two cycles.

For the deductive approach (the first coding cycle), the researcher developed a start list of a priori codes (known as nodes in NVivo) (Azungah 2018; Given 2008). This coding frame is a “record of the codes and criteria used to classify observations” in the interview data (Given 2008, p. 88). The initial codes were created using the key themes in the interview questions (e.g., influencer relations and disclosure compliance practices, awareness of the Competition Bureau’s activities in the industry) and salient topics from the literature review. Concepts from the theoretical framework were also used to generate a start list of thematic codes. For instance, a thematic code related to intermediary power or capital was designed to ensure that the research highlighted any participant insights on intermediaries’ use of social, cultural, economic, or technical capital to influence best disclosure practices during influencer marketing collaborations. Developing a priori codes related to intermediary capital or awareness of the overlapping nature of the SMI and regulatory fields ensured that the analysis was deeply contextualized and aligned with field theory as the orienting framework. The researcher ran the first coding cycle by using the text search query in NVivo to quickly identify phrases and passages related to the start list of codes.

The inductive cycle involved using in vivo (or verbatim) and axial coding to capture emerging themes derived from a line-by-line review of each interview transcript (Azungah 2018; Given 2008). Given (2008) underscores that in vivo codes “ensure that concepts stay as close as possible to research participants’ own words or use their own terms” (p. 472). The researcher read each transcript and highlighted key phrases that were then used to develop new codes reflecting fresh insights from the participants. For example, a new thematic code generated through inductive coding was based on the participants’ recurring prioritization of “paid” (i.e., involving monetary or financial compensation) partnership disclosures over gifted collaborations in the development of legal contracts, content vetting, or education on best disclosure practices.

Results

The findings indicate that influencer relations professionals play a significant role in how disclosure guidelines are understood and applied in the influencer industry. In their capacity as intermediaries, these professionals often act as a key link between the industry and formal regulation, serving as compliance facilitators to support conspicuous disclosure practices. By applying Bourdieu’s concept of capital, the research demonstrates that influencer relations professionals can leverage social, cultural, and technical forms of capital within the SMI field to shift influencers and brands toward compliant disclosure practices. These intermediaries can shorten the compliance knowledge gap between formal regulators and influencers who may have a limited understanding of the legalities of influencer marketing or the value of ad transparency through conspicuous disclosure. Specifically, the research identifies how influencer relations professionals can secure disclosure in three areas: (1) legal contracts and statements of work that codify clear expectations for disclosure, (2) formal and informal content vetting procedures, and (3) intermediary knowledge transfer. Social, cultural, and technical forms of capital can augment the efficacy of these three mechanisms as drivers of compliant sponsorship disclosure.

As analyzed below, social capital within the SMI field can be harnessed through intermediaries’ role as enforcers of contractual disclosure requirements coupled with their influential positions as mediators between brands and influencers. Intermediaries’ thought leadership and industry expertise are often the sources of their cultural and technical power, which is typically exercised during the content vetting and approval process and in the transfer of knowledge to the next generation of influencer relations practitioners. Although influencer relations professionals can access economic capital through entrepreneurial success in the industry, this research does not find that their financial standing has an impact on influencers’ disclosure practices. Figure 1 illustrates the connection between Bourdieu’s concept of capital and the findings.

Figure 1. Theoretical conceptualization. This figure has been designed using icons created and published by Freepik, nangicon, Gajah Mada, and Vectorslab on Flaticon.com.

How Influencer Intermediaries Secure Compliant Sponsorship Disclosure

Using Legal Contracts and Statements of Work to Secure Disclosure

Legal contracts serve as a vital link between the influencer industry and formal regulation due to brands’ and agencies’ growing interest in outlining disclosure requirements in contractually binding agreements and clearly establishing all the legalities surrounding collaboration (Gallagher 2020). The contract development stage is important to ensure that influencers understand what is expected and required of them (Gallagher 2020). Some influencer intermediaries describe the contract phase as the time when influencers are made aware of applicable laws and regulations and the regulatory bodies that mandate these guidelines. Influencer relations professionals sometimes participate in drafting these contracts using online templates or in collaboration with legal professionals. At the influencer contracting stage, influencer relations professionals can play an active role in ensuring that applicable laws are clearly articulated and clarified. Abigail (a talent manager) states that, in her experience, paid partnership disclosure is “always a requirement” in both brand and agency contracts with influencers.

