International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

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International Journal of Information Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijinfomgt

Research Article

Social media influencers’ narrative strategies to create eWOM: A

theoretical contribution
Shuang Zhou a, 1, *, Liz Barnes b, Helen McCormick b, Marta Blazquez Cano a
a
Department of Materials, The University of Manchester, Sackville Street Building, Manchester, M1 3BB, UK
b
Manchester Fashion Institute, Manchester Metropolitan University, Righton Building, Cavendish Street, Manchester, M15 6BG, UK

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Social media influencers (SMIs) as significant stakeholders are increasingly collaborating with brands to cultivate
Social media influencers marketing campaigns. However, literature concerning the narrative strategies used by SMIs to create electronic
eWOM word-of-mouth (eWOM) to introduce brands and products remains under-theorised. This research takes a
Narrative strategy
theoretical perspective of marketing communication, advances the eWOM theory to develop SMIs’ eWOM model
Social media marketing
as the theoretical lens, and adopts semiotic and rhetorical approaches to identify SMIs’ narrative strategies to
Marketing communication
create eWOM to promote brands and products to consumers. By conducting a netnographic study to observe
fashion bloggers’ messages concerning Western luxury brands on Chinese social media, this research identified
six distinct narrative strategies that are different in linking the purpose of eWOM, assigning brands with roles in
eWOM, representing the meanings associated with brands, and using modes of persuasion to convince consumers
to accept these meanings. This research also proposes a model to illustrate the structure of SMIs’ narrative
strategies. The results of this research have implications for the advancement of social media marketing theories
and provide a foundation for future development of knowledge regarding SMIs’ narrative strategies.

1. Introduction
Social media offers a multidirectional communication pattern and
multidimensional transmission of information, facilitating consumer
engagement in brand-related electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) (Lin &
Wang, 2020). As the evolved form of traditional face-to-face word-of-­
mouth (WOM), eWOM becomes one of the most significant touchpoints
in shaping and affecting consumer attitudes and purchase behaviours,
encouraging consumers to be web-fortified decision-makers (Ahmad &
Laroche, 2017; Dwivedi et al., 2020). Marketers have recognised eWOM
as an integral and critical part of the marketing communication mix and
have developed a range of eWOM marketing strategies, such as referral
programmes, viral marketing and seeding campaigns (Dost, Phieler,
Haenlein, & Libai, 2019; Shiau, Dwivedi, & Lai, 2018). These strategies
lead to the advance of marketing communications by empowering
consumers to be content contributors and raising awareness about cul­
tural and societal norms (Dwivedi et al., 2020). In particular, marketers
are increasingly interested in incorporating social media influencers
(SMIs) in their eWOM marketing strategies (Sundermann & Raabe,
2019).
SMIs are characterised by attractiveness, credibility, and expertise,
and their eWOM is perceived as authentic and trustworthy (Uzunoğlu &
Misci Kip, 2014). They could rapidly reach a large and diverse set of
consumers and effectively persuade consumers over traditional adver­
tising campaigns (Jiménez-Castillo & Sánchez-Fernández, 2019). The
benefit from SMIs’ characteristics and capabilities makes them effective
spokespersons for brands and companies (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019).
Marketers are taking these advantages and increasing investments in
influencer marketing, to complement traditional marketing communi­
cation to promote SMI generated content to SMIs’ followers and target
consumers (Audrezet, De Kerviler, & Moulard, 2020). The global in­
vestments in influencer marketing are estimated to reach $15 billion by
2022 (Business Insider Intelligence, 2019). SMIs are provided with
samples of new products or paid to disseminate branded eWOM to
engage and maintain close relationships with customers (Evans, Phua,
Lim, & Jun, 2017), improve brand image and value (Casaló, Flavián, &
Ibáñez-Sánchez, 2020; Dost et al., 2019), increase brand awareness and
social buzz around brands (Kim & Kim, 2020), and persuade consumers

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: amysh.zhou@polyu.edu.hk (S. Zhou), l.barnes@mmu.ac.uk (L. Barnes), H.McCormick@mmu.ac.uk (H. McCormick), marta.blazquezcano@
manchester.ac.uk (M. Blazquez Cano).
1
Present address: Institute of Textiles and Clothing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2020.102293
Received 15 October 2019; Received in revised form 24 November 2020; Accepted 24 November 2020
Available online 24 December 2020
0268-4012/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
S. Zhou et al.
to buy the endorsed products (Lou & Yuan, 2019).
eWOM content creation by SMIs contributes to 90 per cent of influ­
encer marketing impact and thus is more significant than eWOM dis­
tribution (eMarketer, 2017; Ge & Gretzel, 2018). The success of
influencer marketing depends on how SMIs express the eWOM to in­
crease its credibility, attractiveness, and usefulness. In recent years,
reusing and redistributing SMIs created content after an influencer
marketing campaign is prioritised by marketers to obtain continuous
value and improve performance of other marketing communication
channels (Influencer Intelligence, 2019; Linqia, 2017, 2020). Thus,
leveraging SMIs in marketing communication campaigns can also be a
strategic content investment (Linqia, 2020). However, a risk associated
with sponsoring SMIs is that marketers could lose control over SMIs’
eWOM content (Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). Their negative opinions,
thoughts, and feelings about the endorsed brand, as well as inappro­
priate narrative styles, could damage the brand image (Walden, Bortree,
& DiStaso, 2015). Although a global survey by Rakuten Marketing
(2019) shows that 61 per cent of marketers believe in SMIs’ openness on
the creation of content and acceptance of brands’ suggestions, SMIs
maintaining editorial independence in relation to the creation of
authentic content to engage consumers is important (Linqia, 2017;
Rakuten Marketing, 2019). Marketers must look beyond measures of
eWOM frequency or valence to understand how SMIs’ eWOM is framed,
considering influences from the socio-cultural settings and consumers’
demands, preferences, and expectations in the target market. Accord­
ingly, this study intends to explore the narrative strategies used by SMIs
to create eWOM to provide insight into this area.
The concept ‘narrative strategy’ has been well studied and inter­
preted in marketing and consumer scenarios to understand the methods
of structuring narratives for marketing communication (Brechman &
Purvis, 2015) and illustrating consumption experiences (Shankar,
Elliott, & Goulding, 2001). However, the narrative strategies used by
SMIs are overlooked and underexplored in the marketing literature.
Prior research on SMIs’ narratives explored the behaviour patterns of
organising eWOM to legitimate recommendations, accumulate status
and followers, build personal brands, and create online communities.
Very few studies have explored SMIs’ narrative strategies to create
eWOM to communicate attributes and benefits of brands and products to
consumers (e.g. Kozinets, de Valck, Wojnicki, & Wilner, 2010; Kretz &
de Valck, 2010), highlighting the need for additional research on this
topic. In particular, research recently stresses the role stakeholders play
as ‘joint creators’ and moves the marketing literature towards a
multi-stakeholder co-creation perspective (Kazadi, Lievens, & Mahr,
2016). In this regard, further theoretical explanations on narrative
strategies used by SMIs, who are independent, third-party stakeholders,
are required to advance the literature on marketing communication and
eWOM theory, motivating the study undertaken in this area. Also, an
in-depth understanding of SMIs’ narrative strategies to create eWOM is
significant to extend the knowledge of SMIs, complementing the liter­
ature on SMIs’ eWOM content, which shows growth and advance in
recent literature, and enhance understanding about creation of
high-quality eWOM content for marketing communication (Voorveld,
2019).
The present study aims to address the above-mentioned knowledge
gaps. It identifies SMIs’ narrative strategies by taking a marketing
communication perspective, advancing the eWOM theory (Kozinets
et al., 2010) to develop SMIs’ eWOM model as the theoretical lens, and
adopting semiotic and rhetorical analysis. This study explores explicitly,
the narrative strategies used by Chinese SMIs to create eWOM relating to
Western luxury brands, holding great value for theory development and
real-life practice.
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International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
2. Theoretical foundation
2.1. SMIs, eWOM, and opinion leadership
The concept of SMIs can be discussed from the perspective of eWOM
and opinion leadership, helping to understand underlying mechanisms
that make them influential for consumers and appealing for marketing
communications (Casaló et al., 2020; Jiménez-Castillo & Sán­
chez-Fernández, 2019). eWOM is about any positive and negative
product and brand-related opinions and information created and spread
by potential, actual, and former consumers via the internet (Hen­
nig-Thurau, Gwinner, Walsh, & Gremler, 2004). Web 2.0 technology
provides a flexible interpersonal environment for eWOM communica­
tion to occur in various circumstances without the limits of time, ge­
ography, and familiarity (Cheung & Thadani, 2012). Through engaging
in eWOM communication, consumers can obtain information from a
broad and geographically dispersed group of other unknown consumers
who have experience with and knowledge of a certain product or brand.
Findings from empirical research demonstrate that eWOM could pro­
mote interpersonal influence, leading to changes in consumers’ feelings,
thoughts, attitudes, and behaviours (Chen, Teng, Yu, & Yu, 2016; Levy &
Gvili, 2015).
Opinion leadership refers to the tendency of a person to exert
interpersonal influence on other consumers’ attitudes and behaviours
(Shoham & Ruvio, 2008). The two-step flow theory (Katz & Lazarsfeld,
1955) signifies that opinion leaders mediate information diffusion from
mass media to the public. Extending this to eWOM, the opinion leaders
are highly motivated to interact with and influence their social networks
through information sharing behaviour (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019).
They are perceived by followers as experts in specific fields or on
particular topics, as authentic sources for information and recommen­
dations, and as references to guide opinions, attitudes, and behaviours
(Jiménez-Castillo & Sánchez-Fernández, 2019). SMIs take on the role of
opinion leaders and exhibit opinion leadership on social media by
spreading eWOM and building a dynamic relationship with consumers
(Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014).
SMIs are distinguished by the size of followers, such as micro-
influencers who have up to 10,000 followers and macro-influencers
whose follower count can reach 100,000 (Voorveld, 2019) or more.
There are also different types of SMIs studied in prior empirical research.
They are categorised by the social media platforms they use for eWOM
creation and distribution, such as bloggers (Schouten, Janssen, & Ver­
spaget, 2020), Instagrammers (De Veirman & Hudders, 2020), and
YouTubers (Sokolova & Kefi, 2020). SMIs are also recognised as content
creators with a status of ‘celebrity’ (Lou & Yuan, 2019), ‘micro-celebrity’
(Khamis, Ang, & Welling, 2017), or ‘non-traditional celebrity’ (Jimé­
nez-Castillo & Sánchez-Fernández, 2019). In comparison to ordinary
celebrities, SMIs are perceived by consumers as more approachable and
credible (Schouten et al., 2020), and more effective in influencing young
consumers’ brand attitudes and purchase behaviours in particular
(Djafarova & Rushworth, 2017).
2.2. Knowledge gaps in SMIs’ narrative strategies for creating eWOM
Recent efforts have been made to advance the knowledge about
SMIs’ eWOM from several perspectives and dimensions, such as SMIs’
strategies to create authentic content (Audrezet et al., 2020), sponsor­
ship disclosures in SMIs’ eWOM (De Veirman & Hudders, 2020), tax­
onomy and category of SMI’s eWOM content (Kulmala, Mesiranta, &
Tuominen, 2013), SMIs’ emoji rhetoric (Ge & Gretzel, 2018), and factors
that enhance or decrease the influence of SMIs’ eWOM on consumer
behaviour (Djafarova & Rushworth, 2017). However, an understanding
of SMIs’ narrative strategies for creating brand-related eWOM on social
media is still under developed, representing a gap in the social media
marketing literature (Alves, Fernandes, & Raposo, 2016; Dwivedi et al.,
2020). This study intends to fill this gap and adopts the definition given
S. Zhou et al. International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

