Influencer Marketing Report

The purpose of this report was to collect data from Twitter. The data collected consisted of any and all tweets which contained the word “Yeezy” and or were directed at Kanye West. The collection of this data and its interpretation allows the telling of a story driven by the engagement of consumers and how they are influenced by social media.

Mean Retweet Count and Methods

This data set illustrates a picture of the total engagement occurring via retweets. Retweets are the primary source of influence on Twitter. By analyzing the data, the mean number of retweets is dominated by Tweetbot for Mac. This is an alarming statistic as it states the majority of high count retweets are being made outside of human engagement. This data reveals how something may seem popular or trendy on the surface; however, that may not be the case and things can be manipulated to appear as they are not. It is important to keep in mind this data only represents a specific point in time and does not illustrate the whole story.

Mean Engagement of Favorites via Retweets

After visualizing the above diagram, I could not help but wonder if retweets were used as a catalyst to increase engagement of people through favoriting the retweet. The following graph depicts the mean number of favorites from a retweeted source. To my surprise, Tweetbot for Mac dominated this category as well. This left the question of whether or not it was possible that influencing members of the sneaker community were utilizing bots on social media to establish a fan base under the guise of engagement?

Retweet Frequency Percentage by Source

Prior answering the above listed question, one would need to understand the sources being utilized in regard to frequency of retweets. Below we can see the percentage of retweets per source and it is important to not confuse this with the mean number of retweets per engagement source. This diagram depicts the frequency total with respect to community engagement. With this graph, we can note the iPhone is utilized more often than the other two leading mediums for retweets. This dominance illustrates a visual of increased retweet frequency being derived from handheld devices, as opposed to certain tweets with larger retweet counts utilizing Tweetbot as the main source of popularity.

Friend Percentage and Follower Count Relationship

Before drawing a conclusion on the above listed data and outcomes portrayed, it is important to define what it means to be an influencer. The following relationship depicts how as the percentage of friends, who a user follows, increases there is a slight decrease in follower count. When thinking about this in terms of how the influencers profiles are perceived the relationship aligns with the data and makes perfect sense. Influencers, like Kanye West, typically have a significantly larger number of followers as compared to the number of people they actually follow.

Influencer and Total Engagement Source Relationship

This figure below brings the data and analysis full circle in relation to my theory. When examining influencers and the mediums utilized for total impressions, which include both retweets and favorites, more variability can be seen in the data. Outliers that have larger numbers of total impressions seem to be primarily sourced from Tweetbots and/or other sources which cannot be categorized as a handheld device. My experience from working in the footwear industry and being knowledgeable on the subject allows for categorizing Yeezy Mafia, Sneakernews, WorldStar, and XXL as prominent contenders in the world of sneaker influence. To see that most forms of engagement are derivatives of various sources other than handheld devices sparks conversation in terms of engagement. It leads one to ask the following questions: who is actually generating the hype for products that we covet? Is the hype generated by the consumer or is it a by-product of various tactics used by social media titans in effort to utilize falsified engagement as a means of influence?