In conjunction with contractual agreements, some influencer relations professionals use statements of work (SOWs) and campaign briefing materials to communicate the disclosure requirements for paid partnerships. Hunter (an influencer relations manager) defines SOWs as documents that “include all the legal terms of doing the campaign.” The influencers Hunter works with are required to sign her agency’s standard SOW to demonstrate that they are aware of Ad Standards’ advertising guidelines and disclosure requirements. Her agency recommends that paid partnership disclosures be displayed early—either in the first 30 seconds of a video or in the first three lines of a written caption. These recommendations align with Ad Standards’ (2020) view that upfront disclosures are the best practice, even in rapidly evolving digital environments.

Abigail’s and Hunter’s elucidation of how contracts and SOWs are used in the influencer industry demonstrates that intermediaries have an opportunity to exercise their social capital as the enforcers of disclosure guidelines. As defined in the theoretical framework, social capital can be obtained through effectual relationship management between key stakeholders (Abidin 2018). A vital component of influencer relations practice is the strategic leveraging of social capital to establish and manage relationships with influencers and brands (Gallagher 2020; Holt 2019). Vincent (an influencer relations manager) challenges the underestimation (Nixon and Gay 2002) of influencer relations professionals’ social power within the influencer-brand relationship. Vincent asserts that when it comes to communicating disclosure requirements to influencers, contracts give influencer intermediaries “a lot more power [in the SMI field] than they think.” As such, influencer intermediaries’ social standing in the eyes of influencers can be greatly enhanced by their input into what rules and guidelines are included in contracts, SOWs, and campaign briefing materials and their consistent enforcement of these guidelines. In a later section, this work explores the social power that legal contracts and SOWs confer to intermediaries: what one intermediary describes as being influential “middlemen” between influencers and brands.

Using Formal and Informal Content Vetting to Secure Disclosure

Influencer relations professionals can ensure that sponsorship disclosures are checked and verified during the content vetting and preapproval phase. It is standard practice for intermediaries involved in the influencer contracting and content creation stages of a collaboration to assist in formal or informal content vetting and approval of branded influencer content. This vetting and approval stage ensures that the paid partnership disclosures required in legal contracts, SOWs, and other briefing materials are fulfilled.

There are both formal and informal methods of vetting and approving sponsored content. Hunter describes her agency’s formal approach: “We have a really thorough preproduction stage. And then from there…the creators would shoot and edit. They send me the content; I’ll review it and then send [it] to the client. We get any feedback from clients in terms of legal, as well as…any notes they have. And…once we have approval, then we will launch. And… once it’s launched, I’ll make sure…[to] do a quality check that everything is correct.” In Hunter’s experience, the content and its associated disclosures go through levels of intermediary, brand, and legal review during the preproduction and content creation phases. If proper disclosures are missing, influencer intermediaries can ask influencers to amend the content before posting it.

As Leslie (a social media management consultant) elaborates, “even if [influencers] say they forget it, or they just sent the caption, I send it back with #ad, #sponsored and make sure that they copy and paste that exact thing word for word.” Belinda (an independent talent and social media management consultant) offers an alternative approach to securing disclosures. She prefers to publish the content on the influencer’s behalf to ensure that all the required deliverables are included. She builds trust with her influencers so that they feel comfortable granting her permission to post branded content on their social media accounts.

Informal content vetting for sponsorship disclosure usually involves a basic review of the content by the influencer intermediaries themselves. Cheryl (an influencer relations manager for a brand) and Erin (an influencer relations consultant) conduct quick informal checks to ensure that influencers have correctly implemented the expected sponsorship disclosures. Xavier (a social media and marketing manager for a fashion brand) does not specifically monitor influencers’ content for disclosure; rather, he checks that the brand he works for has been clearly tagged in the content. It is essential to note, however, that in the Canadian regulatory context, merely tagging a brand or sponsor within the content is not an effective form of disclosure, as it may not clarify the material relationship between an influencer and a brand (Ad Standards 2020). Although informal content vetting procedures may be necessary due to limited resources, this research does not encourage quick and superficial checks for disclosure, as they often result in inadequate levels of ad transparency.