Table 1
Gaps in the literature concerning SMIs’ narrative strategies to create eWOM.
Characteristics of narratives in eWOM
• Writing styles and language used in framing eWOM (e.g. Archak, Ghose, & Ipeirotis, 2011)
Existing literature • Affective content and linguistic style of eWOM (e.g. Ludwig et al., 2013)
• Methods to improve helpfulness of online reviews (e.g. Li & Zhan, 2011)
These studies mostly focus on characteristics of eWOM, such as the nouns used to express major features of products, adjectives used to express consumers’
Gap in the
evaluations of products, as well as the pronoun, verbs, conjunctions, and function words used to convey the content of eWOM. They neglect an in-depth
literature
exploration on specific strategies to structure eWOM to interpret the meanings of products and brands to consumers.
Rhetorical strategies used in eWOM
• Rhetorical strategies used by online communities to exert interpersonal influence (e.g. Scaraboto, Rossi, & Costa, 2012)
Existing literature • eWOM rhetorical methods used by consumers for seeking and giving advice (e.g. Toder-Alon, Brunel, & Fournier, 2014)
• SMIs’ persuasive attempts to initiate engagement through emojis (e.g. Ge & Gretzel, 2018)
Gap in the These studies focus on the rhetorical appeals of consumers’ and SMIs’ eWOM but do not demonstrate how the meanings of brands or products are communicated
literature and interpreted in eWOM.
Theoretical perspectives for exploring SIMs’ narrative strategies to create eWOM
Prior research has adopted the perspectives of legitimating expertise and reputation, traffic growth, followers accumulation, impression management,
Existing literature relationship building, and personal branding to investigate the strategies used by SMIs to create eWOM for self-presentation and communicating with consumers
(e.g. Delisle & Parmentier, 2016; Kretz & de Valck, 2010; Logan, Hamilton, & Hewer, 2013; Rocamora, 2011).
Gap in the These studies overlook a perspective of marketing communication that helps understand the narrative strategies used by SMIs to create eWOM to introduce and
literature recommend brands and products to consumers.
Gaps in key references
Key references 1. Kozinets et al. (2010)
This research builds on the network coproduction model to explore the narrative strategies associated with consumer community-oriented eWOM marketing. The
Existing literature researchers observed an online seeding campaign about a new technology device to explore the narrative strategies used by prominent bloggers involved in online
communities. This research contributes to the understanding of networked co-production of narratives for social media marketing.
1 The narrative strategies used by SMIs who are independent third-party endorsers.
2 An advance of the network coproduction model to underpin the exploration of SMIs’ narrative strategies.
Gap in the 3 The perspective, circumstance, and context of identifying narrative strategies to create eWOM in terms of:
literature a) Spontaneous narrative strategies used by bloggers for creating eWOM regardless of a seeding campaign;
b) Strategies to craft narratives to transfer brand meanings and to fulfil a persuasive purpose;
c) Strategies to express eWOM about other product categories rather than technology products.
Key references 2. Kretz and de Valck (2010)
This research explored spontaneous bloggers’ storytelling strategies along with using explicit and implicit self-brand association concerning fashion and luxury
Existing literature
brands and products in the Western context. It contributes to the literature on consumer-brand storytelling.
Gap in the 1 The viewpoint of bloggers as independent, third-party stakeholders rather than consumers.
literature 2 A perspective of marketing communication to explore bloggers’ narrative strategies.

by Zhou, Mccormick, Blazquez, and Barnes (2019, p. 198) on opinion
leaders’ narrative strategies “the methods they use language, tone, prac­
tices, signs, symbols, and substance to introduce brands and products in
creating eWOM messages, with the association of their physical identities,
inner thoughts and feelings, ideas, cultural backgrounds, economic and social
positions, and social roles”.
Previous work concerning narrative strategies used for framing
eWOM could be classified into three categories: characteristics of nar­
ratives in eWOM, rhetorical strategies used in eWOM, and SMIs’
narrative strategies. Table 1 shows a summary of references pertinent to
this research to highlight the most closely related previous research on
the topic of SMIs’ narrative strategies and the gaps identified in these
studies. The discussion of these gaps reflects the necessity to conduct
further in-depth exploration of narrative strategies to structure eWOM to
interpret the meanings of products and brands and to exert interpersonal
influence on consumption choices and decisions.
Two studies by Kozinets et al. (2010) and Kretz and de Valck (2010)
have shed light on SMIs’ narrative strategies. The study by Kozinets et al.
(2010) takes a viewpoint of consumer community based eWOM mar­
keting on exploring bloggers’ narrative strategies. Their investigation
assumes that bloggers play a dual role of consumer-marketer in the
networked coproduction of marketing-related communication. Kretz
and de Valck (2010) adopted a consumer-brand storytelling perspective
to explore the methods used by fashion bloggers to generate personal
branded narratives. However, these two studies fail to address the scant
knowledge of narrative strategies used by SMIs as an independent,
third-party stakeholder group that co-creates meanings and values with
consumers and collaborates with brands for influencer marketing
promotions.
Because of the changing nature of marketing communications, re­
searchers are taking an interest in transforming a consumer coproduc­
tion perspective to a multi-stakeholder co-creation perspective to
explore how new groups of salient stakeholders are contributing to
marketing practices on social media (von Wallpach, Voyer, Kastanakis,
& Mühlbacher, 2017). SMIs can be amongst the key external stake­
holders outside the companies. As independent third-party endorsers
(Schouten et al., 2020), SMIs’ eWOM differs from ordinary consumers’
eWOM due to their intense purpose and power of interpersonal influence
and persuasion (Enke & Borchers, 2019; Sundermann & Raabe, 2019).
Their knowledge, skills, and familiarities of the brand meanings
collaboratively communicated in a marketplace, support their engage­
ment in co-creating and negotiating meanings and values of brands with
consumers (Jiménez-Castillo & Sánchez-Fernández, 2019; Lee & Wat­
kins, 2016) and facilitate their collaboration with brands on sponsored
marketing communication to represent a crossover from advertising into
public relations (Jin & Muqaddam, 2019; Kim & Kim, 2020; Uzunoğlu &
Misci Kip, 2014). The research in this paper takes this viewpoint to
explore SMIs’ narrative strategies to address the gap in the literature. A
theoretical model about SMIs’ eWOM (Fig. 1) is developed later, to move
the network coproduction model adopted by Kozinets et al. (2010)
forward to advance the eWOM theory (Kozinets et al., 2010) and un­
derpin the research.
There are also other scopes to extend the literature on SMIs’ narra­
tive strategies. Kozinets et al. (2010) observed a community-based
seeding campaign to explore the strategies used by bloggers for net­
worked coproduction of narratives. The spontaneous narrative strate­
gies used to create eWOM in a naturalistic context are also worthy for
exploration, as put forwarded by Kretz and de Valck (2010). Influencer
marketing can be considered a form of product placement or brand
endorsement (Audrezet et al., 2020). Indeed, brands have increasingly
recognised the significance of building long-term partnerships with SMIs
and shifting one-off, tactical marketing campaigns to an ongoing
approach to influencer marketing (Influencer Intelligence, 2019; Uzu­
noğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). It is necessary to understand the narrative
strategies used by SMIs in a long-standing, habitual way rather than
merely in a way pertaining only to a particular campaign or event. Thus,