Some influencer intermediaries note that sponsorship disclosure is particularly difficult with ephemeral social media, for which the disclosure rules are not well defined. For example, Instagram Stories are short-form pieces of social media content that often disappear after 24 hours (Chen and Cheung 2019). Cheryl speaks to the challenge of securing disclosure for real-time Instagram Stories that have not been prerecorded and approved prior to publication. At the time of the study, stories were posted in 15-second increments, making disclosure integration and placement difficult for influencers who posted longer stories. Ad Standards (2020) has now provided guidelines for disclosure on Instagram Stories, recommending consistent written and verbal disclosure throughout the duration of the content. Xavier contends that the limited availability of ephemeral content makes it difficult to check that disclosures have been included and implemented properly. For this reason, legal practitioners in the field recommend that contracts outline the consequences of not delivering what has been negotiated—especially for ephemeral content (Tobin 2019).

It is important to highlight that not all influencer relations professionals consider content preapproval a reliable mechanism for ensuring voluntary sponsorship disclosure. Even if the approval phase provides influencer intermediaries an opportunity to ensure that regulatory standards for disclosure have been met, the influencers ultimately decide whether to be compliant when they publish the sponsored content. Jade (an influencer talent manager), for example, is apprehensive about the efficacy of approving and monitoring influencer content, asserting that the final steps of publishing are in the hands of the influencers: “Ultimately no matter how many times I say, ‘you have to change this, you have to do this’ I’m not in control of the influencer or the brand accounts. I can’t force anyone to do that. They ultimately decide they’re just going to forget it and assume there will be no consequences.” In Jade’s view, influencers have ultimate control over what is published on their platforms. As such, they can decide to post content without the required forms of disclosure. In some cases, it is easy to edit noncompliant content after it is posted, but with some social media content types and formats, corrections are impossible without removing the content completely. Some brands and agencies do not like to reshoot or relaunch content because of project timelines and budgets, so posts without the proper disclosures often remain published on an influencer’s account. Until proper sponsorship disclosure is widespread and consistently integrated in influencer marketing, active intermediary participation in content vetting and approval is generally beneficial for normalizing a culture of conspicuous disclosure—particularly at the early stages of a sponsored campaign.

There are varying perspectives on the effectiveness of content vetting and preapproval procedures, but in general, these phases of a campaign can have a positive impact on compliance outcomes. Like their role as enforcers of legal contracts and SOWs, intermediaries can actively participate in the content vetting and preapproval process to ensure that influencers and brands meet their disclosure obligations. Influencer relations professionals can leverage their cultural and technical capital to ensure that content reviewers evaluate branded content against a high standard of sponsorship disclosure and legal compliance. As described in the theoretical framework, cultural capital is often derived from possessing highly valued credentials or being a thought leader in a certain field (Abidin 2018; Wolf 2007). Similarly, technical capital focuses on the power of having expert knowledge, but it also captures the exceptionalism that can come from having an uncommon skill set (Abidin 2018, 2021). Combined, cultural and technical capital can give influencer intermediaries an uncommon mastery and technical understanding of the rules and dynamics of the SMI field. Influencer relations professionals can rely on their cultural and technical capital to offer trusted advice to influencers on how best to apply disclosures during the content production, review, and publishing stages of a campaign. As demonstrated in Table 1, influencer relations professionals are often industry thought leaders with years of overlapping industry expertise and experience.

Using Intermediary Knowledge Transfer to Secure Disclosure

Influencer intermediaries can drive compliant sponsorship disclosure by taking on the responsibility of educating influencers about the applicable laws and best disclosure practices for both paid and gifted influencer campaigns. Cheryl and Erin note that they educate influencers on relevant Canadian and/or American guidelines for disclosure during contracting. Cheryl often attaches the latest Ad Standards or Federal Trade Commission disclosure guidelines to the contracts she sends to influencers. Directly linking these resources allows her to reacquaint herself with the latest industry guidance while showing influencers how to access these regulatory resources directly. Intermediary knowledge transfer is also a valuable mechanism for securing disclosure when the applicable rules are still greatly misunderstood. Tory (a social media manager) underscores that the gifted campaign (when influencers receive nonmonetary gifts as compensation) is one area in which the meaning of “material connection” has caused great confusion among intermediaries, influencers, and clients:

I would say the number one [gray area] is “material connections,” two words that mean a lot. I would say that is the biggest one. And any type of events, products, a gift, any of that, getting [clients] to understand that now with the new regulations, anything we give them is now essentially seen as a payment. That was something that I think for folks who weren’t following very closely on the development of the disclosure guidelines, I think that caught them off guard or in a way that they didn’t really understand or that they just didn’t want to acknowledge. That’s…I think what I’ve run into the most is people who don’t want to acknowledge that a trip or this [gift] that you sent to them needs to be disclosed. They think, well, no money, no contract, no disclosure.