3
S. Zhou et al.
Fig. 1. SMIs’ eWOM model.
to specify the circumstances of using narrative strategies for eWOM
creation, the current research explores SMIs’ narrative strategies to
create both non-sponsored and sponsored eWOM over the long-term.
The perspective and context of exploring bloggers’ narrative strate­
gies need to be reconsidered. The study by Kozinets et al. (2010) pro­
vides understanding on bloggers’ communication strategies in aspects of
character narratives, reveal of their participation in promotional cam­
paigns in eWOM messages, interaction and relationship with other
community members, and response to commercial-communal tension
arising from bloggers’ conflict of interest. Through adopting a visual and
textual semiotic analysis in a netnographic study and subsequent her­
meneutic interviews, the study by Kretz and de Valck (2010) shows that
fashion bloggers make self-presentation through combinations of
explicit and implicit mention of products and brands in visual and tex­
tual forms. They stated that fashion bloggers’ use of explicit and implicit
ways to present and mention products and brands is dependent upon
communal norms among consumers, characters bloggers wish to
construct, brand stories or myths bloggers want to talk about, and aes­
thetics of blogs. However, the findings of these two studies do not offer
an understanding on narrative strategies used for interpreting and
transferring brand meanings and persuading adoption of these brand
meanings, which represent a gap of employing a marketing communi­
cation perspective for exploration on SMIs’ narrative strategies.
SMIs’ eWOM is infused with their reputation and reliability and
contains consumption or branded narratives, which can help build
personal identities as well as cultivate consumer culture and consum­
erist values (Kozinets et al., 2010; Kretz & de Valck, 2010). To portray
the roles of opinion leaders concerning brand consumption on social
media, SMIs need elaborate strategies of manipulating languages, signs,
and symbols that stand for meanings of brands and products and crafting
statements to interpret these meanings. In particular, given the wide­
spread adoption and integration of influencer marketing in the mar­
keting communication mix (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019), SMIs are
assumed to make socio-cultural transformations of brand meanings and
values to local consumer needs and preferences in a marketplace
(Kozinets et al., 2010). Thus, SMIs’ eWOM should be framed in a way
that captures the meaning of the brands, adapts to local markets while
maintaining a consistent sense of brand identity, and fulfils the purposes
of persuasion towards consumption of brands. Taking a marketing
communication perspective to explore SMIs’ narrative strategies could
be helpful to understand how SMIs’ eWOM is structured to interpret
brand meanings to conform to socio-cultural norms and meet con­
sumers’ needs and expectations.
The scopes mentioned above render the current research conducted
to obtain an understanding of SMIs’ narrative strategies to fulfil the
knowledge gaps. The goal of the current research is to answer the
following three questions:
RQ: What are the narrative strategies used by SMIs to create eWOM
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International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
to introduce brands or products to consumers?
SubRQ1: What kind of meanings associated with brands or products
do SMIs attempt to interpret and express to consumers?
SubRQ2: How do SMIs persuade consumers to accept these
meanings?
2.3. Theoretical lens and approach for identifying SMIs’ narrative
strategies
The perspective of marketing communication, which was rarely
adopted by prior studies, could be necessary and valuable for identifying
SMIs’ narrative strategies, as the creation of SMIs’ eWOM plays a sig­
nificant role in influencer marketing (Ge & Gretzel, 2018). The evolution
of eWOM theory was summarised and illustrated by Kozinets et al.
(2010) using three models that currently coexist in practice. These
models illustrate three approaches to WOM or eWOM, which can either
occur spontaneously without marketers’ influences or be cultivated
under the indirect and direct influence from marketers. First, the organic
interconsumer influence model shows naturally occurring interpersonal
communication between two consumers to share brand and product
related marketing messages and meanings. Second, the linear marketer
influence model especially emphasises influential consumers, who are
viewed as potential opinion leaders. It illustrates that marketers use
traditional means like advertising and promotions to encourage and
indirectly influence these opinion leaders to share marketing messages
and meanings with other consumers. Third, the network coproduction
model recognises the impact of the internet on communications, adopts
the viewpoint of consumers as active coproducers of brand meanings,
and considers the importance of social networks and online commu­
nities in marketing practice. It elucidates that marketers directly manage
eWOM activities allowed by the internet and use one-to-one seeding
activities to target, influence, and invite consumers to transmit mar­
keting messages to others, resulting in the exchange of marketing mes­
sages among consumers (Holt, 2002; Kozinets et al., 2010). However,
these three models fail to underpin the current study that focuses on
SMIs, indicating a necessity to advance the eWOM theory, which is
previously dominated by the marketer and consumer emphasis.
Based on literature review, this study develops the SMIs’ eWOM
model (Fig. 1) to illustrate the current knowledge in relation to SMIs’
eWOM for marketing communication and provides a different perspec­
tive and direction to the eWOM theory. This model specifies three ap­
proaches to SMIs’ eWOM to spread brand or product related information
to consumers. The first approach is about SMIs’ eWOM being self-
motivated and created without marketers’ influence (Kulmala et al.,
2013). This approach renders SMIs’ editorial independence and freedom
over the use of narrative strategies to create eWOM. The second
approach concerns SMIs’ eWOM created under a low level of
S. Zhou et al.
marketer-controlled buzz marketing activities (Siefert et al., 2009;
Thomas, 2004) and motivated by topic interests and potential of
increasing social capital and blog traffic (Delisle & Parmentier, 2016) to
give their stories about brands and products. In this way, narrative
strategies offer opportunities for brands to define the topic and content
of ‘buzz’ to increase control over the content posted by those SMIs who
do not accept payment and seek to maintain full independence to pub­
lish their own views (Walden et al., 2015). Here, SMIs have the freedom
to create their voluntary content, but the topic of their content is
restricted by the buzz marketing activity. The third approach concerns
SMIs’ eWOM created under a high level of marketer-controlled influ­
encer marketing (Ge & Gretzel, 2018) and motivated by material
compensation (Audrezet et al., 2020). Brands can engage paid SMIs in
influencer marketing activities and agree with them to use narrative
strategies as guidelines to create positive eWOM messages.
This model emphasises the vital role of SMIs’ narrative strategies in
developing marketing campaigns, and specifically in transferring brand
messages and meanings to consumers, which can influence consumers’
attitudes and behaviours. It also illustrates the transmission of brand-
related information in a bidirectional way between eWOM contributor
(SMIs) and eWOM audience (consumers) (Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014)
rather than a unidirectional way from eWOM contributor to eWOM
audience, as shown in the network coproduction model (Kozinets et al.,
2010). This model thus represents the notion of multi-stakeholder
co-creation in the marketing literature (Kazadi et al., 2016). This
model is adopted as the theoretical lens through which to evaluate the
above-mentioned research gaps and research questions concerning
SMIs’ narrative strategies, thereby underpinning the use of a marketing
communication perspective and the exploration of narrative strategies
habitually used by SMIs to create both sponsored and non-sponsored
eWOM.
Moreover, SMIs’ eWOM is expected to persuade and convince con­
sumers’ product adoption and influence their consumption behaviours
(Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). SMIs’ eWOM thus should involve brand
and product related values and meanings as well as persuasive appeals
to increase the potential of influencing consumers’ attitudes and be­
haviours. Accordingly, adoption of semiotic and rhetorical analysis
empowers this research to obtain a comprehensive understating of SMIs’
narrative strategies (Fig. 2), such as what kinds of brand meanings are
mentioned in their eWOM and how they persuade consumers to believe
in these meanings and adopt them in their personal lives. This design
enables this study to contribute to the knowledge about approaches to
investigate SMIs’ narrative strategies because previous relevant studies
have not used a combination of semiotic analysis and rhetorical analysis,
as presented in Fig. 2.
Fig. 2. Bridging gaps in the approach to investigate SMIs’ narrative strategies
(Bettany, 2007; Grayson & Shulman, 2000; Holt, 2004; Larraufie and Kour­
doughli, 2014; Oswald, 2012; Woodside, Sood, & Miller, 2008).
5
International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
3. Research methodology
3.1. Context
The purpose of this research is to identify SMIs’ narrative strategies
to create eWOM to introduce and recommend brands and products to
consumers. A proliferation of collaborations between SMIs and Western
luxury brands in emerging markets, such as China (Exane BNP Paribas,
2017), provides vast scope for studying SMIs’ narrative strategies to
create eWOM. Luxury brands serve more symbolic needs for consumers,
and brand meanings are increasingly co-created by consumers (Seo &
Buchanan-Oliver, 2019). China’s market has a substantial consumer
base for Western luxury brands who rely on social media for brand
related information to make purchase decisions (Bain & Company,
2017, 2018). The cultural context in China and the unique characteris­
tics of Chinese luxury consumers are different from counterparts in
Western markets (Zhang & Kim, 2013), raising difficulties for Western
luxury brands targeting Chinese consumers. Collaborating with Chinese
SMIs, who are knowledgeable about Western luxury brands and
acquainted with characteristics of Chinese consumers as well as adopt
the local cultural values and social norms, can be an effective strategy to
overcome challenges to penetrate China’s market. Restrictions on
Western social media platforms (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and
Instagram) in China (Chen & Reese, 2015, p.4) leads to a ‘digital
deprivation’ (Dey, Yen, & Samuel, 2020) that shows the limit in Chinese
consumers’ access to the broader ‘digital consumer culture’. Therefore,
Chinese SMIs precisely tailor their eWOM to Chinese consumers’ needs
and values. The SMIs’ narrative strategies observed in the Western
context cannot be generalisable to the Chinese context. These factors
clarify the necessity and value to conduct this research in a Chinese
context.
3.2. Data
This research carried out netnography in the form of non-participant
observation on three months of messages created by China’s Top 10
fashion bloggers (Exane BNP Paribas, 2017) on Weibo and WeChat,
which are the most popular and premier platforms for Chinese con­
sumers obtaining information concerning luxury brands (Bain & Com­
pany, 2017). These bloggers consist of seven males and three females
who have a considerable number of followers, have been active in social
media for several years, and have significant influences on consumers’
preferences, attitudes, and perceptions towards luxury fashion brands
(Exane BNP Paribas, 2017). The non-participant observation allowed
this study to identify the narrative strategies used by bloggers to spon­
taneously create messages in habitual ways and natural surroundings,
avoiding the problems caused by the presence of researchers. The ten
bloggers’ messages contain rich textual and visual narratives for analysis
and interpretation. The criterion for selecting appropriate messages for
observation looked at whether bloggers’ messages are relevant to luxury
fashion products, including product categories of ready to wear, leather
goods, shoes, fine jewellery, watches, and accessories. A total of 1007
postings, including 913,816 words and a large additional amount of
visual and audiovisual data, were directly downloaded or copied and
pasted into files. The amount and time-scale of data collected in previous
similar eWOM studies using a netnography method (e.g. Kretz & de
Valck, 2010; Kozinets et al., 2010; Kulmala et al., 2013) were referred as
guidance for determining the counterparts in this research. Further­
more, the ten bloggers’ postings continued to be observed for a period
after data collection to ensure that no new findings of bloggers’ narra­
tive strategies emerged.
3.3. Data coding and analysis
In this research, the topics discussed in SMIs’ eWOM, cultural and
social meanings of products and brands, rhetorical forms of SMIs’
S. Zhou et al.
Fig. 3. Data coding and analysis processes.
statements, and SMIs’ interactive actions with message readers are
essential elements for constructing answers to the research questions. To
capture these elements from data and categorise and conceptualise them
into knowledge, the data were coded and analysed through three pro­
cesses (Fig. 3).
A first cycle coding process using an open coding method was con­
ducted to label the data into codes that indicate the meanings of the
content of data, and a transitional procedure was developed to catego­
rise these codes based on thematic similarity. The code categories and
codes developed in this process are comprehensive, ranging from con­
tent formats, topics in aspects of product-oriented topics, brand-oriented
topics, SMIs-oriented topics, and consumer-oriented topics, SMIs’
interactivity with followers, argument framing, to statement style, form,
and function.
A second cycle coding process involves axial coding and theoretical
coding. Axial coding was used to make links and find relationships be­
tween the code categories developed from the first cycle coding process.
Theoretical coding was used to sort and develop core categories by
adopting semiotic analysis and rhetorical analysis and referencing with
theories from literature to guide analysis. The semiotic analysis aims to
identify brands meanings interpreted in SMIs’ eWOM. This analytical
process adopted the theory of structural semiotics (Saussure, 1983),
which is grounded in structural linguistics and widely used in marketing
semiotic research (Oswald, 2015). The essential notion of this theory is
signs, which stand for things, ideas, and concepts and take a range of
different forms, such as spoken words, written words, vocal tones, im­
ages, gestures, and objects (Eco, 1976, p.7). Saussure (1983) defined a
sign as being made up by a signifier and a signified. The signifier is the
physical form of the sign, like words on a page, sounds, and images,
while the signified refers to the meanings expressed by the sign. The
dialectical relation of the signifier and the signified is called significa­
tion. Two analytical terms are used for discerning meanings of a sign:
denotation and connotation. Denotation describes the literal, obvious,
or common-sense meaning of a sign from a culturally well-adjusted
perspective (Chandler, 2007, p.137). Connotation refers to the ideo­
logical and emotional types of sociocultural and individual associations
that are connected to a sign. These associations are typically derived
from cultural conventions and socially accepted norms. The main code
categories developed in this analytical process are original meanings
created by marketers, which are shown in the marketing messages
interpreted in bloggers’ eWOM, meanings derived from social groups,
which are identified in group’s opinions, beliefs, and advice schemes
elucidated by bloggers, and meanings relevant to individuals, such as
designers, celebrities, SMIs, and consumers.
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International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
The rhetorical analysis seeks to understand the modes of persuasion
used by SMIs to convince consumers to believe in the meanings given to
brands and products in the context of eWOM. This analytical process was
grounded in Aristotle’s theory about three classical rhetorical forms of
persuasive appeal: ethos, pathos, and logos (Aristotle, 2007, p. 14),
which render a text to be powerful to persuade the target readers and
have been adopted in eWOM studies (Hamilton, Vohs, & McGill, 2014).
Ethos concerns how communicators convince their trustworthiness and
credibility to leverage authority. Pathos signifies the emotional appeals
of communicators and explains their intention to get readers emotion­
ally involved in the process of communication. Logos refers to the logical
arguments in the context of communication. After the theoretical cod­
ing, which involves a combination of semiotic and rhetorical analysis,
the final integrated code categories are the central theoretical categories
that indicate the primary concern of this research and inform the theory
building phase.
More specifically, Fig. 4 shows three main steps of analysing a piece
of data from the first cycle coding, semiotic and rhetorical analysis, to
the final theory construction. For example, a fashion bloggers’ message
concerning a leather bag was firstly analysed via applying open coding.
This piece of data was labelled with codes that indicate the topic, pur­
pose, and meanings of content. Then it was analysed again by applying
semiotic analysis at the second step to explore the meanings of the
leather bag product mentioned in this message and the sources for these
meanings. Finally, it was analysed for the third time to implement
rhetorical analysis to explore the persuasive tactics for promoting the
adoption of these meanings. The rhetorical analysis aims to understand
the emphasis this message puts on the three persuasive appeals and
behaviours or activities that secure the effectiveness of this rhetorical
Fig. 4. The process to analyse a piece of data.
S. Zhou et al. International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

appeal. After these three steps, the overall codes labelled on this piece of factual account. As aforementioned, all bloggers’ messages were directly
data were linked, integrated, and recorded for the development of copied and pasted into word processing documents, assuring the accu­
central theoretical categories, which were used for theory building of racy and objectivity of the data gathered. Interpretive validity is the
SMIs’ narrative strategies. accurate description and interpretation of participants’ viewpoints,
meanings, and thoughts. It is achieved by taking a non-participant
observation on the naturally occurring bloggers’ messages without re­
3.4. Reliability and validity
searchers’ influences and interpreting and analysing the data without
bias or subjectivity. Theoretical validity refers to the ability of theoret­
The data were coded and analysed by a main coder, and the overall
ical explanations of data to clarify the phenomena under study, and is
data analysis process has three supervisors to guarantee the validity and
gained in this research through the establishment of concepts about
reliability of the results. Reliability in qualitative studies is ensured by
SMIs’ narrative strategies by using theory triangulation. Two methods,
consistency and stability of measurement throughout the research
semiotic analysis and rhetorical analysis, were adopted to understand
(Zikmund, 2000). In this research, consistency is achieved by coding,
and interpret the data from different perspectives and with links to
analysing, and labelling data as well as reporting findings with partic­
different theories.
ular reference to theories adopted in previous eWOM studies, including
the theory of structural semiotics (Saussure, 1983) adopted in research
4. Results
by Kucuk (2015) and Rossolatos (2018) and the Aristotle’s theory
(Aristotle, 2007, p.14) used by Hamilton et al. (2014). Adopting these
4.1. Formation of SMIs’ narrative strategy
two theories helps to enhance the consistency of measurement and
maintain coherency with prior work. Stability is ascertained as intra­
Before elaborating on the findings of narrative strategies, it is
coder reliability that the development of codes and code categories was
necessary to explain the key elements of SMIs’ narrative strategy. Data
checked more than once to ensure the overall data were coded in a
analysis and interpretation reveal that SMIs’ narrative strategy is
consistent manner.
composed of the brands’ meanings interpreted to consumers and the
Validity in dimensions of descriptive validity, interpretive validity,
methods to persuade consumers to accept these meanings. A conceptual
and theoretical validity is achieved in this research (Brewer, 2000;
model is developed based on the findings to illustrate the formation of
Maxwell, 1996). Descriptive validity is the accuracy in reporting the

Fig. 5. A theoretical model of the formation of SMIs’ narrative strategy.

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S. Zhou et al. International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

SMIs’ narrative strategy to create eWOM (Fig. 5). This model provides a
theoretical base and rationale for this research identifying and under­
standing SMIs’ narrative strategies.
4.1.1. Semiotic meanings of brands or products
In SMIs’ eWOM messages, a sign standing for a product or a brand
consists of a signifier that represents the sign in the form of text, image,
video, or sound and a signified that refers to the meaning conveyed by
the sign (Saussure, 1983). To introduce and recommend brands and
products through eWOM, SMIs use signs and symbols to signify and
convey the meanings of these brands and products to consumers. These
meanings thus serve as stimuli to attract attention, arouse interests, and
evoke desires to buy and use the recommended products. The upper half
of Fig. 5 shows three levels of meanings introduced and discussed in
SMIs’ eWOM, which were identified by using semiotic analysis in this
study. The theory of orders of signification (Chandler, 2007,
p.139–140), which is the key notion of semiotics, was adopted to
elucidate and interpret the identified meanings. The meaning inventors
that produce and assign the three levels of meanings to brands or
products, and examples of these meanings, are summarised and illus­
trated in Table 2.
The first order signification is the original meanings of a product or a
brand, which are company determined and used to build the product’s
brand identity and brand equity. This level of meanings is taken from
marketing communication messages to inform and impress consumers
about the characteristics, attributes, and values of a brand or product
(McCracken, 1986). They are related to a brand’s identity or DNA
(Roper, Caruana, Medway, & Murphy, 2013) that can position and
differentiate it in a crowded and competitive market. SMIs sometimes
introduce this level of meanings to consumers to improve consumers’
knowledge about the tangible and intangible attributes of luxury brands,
such as craftsmanship, aesthetics, heritage, brand history, quality, and
utilitarian values.
The other two levels of meanings are developed in different manners
with the first order signification. They are uncontrolled non-marketer
created meanings (Allen, Fournier, & Miller, 2008). Today, brand con­
sumption is influenced by dynamic socio-cultural developments and
diversity of social media platforms, which increase interaction among
consumers and facilitate the exchange of brand related information from
various sources. As motivated by exhibiting opinion leadership on brand
consumption on social media, SMIs have to capture and reflect these
factors in their eWOM to demonstrate their expertise and maximise the
potential for influencing consumer attitudes and behaviour. Therefore,
in SMIs’ eWOM, the roles in contributing to the other two levels of brand
meanings range from cultures, eWOM environments, social groups and
norms, to individuals, including SMIs, celebrities, and consumers.
The second order signification is social groups generated meanings,
which are derived from social communication and interaction among
consumers and influenced and regulated by cultural conventions and
group norms prevalent in a market and platforms for eWOM. This level
of meanings is similar to ‘social meanings’ discussed in the study by Seo
and Buchanan-Oliver (2019), which are context-specific and denote a
shared system of symbols that consumers may commonly use in
communicating and interpreting brands in a particular market. It is also
relevant to the ‘public meanings of possessions’ put forward by Richins
(1994) that signify the agreed-upon elements of an object’s meanings by
the general population or social subgroups. Similarly, the third order
signification is about the additional, connoted, symbolic meanings
attached to a brand in SMIs’ eWOM. However, compared with the sec­
ond order signification derived from local and conventional in­
terpretations of brand meanings, the third order signification is more
personalised and cultivated by individuals such as celebrities, con­
sumers, SMIs, models, and designers of brands. This level of meanings
contains idiosyncratic elements derived from personal values and
characteristics or personal experiences with brands or products. They
are related to the ‘personalised meanings’ summarised by Seo and
Buchanan-Oliver (2019) to represent the meanings interpreted and
customised by individual consumers according to their experience with
brands.
This study also found some similarities between the second and third
order significations. For example, a blogger’s message describes a dress
she purchased for a graduation ceremony while the public label this
product as befitting for solemn and dignified occasions. Except for her
personal attached meanings, the symbolic value of this dress for this
blogger may also contain elements of shared meaning by social groups,
such as the recognition that this dress is smart and formal. This finding
appears to support Richins’s (1994) suggestion that personal meanings
of possession may include elements of public meanings assigned to this
item, and the interpretation by Seo and Buchanan-Oliver (2019) that
personalised meanings are developed by people transforming and
interpreting the established and commonly agreed cultural meanings in
the context of their life themes and projects. Hence, with the introduc­
tion of original, socialised, and individualised meanings and infusion of
personal experience and professional interpretation into eWOM mes­
sages, the brand meanings discussed by SMIs seem to be much richer and
more varied than the predetermined meanings introduced in traditional
marketing communication messages.
4.1.2. Rhetorical tactics for persuasion
The bottom of Fig. 5 shows the other dimension of a SMIs’ narrative
strategy: the rhetorical tactics used to persuade consumers’ acceptance
and adoption of brand meanings. A range of rhetorical tactics used by

Table 2
Semiotic meanings of brands or products interpreted in SMIs’ eWOM.
Meaning inventors
Brand company or retailer
Examples
First order signification

• Unique selling proposition (e.g. “feminine and elegant”);

• Physical propertie (e.g. “the fabric is rain-proof, breathable and lightweight”)
Meaning inventors
Cultural conventions and social norms shared by target markets or prevalent on social media platforms for spreading eWOM
Examples
Second order signification

• Symbolic values (e.g. “must-have items for stylish men”);

• Discourses from popular culture (e.g. “faddish”, “It bags”)
Meaning inventors
Individuals, such as celebrities, SMIs, or consumers
Examples
Third order signification

• Personal consumption experience (e.g. “he sent it to me on Valentine’s Day”, “my first luxury bag”);
• Emotional expression about values, attitudes, and beliefs (e.g. “the one I want most”, “I have a growing fancy in it”, “super cost-effective”)

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S. Zhou et al. International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

Table 3 professional knowledge to demonstrate SMIs’ authority and credibility.