Through intermediary knowledge transfer, Tory is able to challenge prevailing misconceptions surrounding disclosures for gifted collaborations by educating clients and influencers on the legal and regulatory definitions of payment in the SMI field.

In addition, some influencer intermediaries operate as links between the industry and regulatory compliance through their roles as formal and informal educators. Prior research recognizes the educational benefit of influencer intermediaries, highlighting their ability to effectively reconcile the goals of brands and influencers, manage influencer marketing campaigns, and fulfill a pedagogic function by offering meaningful advice or educational resources to aspiring influencers (Maguire and Matthews 2010; Stoldt et al. 2019). Faye, Erin, and Leslie teach social media marketing courses, and they have taken it upon themselves to expand the syllabi to cover influencer marketing and influencer relations. In these courses, they share their personal experience with communications, advertising, and marketing students who aspire to work with different types of influencers. Faye extends her knowledge transfer role beyond her students by advising colleagues on paid partnership disclosure and other regulatory compliance issues. Her role as an educator in her workplace has been well received, and she has become the “de facto Ad Standards Canada company figurehead” at the talent agency she works for. This type of knowledge transfer can help influencer relations specialists–in–training develop a strong understanding of disclosure compliance at the beginning of their careers and can also direct seasoned professionals toward compliance through peer mentorship.

These findings demonstrate how influencer professionals can utilize their cultural and technical capital to encourage disclosure compliance in dynamic ways. Some intermediaries engage in valuable knowledge transfer at the influencer contracting or content vetting and preapproval stage, while others apply their cultural and technical capital to encourage disclosure beyond a brand campaign. Some influencer intermediaries gain cultural and technical capital by engaging in communal information sharing or in thought leadership at the management level to support their peers and colleagues. In addition, some influencer relations professionals build cultural and technical capital through teaching in the academic space, advising the next generation of influencer relations professionals on compliance with disclosure guidelines. The following section describes in more detail the avenues through which influencer relations professionals can build cultural and technical capital.

The Influence of Intermediary Social, Cultural, and Technical Capital on Disclosure Practices

Social Capital: Positioning between Brands and Influencers

Some influencer intermediaries maintain that they have limited control over how influencers ultimately choose to publish branded content, while others argue that intermediaries’ influence over disclosure is unfairly underestimated. In alignment with Vincent’s view that intermediaries have more social capital than they think, Robin (a social media manager) posits that influencer intermediaries have “a bit of control” over how influencers and brands collaborate due to their negotiation powers and proximity as “middlemen” in the influencer-brand relationship. In Robin’s view, being a middleman in an influencer campaign grants him some control (or social capital) when it comes to managing the influencer-brand relationship and fulfilling the needs of all parties involved. Robin demonstrates that, through effective influencer relationship management, this same social capital can be used to ensure compliant sponsorship disclosure and best industry practices in the SMI field.

Influencer relations professionals can augment their social capital as advocates or “enforcers” of the disclosure requirements in legal contracts and SOWs by capitalizing on their role as liaisons between influencers and brands. Intermediaries are empowered when they are viewed as the “ardent spokesmen” (Bourdieu and Nice 1984) of brands and participate in the inclusion of disclosure requirements in legal contracts and SOWs. More importantly, the legal force of a contract or SOW augments intermediaries’ social capital when working with influencers or brand clients that may want to participate in covert native advertising. Intermediaries offer great social value not only by making it easier for influencers and brands to collaborate within legal boundaries but also by ensuring that both parties are compliant with applicable regulations.

Cultural and Technical Capital: Thought Leadership and Field Expertise

This research demonstrates that through content vetting and approval and through intermediary knowledge transfer within the community (i.e., the SMI field), intermediaries can encourage compliant sponsorship disclosure. Cultural and technical forms of capital are at the core of how influencer relations professionals drive compliant disclosure practices. Intermediaries build cultural and technical capital in the SMI field by focusing on the professional competencies, experiences, and skills that allow them to operate as effective compliance facilitators. Although there may be other sources of cultural and technical capital within influencer relationship management, this research identifies three: (1) thought leadership and knowledge transfer skills, (2) educational contributions, and (3) experience related to personal content creation and overlapping industry experience.