Rhetorical tactics used by SMIs for persuasion. It was also identified in a prior study (Scaraboto et al., 2012) that
Logos Ethos Pathos investigated the rhetorical strategies used for interpersonal influence in
online communities. However, the context of using claiming expertise
Attention- Attract consumers’ Build source
attracting attention to attractiveness identified in this research is different from that identified in the prior
arguments study. This research found that claiming expertise is used by the SMIs
Claiming Logical arguments to Build source who are already famous for their expertise and have a large number of
expertise highlight meanings or authority and followers. They use this tactic to convince expertise and display au­
reasons credibility
Meaningfulness Intensify the encoding Build source
thority on particular brands or product categories consumption. In the
penetration of attractiveness prior study, claiming expertise was observed as being used by online
arguments community members who are actively answering questions posted to the
Mood affecting Induce affective community to ascertain their expertise on a topic (Scaraboto et al.,
states in
2012). Meaningfulness concerns connecting brand values with in­
consumers
Interactivity Increase consumer dividuals’ lives and well being or using archetypes to make messages
seeking engagement in resonate with consumers on a deeper level. It is identified by referring to
eWOM the ‘meaningfulness explanations’ theory described by McGuire (2000),
Collaboration Link arguments with Enhance which is about the application of knowledge structures in a compre­
consumer-generated consumer
contents to increase emotional
hension process to evoke message readers’ subjective or objective cor­
argument credibility involvement in respondence. Sometimes, SMIs use this means to arouse consumers’
eWOM empathy about how to use a particular brand or product for individual
identity construction projects.
Mood affecting emphasises pathos and is adopted by SMIs to induce
SMIs was identified (Table 3), including attention attracting, claiming
consumers’ positive emotional states when they are reading messages.
expertise, mood affecting, meaningfulness, interactivity seeking, and
These emotional states may influence how consumers process message
collaboration.
content and their subsequent decision-making and behaviour. Inter­
These tactics were defined with reference to the results of prior
activity seeking and collaboration are used to increase interaction be­
research on rhetorical tactics used by consumers in eWOM communi­
tween SMIs and consumers to enhance eWOM impact. The adoption of
cation (Scaraboto et al., 2012; Toder-Alon et al., 2014). These six
these two rhetoric tactics is influenced by the external environment of
rhetorical tactics place different levels of emphasis on three persuasive
eWOM communication and the format of interaction and communica­
appeals, which respectively stand for building message senders’ credi­
tion between SMIs and consumers. Interactivity seeking highlights
bility or attractiveness (ethos), arousing message readers’ emotional
pathos and is used by SMIs to interact with consumers for creation of
responses (pathos), and emphasising logical arguments (logos). The
eWOM messages to enhance consumers’ engagement in eWOM
adoption of these persuasive appeals could be influenced by purposes of
communication. For instance, consumers sometimes are invited by SMIs
eWOM, SMIs’ preferences, and eWOM environments.
to provide ideas or suggestions on the topics of SMIs’ messages or vote
Attention-attracting, claiming expertise, and meaningfulness
for the most liked topics before message creation. Collaboration focuses
emphasise logos and ethos. Attention-attracting aims to grab consumers’
on logos and pathos and aims to improve the credibility of SMIs’ eWOM
attention by highlighting arguments or SMIs’ attractiveness. SMIs who
by incorporating consumer-generated content. It refers to SMIs inviting
intend to arouse the interests and attention of consumers or social media
consumers to send them statements about personal experience with
users always adopt this tactic. They publish eye-catching content or
brands and then filtering, selecting, and presenting these statements in
images or make their messages relevant to the hottest topics or trends on
eWOM messages. By embracing consumer-produced meanings of brands
social media. Claiming expertise is about using logical arguments and

Table 4
Frequency and contexts of SMIs’ adoption of six narrative strategies.
Narrative Strategies Frequency of Use (data including 1007 postings) Examples of Usage Context

Advising 155 • Response to consumers’ inquires

• Joining in the discussion on trending topics on social media
• New product promotion
• SMIs’ or followers’ advice on solutions to problems and alternative selection
Enthusing 67 • New product promotion
• Sensing, reporting, or predicting trends in the market
Educating 289 • New product launch event
• SMIs meeting with followers
• New product promotion
• SMIs’ knowledge-sharing
Appraising 192 • New product promotion
• SMIs meeting with followers
• Celebrity interviews
• SMIs’ or followers’ experience-sharing
• Product trend analysis
Amusing 48 • New product launch event
• Joining in the discussion on trending topics on social media
• Celebrity style analysis
Assembling 256 • New product launch event
• Celebrity endorsement
• Celebrity interviews
• SMIs’ “Outfit of the day”
• Celebrity style news

9
S. Zhou et al.
in SMIs’ eWOM, this tactic could also be useful for enhancing con­
sumers’ emotional involvement and leveraging peer group influences.
The next session will present the identified SMIs’ narrative strategies.
4.2. SMIs’ narrative strategies to create eWOM
Six SMIs’ narrative strategies were identified by understanding the
purpose of SMIs’ messages and exploring the connection between the
results of semiotic analysis and rhetorical analysis. These narrative
strategies are used by SMIs to create eWOM in textual and visual formats
to introduce the meanings assigned to brands and products and persuade
consumers to adopt these meanings. They are used in different contexts,
such as marketing campaigns and events, interactions between SMIs and
consumers, and stages of a product life cycle, as shown in Table 4.
4.2.1. Advising
Because SMIs are knowledgeable in specific fields or on particular
topics, their suggestions or advice are highly valued by consumers. They
use the advising strategy to communicate the socially shared brand
meanings or individualised meanings developed by themselves, celeb­
rities, or consumers to advise and authorise the use of particular brands
or products to solve issues faced by consumers:
“Some enthusiastic readers recently asked me a question: how to deal
with a round, chubby face? I thought…the best solution is choosing
appropriate eyeglasses! Apart from the benefit of making your face look
slimmer and smaller, it can also be used as the best item to highlight your
outfit when you go out without makeup…today I will introduce the four
most stylish glasses to you…Miu Miu…Burberry…” (SMI 10, 4.17.w);
“Messages from readers: New bags to refresh your look this summer.
They stated that the most wanted new bag is a small white bag~
Reader A: This Dior bag with white patent leather…makes me feel cool
and refreshed. I bought it in Sydney, Australia, at the price of AU$ 5,000
that equals RMB 25,000. The white colour is also suitable for large bags.
Reader B: I purchased it (a Gucci bag) in Hokkaido at quite a high price of
RMB 13,000. This bag can be easily matched. Matching it with a white t-
shirt and jeans in summer can create a refreshing and comfortable
outlook.” (SMI 1, 5.26).
The quotes above are examples of SMIs’ eWOM using the advising
strategy. The problems discussed by SMIs may be ongoing with con­
sumers or potentially occur in the future. SMIs’ messages constructed
with the advising strategy often contain a detailed description of context
and problem along with solution opinions. To enhance eWOM persua­
siveness, SMIs strategically adopt four rhetorical tactics: claiming
expertise, attention attracting, interactivity seeking, and collaboration.
SMIs’ eWOM gives logical explanations on solutions and adopts a logos
appeal to emphasise brand meanings and an ethos appeal to convince
source knowledgeability to enhance the persuasive impact of eWOM.
Consumers’ attention is expected to be attracted by these logical argu­
ments, increasing the probability of SMIs’ eWOM being centrally, rather
than peripherally, processed (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986). Moreover, SMIs
take and gather the relevant consumption experiences from consumers,
thereby achieving interacting and collaborating with consumers on
framing eWOM. Their messages thus use a logos appeal to embrace
consumer-generated content to enhance argument credibility to in­
crease the likelihood of consumers accepting the claimed brand mean­
ings and a mode of pathos to make consumers feeling emotionally
involved in the eWOM.
4.2.2. Enthusing
SMIs use the enthusing strategy to frame messages to deliver
meanings derived from emotional aspiration of consumers’ peer or
reference groups toward particular brands or products. These brands
and products are considered as the objects of desire by these meaning
inventors:
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International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
“Kelly Himalaya, Himalaya Crocodile Leather Pattern
The ultimate handbag, coveted by many girls, the best bag in the world,
which is scarce and difficult to buy…
A portable Kelly, square and small, has become the utmost favourite
handbag of the rich girls.” (SMI 8, 3.8.w);
“At that time, Karlito was limited edition. It attracted many people’s
desires although it was not widely available…People who could own it
were famous fashion bloggers, supermodels, stars, etc…FENDI also
released accessory items for the ‘Karlito’ collection, which were sold out
immediately.” (SMI 10 3.6.w).
The purpose of this strategy might be using the means of utilitarian
interpersonal influence (Bearden, Netemeyer, & Teel, 1989) to operate a
process of compliance in which consumers endeavour to comply with
reference groups’ norms and values to gain rewards of being accepted by
reference groups or avert social exclusion that being rejected or feeling
shunned by reference groups. In the above quotations from data, the
norms and values come from the words “the best bag in the world, which is
scarce and difficult to buy”, “the utmost favourite handbag of the rich girls”,
“people who could own it were famous fashion bloggers, supermodels, stars”,
and “sold out immediately”. By using these kinds of words, SMIs’ eWOM
messages express a great fanship or worship of brands or products from
themselves or the potential reference group as perceived by consumers,
such as celebrities, models, brand communities, or subcultural tribes.
The rhetorical methods used by SMIs here are mood affecting and
attention attracting. Through facilitating consumers’ attention to, and
enthusiasm toward, the product, SMIs motivate consumers to adopt the
reference groups’ norms and values and cultivate a strong desire for
ownership of this product to catch up to or keep up with their reference
groups (Aaker, 1997; Bagozzi & Dholakia, 2006). This strategy could be
linked with the findings from the study by Kretz and de Valck (2010)
that interpret fashion bloggers’ behaviour of using overwhelmingly
enthusiastic and hysterical narratives to express their desire and
addiction to the recommended brands and products.
4.2.3. Educating
Sometimes SMIs take the role of a teacher and aim to encourage the
development of consumers’ knowledge, understanding, or aesthetic on
brands and products. Brands or products thus serve as teaching aids in
the process of knowledge education. By this means of educating, SMIs’
messages interpret the company or marketers created meanings of a
product or a brand (Allen et al., 2008) to consumers, such as the design
of the product, quality, craftsmanship, and innovation:
“Anthony Vaccarello’s resolution to bring Saint Laurent back to modern
times is obvious. The new collection features lots of elements left by pre­
vious collections. Anthony Vaccarello placed a great emphasis on clear-
cut and soft-but-not-weak features, which are in line with the styles of
both Saint Laurent and him. Vaccarello is skillful at designing the shape of
garments and choosing fabrics. He is a talent.” (SMI 5, 3.1);
“Fendi’s Kan I collection inherited the complicated and delicate crafts­
manship…Every item under the collection was made as delicate as
possible, to realise their buyers’ dream of leading a luxurious life as Marie
Antoinette. Handmade stud and embroidery are both time-consuming,
therefore, it takes a lot of time to make each bag. The softness of spring
and brilliance of summer are represented through colours and craft.
Therefore, each bag is an artwork.” (SMI 5, 3.3.w).
The adoption of these brand meanings is persuaded by SMIs using
rhetorical means of claiming expertise and mood affecting. SMIs use
their profound knowledge and penetrating insight to logically interpret
these meanings to consumers to reinforce their trustworthiness and
portray a sequence of consumers’ interest, expectancy, and resolution in
product purchase. Moreover, SMIs use rhetorical tropes such as elegant
figures to put consumers into an aesthetically pleasurable state, making
consumers more accepting of these meanings.
S. Zhou et al. International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293

4.2.4. Appraising rhetorical tactic of collaboration to invite consumers to send their per­
The appraising method stresses the meanings derived from SMIs’ or sonal experience and evaluation of products to them, thereby injecting
individual consumers’ experiences with products. It designates assign­ such consumer-generated content into their eWOM to enhance credi­
ment to products and then judges the products’ practical performance, bility and persuasion. Unlike consumer-generated reviews, SMIs’ eWOM
value, and contributions from different perspectives (Kretz & de Valck, is infused with their authority and expected to provide an efficient
2010): demonstration to justify their affective attitude and support evaluative
arguments. Hence, SMIs also adopt a rhetorical method of claiming
“I was totally in love with this Celine Clasp once I got it. The bag can be
expertise to persuade consumers. This strategy is similar to the finding
folded to be a large handbag…It’s especially cool to carry it on your
from the study by Kretz and de Valck (2010) that interprets the
shoulders or in your hands. I like the way the models carry it in the show,
behaviour of fashion bloggers building expertise by evaluating the
with one shoulder strap and leaving the other naturally flowing. This style
performance of products with efficient demonstration and arguments.
feels especially casual, just like walking with the wind.” (SMI 7, 3.6.w).
“Your stories about bags are fascinating! The following are readers’
4.2.5. Amusing
stories about sending bags to mothers.
The purpose of the amusing strategy is to frame SMIs’ eWOM crea­
Reader A: I bought my mom this Chanel bag… Although it is in a mini size,
tively and dramatically to satisfy the consumers who are entertainment
it can be stuffed with a lot of things…Dear mom, happy Mother’s Day!
seekers or imagined empathetic audiences. In the dramatised messages,
Reader B: My mom became a loyal fan of Dior…She took a fancy to this
brands and products are characters acting within the context of the plot
bag with a ‘DIOR’ letter logo…I secretly bought it when she was hesitant to
that claims the brands’ or products’ meanings:
purchase. It’s a big surprise for her. Oh, what I also want to say is that this
bag is very suitable and stylish for young people…both boys and girls.” “There is a woman soldier.
(SMI 8, 4.21.w)
She can do a triathlon while wearing a mini skirt on the street.
By this means, SMIs’ eWOM is similar to product evaluation mes­
She is all muscle, hard, strong muscle.
sages or reviews created by consumers. As consumer-generated reviews
She was even fine after getting hit by a car.
are perceived as credible (Dwivedi et al., 2020), SMIs sometimes adopt a

Table 5
A summary of six narrative strategies used by SMIs to create eWOM.
SMIs’ narrative strategies

Advising
Purpose To give advice on the use of particular brands or products to solve the issues faced by consumers or the potential issues that might occur in the future
Role of Brands Brands/products as solution partners
Semiotic Second order signification: socialised meanings shared by consumer groups
Meanings Third order signification: individualised meanings developed by SMIs, celebrities, or consumers
Rhetorical
Claiming expertise, attention attracting, interactivity seeking, and collaboration
Tactics
Enthusing
To express reference groups’ intense fanship or worship of a brand to motivate consumers to adopt the norms and values and cultivate a strong desire for
Purpose
ownership of this brand
Role of Brands Brands/products as objects of desire
Semiotic Second order signification: socialised meanings shared by reference groups, such as brand communities or subcultural tribes
Meanings Third order signification: individualised meanings developed by SMIs, celebrities, models, or consumers
Rhetorical
Mood affecting and attention attracting
Tactics
Educating
Purpose To improve consumers’ knowledge, understandings, and aesthetic on brands or products
Role of Brands Brands/products as teaching aids
Semiotic
First order signification: company or marketers created meanings of a brand or a product
Meanings
Rhetorical
Claiming expertise and mood affecting
Tactics
Appraising
Purpose To judge the performance, value, or contributions of a brand or product from different perspectives
Role of Brands Brands/products as task performers
Semiotic
Third order signification: individualised meanings derived from SMIs or consumers’ experiences with products
Meanings
Rhetorical
Claiming expertise and collaboration
Tactics
Amusing
Purpose To create eWOM in a creative and dramatic way to satisfy the consumers who are entertainment seekers or imagined empathetic audiences
Role of Brands Brands/products as actors
First order signification: marketer-created meanings
Semiotic
Second order signification: social groups generated meanings
Meanings
Third order signification: individualised meanings associated with SMIs, consumers, or celebrities
Rhetorical
Mood affecting and attention-attracting
Tactics
Assembling
Purpose To highlight the value of a brand or a product for identity construction and self-defining behaviour
Role of Brands Brands/products as identity construction partners
Semiotic
Third order signification: individualised meanings associated with SMIs or celebrities
Meanings
Rhetorical
Meaningfulness
Tactics