Thought Leadership and Knowledge Transfer

Influencer intermediaries gain cultural and technical capital through thought leadership and communal knowledge transfer and information sharing within their field. For example, Faye’s leadership in and understanding of compliance-related matters is a highly valued and admired professional attribute on her talent management team. Investments in this kind of cultural and technical expertise can inspire fellow influencer intermediaries and the influencers and brands they collaborate with to work toward consistent and compliant sponsorship disclosure.

In addition, some influencer intermediaries build thought leadership and technical expertise by engaging in communal knowledge and information transfer. Within the SMI field, knowledge transfer related to regulatory guidelines and other salient industry issues often occurs through the exchange of relevant articles, newsletters, and industry publications. For instance, Keegan (a social media manager and agency leader) and her team created an internal Slack social networking channel to share relevant industry news and updates. Slack is a digital platform used by businesses to facilitate organizational communication through features such as direct messaging and private chat rooms (Slack Help Center n.d.).

Educational Contributions

Cultural and technical capital can be achieved through teaching in the academic space. Like Faye, Leslie and Erin demonstrate the value of cultural and technical capital by being thought leaders in the research and academic arenas. In addition to their influencer relations work, all three teach college-level courses (see Table 1) that introduce influencer marketing and influencer relations. Erin, in particular, bolsters her teaching with her hands-on consulting experience and scholarly research on influencer relations. These influencer intermediaries acquire their cultural and technical capital from educational institutions that recognize their unique expertise and voices in the industry. It is important to expand influencer marketing knowledge within traditional academic spaces. Gale, who recently graduated from a media and communications program, attested to the limited source material on influencer marketing in relevant academic programs: “My school gave me the writing skills and stuff I have now. And maybe the presentation and oral communication skills. We didn’t really learn much about influencer marketing. It was maybe something that would be brought up in a lecture or if we had a guest speaker, they would talk about their influencer marketing campaigns. But we never actually really learned how you outreach, how you find influencers, how you do the whole process. I kind of had to learn that as I was going.” Prior to entering the field, Gale gained exposure to and preliminary knowledge of the influencer industry through guest speakers, her own undergraduate research, and mentors at her internships. This perspective reveals the uniqueness of influencer marketing and relations expertise at the training level. Influencer intermediaries can support students and future influencer relations professionals by helping them build foundational knowledge of compliance requirements at an early stage in their careers.

Personal Content Creation and Overlapping Industry Experience

Influencer intermediaries can draw cultural and technical capital from their experience as influencers in the SMI field and from overlapping industry experience. Some influencer intermediaries (e.g., Keegan, Pat, Sidney, William, and Xavier) accumulated cultural and technical capital through their professional influencer relations work as well as through their experience as content creators. Keegan, for instance, did not gain her cultural and technical capital as the founder of a talent agency through formal education or training. To prove to clients that she could offer meaningful social media marketing and influencer relations advice, she became an influencer and content creator herself. Keegan built a community of almost 30,000 Twitter followers and was able to monetize her craft and transform it into a viable revenue stream. Similarly, Sidney’s fashion blog attracted a million views per month, and he used this personal success as an influencer to enter the entrepreneurship and management side of the business. The cultural and technical capital gained from personal experience has given these influencers the power to run their own agencies and provide valuable advice about how to successfully navigate the SMI field.

In terms of overlapping experience, some influencer intermediaries started in the more traditional fields of communications and marketing (see Table 1). Their knowledge and appreciation of regulatory compliance are enhanced by lessons learned from radio, television, and advertising. This background is a source of cultural and technical knowledge that gives credence to these intermediaries’ advocacy of clear and upfront sponsorship disclosure. Pat (an influencer relations professional with talent management experience) previously worked for a boutique talent agency that focused on children and family influencer brands. This introduced him to the necessity of regulatory and legal compliance, as the rules and regulations surrounding family-oriented advertising are extremely strict. Because of this previous experience, Pat was eager to learn about applicable disclosure guidelines and to rigorously apply them to his current work with adult influencers.

Discussion

Our research finds that influencer intermediaries can have a significant impact on disclosure practices in the SMI field. Influencer intermediaries can play key roles as compliance facilitators and catalysts by their involvement in influencer contracting as well as formal and informal content vetting. Through active participation and intervention in the development of influencer contracts, SOWs, and briefing materials, influencer relations professionals can help reduce disclosure breaches and normalize regulatory compliance at critical points in the establishment of working relationships with influencers. Knowledge transfer is also identified as a vital mechanism to encourage sponsorship disclosure, as influencer intermediaries can educate influencers about formal regulatory frameworks and best practices guidelines. Furthermore, influencer intermediaries can improve disclosure and compliance outcomes by educating influencers, clients, and other intermediaries about the legal and regulatory requirements applicable to less common forms of influencer marketing. For example, knowledge transfer related to the legal definition of material connection can dispel the misconception that gifts do not constitute a form of payment. Our findings on the educational role of influencer relations professionals are consistent with extant research that recognizes the pedagogical value of intermediaries within cultural fields (Maguire and Matthews 2010; Stoldt et al. 2019). Comprehensively, our research illustrates that the power of influencer intermediaries is not limited to the influencer celebrification process (e.g., talent scouting, influencer recruitment, impact analyses) (Brooks, Drenten, and Piskorski 2021) but extends to the legal and regulatory aspects of influencer marketing that can expose both influencers and brand clients to great risk.

Despite influencer intermediaries’ underestimated power in the SMI field, they have access to forms of social, cultural, and technical power that can be maximized to influence best disclosure practices and high standards of compliance with formal regulatory guidelines. The belief that influencer intermediaries have no or limited power to encourage high standards of disclosure and regulatory compliance comes from an inability to independently identify the mechanisms (e.g., legal contracts, SOWs), unique field positioning (e.g., proximity to brands and influencers), and professional and personal experience that grant influencer intermediaries social, cultural, and/or technical capital in the SMI field. Their proximity to brands and influencers means that they can generate enough social capital through their trusted relationships with these actors to advocate for upfront, consistent, and conspicuous disclosure in a consequential way. Establishing trust and maintaining a healthy rapport with both the brand and the influencer make it easier to negotiate and reach mutually agreeable compromises on disclosure. Our findings align with Bourdieu’s conceptualization of social capital, which posits that social capital can be gained through the development of strong relationships and networks between people or groups (Abidin 2018). In addition, legal agreements and SOWs that outline the necessity of disclosure can augment the social power of influencer intermediaries—particularly when the influencers and clients may intend to violate the requirements for ad transparency. Social capital is thus achieved by being viewed as standard setters at the point of establishing a working relationship with influencers, at hiring, during the production of content, or at the publishing of branded content.

As our research reveals, social capital is also exemplified through influencer intermediaries’ relational proximity to influencers. As influencers’ day-to-day representatives or managers, influencer intermediaries are often relied on for advice on how to navigate the rules of the SMI field. Bladow (2018) contends that this advisory role largely confers the responsibility for disclosure compliance to influencer intermediaries. Furthermore, depending on the type of organizations they work for, influencer intermediaries can operate as influential “referees” (referencing Bourdieu’s game analogy), assisting in the negotiation, definition, or enforcement of the rules of the influencer game (e.g., being a member of the Ad Standards Influencer Marketing Steering Committee).

Our research identifies the value of cultural and technical capital within influencer relations. Influencer intermediaries can harness sources of cultural and technical power through (1) the development of respect by means of thought leadership and knowledge transfer, (2) educational and academic contributions through teaching and research within the influencer industry, and (3) personal content creation and industry experience. Although some influencer intermediaries do not recognize the positive impact their cultural and technical expertise can have on disclosure compliance, we find that these professionals’ personal experiences as industry researchers, college-level educators, content creators, brand owners, and/or agency leaders can position them as trusted advisers on many areas of regulatory compliance relevant to the SMI industry. By locating these forms of social, cultural, and technical capital within the experience and professional competencies of the interviewed professionals, this research demonstrates that some influencer intermediaries struggle to independently identify the tools, relationships, and competencies that substantiate the value of proper influencer relationship management.