11
S. Zhou et al.
She still had amazing physical strength after this accident and chased a
thief across eight streets with no difficulty.
Who can understand why she put up a desperate fight for~
A bag.
Eventually, even the thief was afraid of her performance.
The thief gave up as he asked her:
“Is a bag worth you making such a desperate effort?”
The woman soldier gave a meaningful response:
“This is not an ordinary bag. This is Prada!”
(SMI 10, 5.25);
“There are some great blockbuster movies released this year…‘Valerian
and the City of a Thousand Planets’ might be the most beautiful science
fiction film…Cara Delevingne starred in this film…She also co-acted in a
blockbuster movie called ‘New bags are waiting for you to purchase’ with
Kristen Stewart, the French supermodel Caroline de Maigret, and Pharrell
Williams. This movie will be released on 3rd April, but they only play
supporting roles. The leading role is played by the new Chanel Gabrielle
handbag. It is called Gabrielle and comes from the Chanel Spring/Sum­
mer 2017 show. It is created to pay tribute to Miss Gabrielle Chanel in
accordance with her principle of ‘being gorgeous and practical, being
elegant but not too feminine’.” (SMI 10, 3.23.w).
The genre or type of dramatised messages can be various, from
comedy, action, to science fiction. Similarly, the meanings of brands or
products claimed in messages are diverse, from marketer-created
meanings, social groups generated meanings to individualised mean­
ings. SMIs use mood affecting and attention-attracting tactics to evoke
consumers’ feelings of enjoyment and entertainment, less counterargu­
ment and less direct elicitation of belief than occurs with logical argu­
ments. By this means, their messages can build an empathetic bond
between consumers and concerns of brand meanings.
4.2.6. Assembling
According to Thompson and Hirschman (1995), products or brands
as possessions can convey images, styles, and cultural meanings to in­
dividuals’ identities. In this way, brands and products could contribute
to identity construction and self-defining behaviour (Schau & Gilly,
2003). SMIs use the assembling strategy to link brand and product value
with personal identities or personality traits to highlight the trans­
formation of brand meanings. Thus, the brand or product meanings
discussed in their messages are individualised meanings:
“The Hadid sisters starred in a commercial for this collection. The
handbags are miraculous. Even Bella, who always looks serious, looks
cute with them, while Gigi looks like a Rococo princess from the 18th
century in satin and luxurious clothes, gorgeous and romantic. It seems
that the people carrying such handbags can go for a dream-like afternoon
tea at a royal court at any time.” (SMI 5, 3.8.w);
“Emporio Armani and Mr Hu Ge complement each other… Mr Hu Ge is
indeed a person with a warm heart, but he is also a decisive person. He
considers the feelings of others, but not stooping to compromise. This
character also represents the style of Emporio Armani—Fashion is to
serve people rather than stand high above the masses, but it never blindly
follows popularity to lose its own style.” (SMI 5, 3.4.w).
Within this strategy, the rhetorical mode of meaningfulness is used
by SMIs to convince consumers to accept brand myths. SMIs associate
themselves or celebrities with the symbols and signs communicated by
products or brands to construct archetypes. Two meaningful rhetorical
figures, nostalgia and biographies, are used to evoke consumers’ positive
resonance toward brands and products to enhance eWOM persuasive­
ness. The assembling strategy is widely represented in many prior
studies as the behaviour of associating images of bloggers and brands for
creation of archetypes (Delisle & Parmentier, 2016; Kretz & de Valck,
2010; Rocamora, 2011), especially the behaviour that publishes a visual
and written account of bloggers’ “outfit of the day”.
12
International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
Fig. 6. Differentiating six narrative strategies in SMIs’ attribution and variation
of brand meanings.
5. Discussion
5.1. Six SMIs’ narrative strategies
SMIs’ eWOM is perceived as a credible and trustworthy online in­
formation source for consumers and significantly influences consumers’
attitudes and behaviours (Jin & Muqaddam, 2019). The results of this
study reveal that SMIs organise and generate eWOM by adopting a range
of narrative strategies, using signs and symbols to interpret brand
meanings given by multi-sources, and structuring these signs and sym­
bols with particular rhetorical tactics to persuade consumers to accept
and adopt these brand meanings. Although the motivations of SMIs
spreading eWOM to promote brands may be various, such as
self-presentation, social interactions, claiming expertise, or brand
sponsorship, their narrative strategies to create eWOM are profoundly
influenced by the cultural, social, and contextual settings in which
eWOM takes place.
The main research findings are six narrative strategies used by SMIs
to create eWOM, including advising, enthusing, educating, appraising,
amusing, and assembling. Table 5 shows a summary of the character­
istics of these six narrative strategies. They are different in linking the
purpose of eWOM, assigning brands and products with roles in eWOM,
representing the meanings associated with brands or products, and using
modes of persuasion to convince consumers to accept these meanings.
SMIs’ narrative strategies differ from the strategies used by jour­
nalists and brands to craft branded messages. Journalists’ messages are
usually created in an appropriate way to enhance capabilities for scru­
tiny and coverage (Humphreys, 2010). SMIs hold a relatively more in­
dependent editorial stance than journalists and their own generated
meanings related to brands and products could be more salient in their
narratives. Moreover, on the surface, the purposes of SMIs’ eWOM may
be similar to the objectives of advertising or other types of marketing
campaigns, such as specifying the values being sought for brands and
delivering the desired symbolic properties of brands to consumers
(McCracken, 1986). However, due to SMIs’ trustworthy and approach­
able characteristics, communicative nature of eWOM, and community
norms prevailing in social networking platforms for spreading eWOM,
SMIs’ narrative strategies to introduce and recommend brands differ
from those employed by traditional media. The brand meanings dis­
cussed by SMIs seem to be much richer and more varied, such as SMIs’
personalised brand meanings, the established and commonly agreed
meanings in the market, the meanings created in contexts of consumers’
own life themes and projects, and the dynamic meanings communicated
S. Zhou et al.
Fig. 7. Implications of SMIs’ narrative strategies for the formulation of social media marketing strategies.
and negotiated between SMIs and consumers via social media. Besides,
SMIs cultivate more intimate interaction with consumers to communi­
cate brand values and persuade the adoption of brand meanings. The
interaction can be emotional, such as the use of advising strategy to
show SMIs’ empathy for and concerns of consumers’ problems within
brand selection and consumption, or be behavioural, such as SMIs
adopting rhetorical tactics of interactivity seeking and collaboration to
make ongoing dialogue with consumers to narrow the distance between
them and consumers. SMIs’ such effort to signal intimacy and accessi­
bility and build parasocial relationships with consumers makes them
differentiated with celebrities (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019), who seek
an accentuated distance with consumers (Jerslev, 2016).
Fig. 6 shows a matrix of six narrative strategies to further differen­
tiate them in two aspects, SMIs’ attribution and variation of brand
meanings. SMIs’ eWOM can be persuasive and influential to consumer
attitudes and behaviours since they assign causes of, or reasons for, their
acts and behaviours (Calder & Burnkrant, 1977; Friestad & Wright,
1994). The six narrative strategies differ in whether SMIs infuse cogni­
tive or affective attributes in their eWOM to offer cues to reasons for
their brand recommendation and dissemination of brand messages.
These two types of SMIs’ attributes could strengthen the distinction
between their eWOM and marketer-created messages and influence
consumer information processing and decision making (Petty &
Cacioppo, 1986). This matrix also presents how the six narrative stra­
tegies differ in disseminating diverse brand meanings, such as the
standardised meanings created by marketers (e.g. the first order signi­
fication) and the localised meanings that resonate with socio-cultural
norms and conventions and consumers’ personal backgrounds, con­
texts of consumption, and preferences in a target market (e.g. the second
and third order signification). The standardised meanings can help to
maintain consistency in marketer-intended brand positionings while
localised meanings can promote anchoring brands in a particular cul­
tural or community context to attain relevance among target consumers
(Kates & Goh, 2003).
13
International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
5.2. The value of SMIs’ narrative strategies to social media marketing
SMIs are ascribed as third-party actors with competences to build
strong relationships and emotional intimacy with consumers and exert
influence on consumer behaviour (Dwivedi et al., 2020; Sundermann &
Raabe, 2019). They are primarily recognised as content creators, content
distributors, and intermediaries between brands and consumers (Uzu­
noğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). Given the possible synergy effects of their
collaborations with brands to fulfil objectives of marketing and public
relation, they are also qualified to serve the roles of testimonial givers,
strategic counsellors, consumer community managers, and brand event
hosts (Enke & Borchers, 2019). Among these boundary-crossing quali­
ties of SMIs, producing creative and high quality content is essential for
them to engage in marketing programmes (Enke & Borchers, 2019;
Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014).
As illustrated in the SMIs’ eWOM model (Fig. 1), SMIs’ eWOM cre­
ation could be self-motivated or incentivised and influenced by mar­
keters. SMIs can either create organic narratives independently or co-
create content with brands by integrating commercial information into
their messages and transforming marketer-created content in a way that
is perceived as authentic by consumers (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019).
The risk of marketers’ lack of control over SMIs’ content creation is
noticed in research and practice, making influencer marketing distin­
guished from celebrity endorsement (Enke & Borchers, 2019). Hence,
effective and strategic monitoring and management of SMIs’ eWOM
creation is required. To provide insight into counteracting this loss of
control, the value of six SMIs’ narrative strategies to social media mar­
keting is summarised and discussed in contexts of five approaches to
incorporate SMIs’ eWOM into social media marketing strategies (Fig. 7).
These approaches are spontaneous SMIs’ eWOM encouragement,
multi-stakeholder value co-creation management, one-off approach to
influencer marketing, long-term collaboration with SMIs, and reuse and
redistribution of SMIs’ eWOM. They range from the low level of
marketer-controlled strategy to the high level of marketer-controlled
strategy and differ in marketing objectives.
S. Zhou et al.
Spontaneous SMIs’ eWOM encouragement is about facilitating SMIs’
independent content creation without being engaged by marketers.
Triggering non-paid SMIs’ spontaneous eWOM created on behalf of
brands and companies is challenging for marketers. However, their
eWOM comprising earned and shared media could be encouraged to
create a social buzz about a brand to extend its social media presence
and enhance brand awareness (Enke & Borchers, 2019). Marketers can
conduct event-based buzz marketing activities on social media to seek
positive personal stories concerning consumption of brands (Siefert
et al., 2009). SMIs would be motivated to engage in such events due to
their interests in brands or specific topics and their attempts to boost
blog traffic and increase social capitals (Delisle & Parmentier, 2016).
Here, narrative strategies can be adopted to determine the topic and
content of stories given by event participants, thereby offering oppor­
tunities for marketers to increase control over SMIs’ voluntary content
created for participating in the events. The events should be organised in
an attention-grabbing and meaningful way to highlight personal
meanings attached to brands. The assembling strategy, which empha­
sises how a brand or a product is related to self-concept and contributes
to self-identity construction, can be adopted for designing the topic and
content of buzz events.
Multi-stakeholder value co-creation management concerns the po­
tential of SMIs for facilitating and managing the process of multi-
stakeholder brand meaning co-creation on social media. Stakeholders
are empowered to co-create brand meanings through disseminating
knowledge, evaluations, perceptions, expectations, and brand experi­
ences on social media (Rosenthal & Brito, 2017). However, their con­
versation about brands can be negative, or the co-created brand
meanings can significantly differ from marketer-cultivated meanings in
the marketplace. Given the difficulty in marketers maintaining control
over the process of brand meaning co-construction (Essamri, McKech­
nie, & Winklhofer, 2019), SMIs could be effective assistants to exert
influence on how brand meanings are decoded and recoded on social
media. The results of this study show that SMIs’ eWOM disseminates a
portfolio of meanings derived from varied and salient stakeholder
groups who have an interest in, or experience with, the brands, such as
marketers, designers, celebrities, social groups, SMIs, and consumers.
SMIs actively learn these diversified meanings and filter and choose
specific meanings for dissemination on social media. Then these mean­
ings are negotiated and reconstructed through bidirectional and dy­
namic communication between SMIs and consumers, representing a
multi-stakeholder co-creation of brand meanings (Vallaster & von
Wallpach, 2013). To trigger iterations of multi-stakeholder value
co-creation process, SMIs facilitate interaction and conversation by
asking for consumers’ “thoughts and perceptions about the brand after
reading my description of it” (SMI 6, 3.24.w), and “the feelings emerged after
reading these consumers’ experiences with the brand” (SMI 3, 3.9.w).
Hence, SMIs could take over the intermediary and managerial roles in
value co-creation with consumers on social media, while consumers
switch roles of brand meaning providers and beneficiaries in the value
co-creation process. The four narrative strategies, advising, educating,
appraising, assembling, could provide implications on monitoring or
managing the brand meaning co-creation process on social media, and
be more effective in avoiding resistance, dilution, and distortion of
brand meanings than the enthusing and amusing strategies.
Brands can build one-off or long-lasting collaboration with SMIs and
maintain control over SMIs’ content (Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). As
SMIs having an authoritative voice on adoption of innovation and brand
consumption, one-off collaboration aims typically to enhance the
diffusion of innovation to support product launches or introduce an
existing product to a new market (Jiménez-Castillo & Sán­
chez-Fernández, 2019). Narrative strategies could be referenced by
marketers to cultivate an influencer marketing campaign in steps of
formulating the central theme and enforcing a binding framework in
which SMIs create content with some degrees of independence and
freedom. According to the findings of this study, the effective narrative
14
International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
strategies for one-off campaigns might be educating, appraising, and
assembling, as they support spreading marketers and SMIs generated
brand meanings and showcasing SMIs’ expertise.
Long-term collaboration with SMIs allows a continuous creation of
brand-related content and constant brand promotion and serves as a
critical factor for effective marketing communication (Uzunoğlu & Misci
Kip, 2014). SMIs are expected to keep close and stable relationships with