Theoretical Implications

This research applies Bourdieu’s field theory to a new environment: the influencer marketing industry. It does so by assessing how cultural field dynamics (e.g., the overlapping nature of fields) can affect sponsorship disclosure practices and regulatory and legal compliance in the Canadian influencer field. Other scholars have similarly applied Bourdieu’s field theory (and the concepts it gives rise to) to examine how actors compete for power or capital in a given field, to contemplate the effect of overlapping fields on their autonomy (e.g., Bathmaker 2015), or to assess how the “rules of the game” within fields are negotiated and can change over time (e.g., Angers 2017). In a similar fashion, this research applies Bourdieu’s field theory and concepts of capital and cultural intermediaries to challenge the underestimated power of influencer intermediaries and investigate how intermediary power materializes in the SMI field. For example, the positioning of influencer relations professionals between influencers (consumers) and brands (producers of cultural products) is conceptualized by Bourdieu’s cultural intermediaries concept, while the impact of applicable laws on disclosure practices finds theoretical support in Bourdieu’s elucidation of how the “rules of the game” govern actors’ behavior. Together, field theory and the subconcepts of capital and cultural intermediaries allowed this research to frame compliance as an issue of power and contemplate how influencer intermediaries can capitalize on this power (i.e., capital) to encourage voluntary disclosure among influencers and brand clients.

Managerial Implications

The managerial implications of this research are threefold. First, because influencer marketing is still an emergent area of strategic communications at the corporate level (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019), our study highlights the impact an actively engaged influencer relations professional can have on disclosure and regulatory compliance. This is evidenced by the discovery that the legal contracting, content vetting and preapproval (formal and informal), and mentorship and knowledge transfer (to influencers and peers) phases of an influencer marketing campaign provide influencer intermediaries an opportunity to normalize the standard of disclosure at the beginning of a campaign and emphasize the shared responsibility and legal basis of sponsorship disclosure. Moreover, through the mechanisms of legal contracts and SOWs, content vetting, and knowledge transfer, influencer intermediaries have the opportunity to close any compliance knowledge gaps among clients and influencers.

Second, although the influence of intermediaries is often debated and sometimes underestimated (Nixon and Gay 2002; Moor 2008), our research finds that influencer intermediaries have access to forms of social (e.g., as trusted “middlemen” between influencers and brands), cultural (e.g., as thought leaders and compliance advisers), and technical (e.g., as holders of uncommon industry competencies) expertise that can position them as trustworthy advisers on industry best practices and mentors who can set high compliance standards for influencer relations specialists–in–training at the start of their careers or for their colleagues through peer-to-peer mentorship.

Third, as both a managerial and a scholarly contribution, the research offers industry-led solutions to reduce noncompliant disclosure practices that infringe on applicable laws and pose consumer protection concerns for formal regulators. These solutions amplify the voices and lived experiences of influencer intermediary professionals—a perspective of advertising and influencer marketing research that has been greatly understudied (Childers, Lemon, and Hoy 2019; Lou and Jin 2021).

Limitations and Future Research

As is typical of any study, this research has some limitations. Although extant literature on ideal sample pools for qualitative interviews reveals that a sample of 10 to 40 participants is a reasonable number to achieve adequate data saturation (Guest, Bunce, and Johnson 2006; Hagaman and Wutich 2017; Hansen and Machin 2019), a larger sample would generate more intermediary contributions that could, in turn, be extrapolated to a larger group of relevant industry professionals. Juxtaposing the qualitative findings against an additional engagement with influencer intermediaries through more semistructured interviews or focus groups would help assess whether our findings are consistent across a larger sample of influencer relations professionals.

In addition, due to the small sample size, our findings may not be generalizable to other markets or legal jurisdictions. The generalizability of qualitative inquiry is limited due to the subjectivity of the data collected. However, because of the exploratory nature of the research methodology, external generalizability was not a core objective of this work. The research findings are useful for exploratory purposes and can be used as a basis for subsequent quantitative or qualitative research (Clow and James 2014). Our goal was to ensure the validity and reliability of our research method and analysis within the Canadian context. We aim to rely on the findings of this research as a foundation for future research.

The experiences of influencers and brand clients are absent from the current work, yet they are an integral part of the research because their commercial relationship is what necessitates the involvement of influencer relations professionals and confers the legal duty to disclose on both sides of a collaboration. Allowing influencers and brand representatives to participate in future research through surveys, interviews, or focus groups would provide a more holistic understanding of why compliant and upfront disclosure is such a challenging area of influencer marketing–related work. Moreover, future research can explore in greater depth the disclosure challenges posed by ephemeral and short-form video formats that have gained popularity on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok.

Ethical Approval

Ethical approval was granted on December 8, 2020, by the Research Ethics Board at Toronto Metropolitan University (REB 2020-406).

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Ted Rogers School of Management Research Advancement Grant (PI: Jacobson).