their followers and initiate, encourage, and direct interactions through
sharing daily insights and using likes, shares, comments, and live
streaming functions on social media (Enke & Borchers, 2019). These
ongoing dialogue and interactions could create a sense of intimacy be­
tween SMIs and their followers and encourage parasocial relationships,
leading to prolonged brand awareness, enhanced brand credibility and
affinity, and finally a positive influence on attitude towards brands and
purchase intention (Sundermann & Raabe, 2019). For formulating
long-term partnership strategies, narrative strategies can be used to
select suitable SMIs and frame eWOM. This study found that SMIs usu­
ally use their prefered narrative strategies to create eWOM, and thus
their messages maintain a consistency of style throughout content and
interactions with followers. By referencing narrative strategies, mar­
keters can understand the style and structure of SMIs’ eWOM created in
their habitual ways, such as the brand meanings they prefer to interpret
to consumers and the persuasive methods they usually use. Then mar­
keters can select appropriate SMIs whose eWOM content is ideal for the
brand image and marketing objectives. Besides, SMIs’ eWOM should be
created in a creative, interactive, and entertaining way to arouse con­
sumers’ durable interests in the recommended brands. Following this
consideration, the narrative strategies of advising, enthusing,
appraising, amusing, and assembling could be referenced for eWOM
creation, except for the education strategy that mainly focuses on
conveying marketer-created brand meanings and framing messages in a
style that is less of pleasure and amusement.
SMIs normally distribute their eWOM via one or more social media
platforms, where they have built a reputation and an authoritative voice
and reached a large group of followers. This study explored the eWOM
created by SMIs on two social media platforms that serve different
purposes. Weibo is used for large-scale exposure, while WeChat is used
for precisely targeting followers (Market Me China, 2015). There are
overlapped SMIs’ messages distributed on these two platforms, but
differences in their eWOM content published on the two platforms are
also salient. The narrative strategies of educating, amusing, and
assembling are more frequently used for eWOM creation on Weibo while
advising, enthusing, appraising, which can help build emotional in­
timacy with followers, are more often adopted to create content on
WeChat. This finding provides implication for the strategy of reusing
and redistributing SMIs’ eWOM on the paid and owned media, which
aims to embed SMIs’ eWOM in broader marketing communication
strategies of companies to promote brand publicity and maximise media
coverage and campaign reach (Enke & Borchers, 2019; Influencer In­
telligence, 2019; Werder, Nothhaft, Verčič, & Zerfass, 2018). Here,
narrative strategies could be adopted to create or select SMIs’ eWOM for
the subsequent reuse and redistribution on other social media platforms.
To make SMIs’ eWOM content effectively complement marketer-created
messages, the narrative strategies of advising, appraising, assembling
may be helpful to spread the social group commonly shared meanings
and individualised meanings, attract attention, and facilitate interaction
with SMIs’ followers and target groups. However, the use of narrative
strategies should be carefully considered, since the effectiveness of
different content can be varied from platform to platform due to plat­
form functions and community dynamics and norms on the platform.
6. Implications, limitations, and future research
6.1. Theoretical implications
This study contributes to the social media marketing literature and
S. Zhou et al.
adds to the body of research about SMIs’ eWOM creation on social media
(Alves et al., 2016; Dwivedi et al., 2020). SMIs’ eWOM is perceived as
more authentic and trustworthy than marketer-generated messages and
utilised as a segment of marketing strategies. Creation of high quality
content is vital to maintaining the effectiveness of SMIs’ eWOM for
marketing communication (Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip, 2014). Despite the
increasing collaboration between brands and SMIs, who display opinion
leadership to consumers on social media, there has been little research on
how they create brand-related eWOM to convince consumers. This study
attempts to reduce this gap by exploring the narrative strategies used by
SMIs to create eWOM to convey and interpret brand meanings to con­
sumers and persuade consumers’ adoption of these meanings. This study
is one of the first to explore SMIs’ narrative strategies for eWOM creation
and contributes to the theory development of SMIs’ narrative strategies by
a). suggesting a theoretical perspective of marketing communication for
exploration, b). developing a conceptual model to illustrate the structure
of SMIs’ narrative strategies (Fig. 5) that can be utilised by academics and
practitioners in different cultural contexts or for different product cate­
gories, and c). putting forwarding an approach to combine semiotic and
rhetorical analysis to investigate SMIs’ narrative strategies (Fig. 2).
This study builds upon and extends the relevant research by Kozinets
et al. (2010) and Kretz and de Valck (2010) in aspects of the viewpoint of
bloggers, the theoretical model adopted to underpin research, as well as
the perspective, circumstance, and context to identify bloggers’ narrative
strategies to create eWOM. This research raises the importance of an
advanced understanding of the narrative strategies used by SMIs as in­
dependent, third-party stakeholders, rather than the dual role of
consumer-marketer. This study found that the brand meanings conveyed
in SMIs’ eWOM are derived from a variety of stakeholder groups,
reflecting the involvement of SMIs in a multi-stakeholder value
co-creation process, and thus questioning the findings of these two prior
studies that the narratives and stories crafted by bloggers are always
self-related. The findings of this study also reveal that SMIs persuade
adoption of brand meanings by placing different emphases on three
rhetorical appeals of ethos, pathos, and logos, thereby strengthening
consumers’ belief in their credibility, attractiveness, and expertise and
building interaction and collaboration with consumers. The factors
influencing the use of three persuasive appeals are objectives of eWOM,
eWOM environments, and SMIs’ habitual preferences. This study identi­
fied six distinct SMIs’ narrative strategies for eWOM creation: advising,
enthusing, educating, appraising, amusing, and assembling. They are
different in fulfilling the objective of eWOM, recognising the roles of
brands or products in eWOM, communicating the meanings attached to
brands or products, and adopting rhetorical tactics to persuade con­
sumers’ adoption of these meanings. These six narrative strategies pro­
vide meaningful insights to the formulation of social media marketing
strategies and counteracting marketers’ loss of control over SMIs’ eWOM
content, which is increasingly acknowledged in literature (Enke &
Borchers, 2019; Sundermann & Raabe, 2019; Uzunoğlu & Misci Kip,
2014).
6.2. Practical implications
The results of this study have practical implications for both SMIs and
marketers. Reading social media contents or blogs has become a habitual
information search behaviour to inform decision-making, a way to discuss
issues of interest with peers, and a part of a daily self-indulgence routine
in pursuit of entertainment (Kretz, 2012). High quality content of eWOM
is essential for SMIs to increase traffic, uphold the opinion leader role, and
maintain influences on brand consumption. Armed with a knowledge of
narrative strategies for creating eWOM, SMIs can be better informed on
what kinds of meanings of products or brands can be introduced and
interpreted to their followers and how to effectively tailor their eWOM to
engage and persuade followers to adopt these meanings.
From a marketer’s perspective, the results of this study can provide
useful insight into the above mentioned five approaches to embed SMIs’
15
International Journal of Information Management 59 (2021) 102293
eWOM in social media marketing strategies (Fig. 7), which entail high
quality of SMIs-created content. These strategies are spontaneous SMIs’
eWOM encouragement, multi-stakeholder value co-creation manage­
ment, one-off approach to influencer marketing, long-term collaboration
with SMIs, and reuse and redistribution of SMIs’ eWOM. By referencing
and adopting the narrative strategies, markers’ control over SMIs-
created content could be enhanced. They can monitor, control, or
decide on the grounds of eWOM creation, communication, and distri­
bution strategies and the activities or roles SMIs should handle when
involving in a collaboration. Marketers should be aware of SMIs’ pre­
fered narrative strategies to create eWOM and their needs for increasing
attractiveness and effectiveness of their content, so as to better support
SMIs’ efforts to generate high quality and creative content for marketing
campaigns.
6.3. Limitations and future research
The limitation of this research is the characteristic of the study design,
which adopts a Chinese cultural context and a luxury product context.
This research supports and encourages the development of knowledge
about SMIs’ narrative strategies to create eWOM in a different cultural
context, or for promoting a different product category that also serves
symbolic needs and emphasises emotional and subjective impressions of
intangible aspects of products. To extend the theoretical and managerial
implication of the six narrative strategies for social media marketing,
further investigation can be conducted on examining the effectiveness of
these narrative strategies to balance commercial and non-commercial
tensions and mitigate sponsorship disclosure in SMIs’ eWOM, which
may result in losing their powerful effects on consumers’ attitudes and
behaviours (Boerman, Willemsen, & Van Der Aa, 2017; Halvorsen,
Hoffmann, Coste-Manière, & Stankeviciute, 2013). Further investigation
can also be conducted on how consumers respond to and internalise SMIs’
eWOM framed with particular narrative strategies, which may provide
valuable insights for SMIs and companies concerning how to cultivate
social media marketing campaigns to achieve more significant impact
effectively. Moreover, the increasing technological and digital revolutions
in recent years, such as augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR),
artificial intelligence (AI), chatbots, and machine learning algorithms,
provide marketing communications with more opportunities to identify
customer needs, reach consumers with personalised content, and enhance
customer engagement (Kietzmann, Paschen, & Treen, 2018). Further
research can explore how SMIs create and disseminate eWOM via
adopting these technologies.
7. Conclusion
Benefits and challenges brought by collaborating with SMIs to
develop marketing campaigns are noticed in research and practice. One
of the most significant challenges is that marketers maintain control
over the creation of SMIs’ eWOM, which is a crucial factor determining
the success of influencer marketing strategies. To provide meaningful
insights into this issue and reduce the gap in the social media marketing
literature, this study introduces a relatively new and overlooked area of
SMIs’ narrative strategies. It explores how SMIs create eWOM to intro­
duce and recommend brands and products to consumers. This study
adopts a theoretical perspective of marketing communication and ad­
vances the eWOM theory to develop the SMIs’ eWOM model, which il­
lustrates three approaches to SMIs’ eWOM and represents the notion of
multi-stakeholder co-creation. This study utilises the SMIs’ eWOM
model as the theoretical lens and employs a combination of semiotic and
rhetorical analysis to explore SMIs’ narrative strategies to create both
sponsored and non-sponsored eWOM in their habitual ways. The main
findings are six different SMIs’ narrative strategies (advising, enthusing,
educating, appraising, amusing, and assembling), providing valuable
implications for monitoring and management of the creation of SMIs’
eWOM and leveraging SMIs’ eWOM to develop social media marketing
S. Zhou et al.
strategies. Moreover, this study develops a conceptual framework to
represent the structural elements of SMIs’ narrative strategy, including
the brand meanings SMIs interpret and express to consumers and the
tactics used by SMIs to persuade consumers’ acceptance and adoption of
these meanings. This study supports and encourages future studies to
shed more light on SMIs’ narrative strategies and other related topics.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Shuang Zhou: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation,
Formal analysis, Data curation, Visualization, Writing - original draft,
Writing - review & editing. Liz Barnes: Supervision, Conceptualization,
Methodology, Validation, Writing - review & editing. Helen McCor­
mick: Supervision, Methodology, Validation, Writing - review & edit­
ing. Marta Blazquez Cano: Supervision, Conceptualization, Validation,
Writing - review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to in­
fluences the work reported in this paper.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary material related to this article can be found, in the
online version, at doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2020.102293.
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Shuang Zhou is Research Assistant Professor in Fashion Business at the Hong Kong
Polytechnic University. She received her MSc in creative and cultural industries man­
agement at the University of Sheffield in 2015 and then obtained her PhD in fashion
marketing at the University of Manchester in 2019. Her research interests focus on
influencer marketing, marketing communications, technological innovations in marketing
and retail, social media marketing, consumer behaviour, and luxury consumption. She has
presented her research at several national and international academic conferences.
Liz Barnes is Professor of Fashion Marketing at Manchester Metropolitan University, UK.
Her research interests focus on the concept of ‘fast fashion’ in relation to supply chain
management, omnichannel retail, fashion marketing communications and the fashion
retail environment. She is an Editorial Advisory Board member of the Journal of Fashion
Marketing and Management and Deputy Chair of the Academy of Marketing’s Fashion
Marketing and Consumption SIG. Liz has held a number of senior posts at higher education
institutions in the UK and is currently Head of Manchester Fashion Institute at Manchester
Metropolitan University.
Helen McCormick is Reader in Fashion Marketing at Manchester Metropolitan University,
UK. As a subject specialist in fashion marketing Helen conducts research in the areas of
digital strategy and innovation in the retail industry, focusing on consumption behaviour,
marketing communications and customer engagement and more recently sustainable
business practices in fashion retail and responsible consumption behaviour management.
Her research interests follow contemporary issues considering how they affect consumer
and business practices. She has significant experience in leadership roles in Higher Edu­
cation in Teaching and Learning, Line Management of staff and pastoral support of stu­
dents and is currently Section Head for the Fashion Communication programmes within
the Manchester Fashion Institute.
Marta Blazquez is Lecturer in Fashion Marketing at the University of Manchester. She
holds a BA in advertising and PR and has developed a career in the advertising of mar­
keting industry for more than 10 years. She was awarded European PhD in Marketing with
Cum Laude mention. Her research interest includes omnichannel retail, experiential retail,
channel integration, in-store technology, social media marketing, mobile marketing and
consumer behaviour. She has written articles in leading journals, contributed to edited
books, and presented her work at various national and international conferences. Blazquez
has been visiting researcher in the Oxford Institute of Research Management (OXIRM),
University of Oxford, and has been invited lecturer on several occasions in China and
Spain. She supervises a number of PhD and MSc students in the areas of fashion marketing
and retailing.