Business marketing has changed drastically in the era of the Internet and social media. These new marketing tactics dig into the ethos of persuasion with the use of media influencers. These influencers typically have a large number of followers and often promote an attractive lifestyle through pictures, videos, or blogs. With Instagram seeing 1 billion users monthly, businesses are paying influencers for sponsored posts where they advertise a large range of products from skincare to health food plans.
The ethics of these influencers advertising products for thousands of dollars per post is a concern and there is a lack of transparency behind them. Journalists and public relations specialists are recognizing this, along with many social media users who are frequently calling out influencers for not disclosing when a post is paid.
However, there's a new, greater threat in the world of marketing: companies creating their own virtual influencers.
Meet Lil Miquela
She is a 19-year-old Brazilian-American model, influencer, and music artist with 1.6 million followers on Instagram. The kicker? She is completely computer-generated.
One quick scroll through her page as someone unaware of the rise in human simulation accounts could lead to some confusion - especially since Lil Miquela's music is streamed by 80,000 people on Spotify each month and she frequently does promotions with real human celebrities.
While one could argue that Lil Miquela's Instagram is a harmless experiment with animated content, but the idea of the persona promoting products such as clothes and perfume is ingenuine considering the products could never even be tested. The alignment with this influencer to a company is ingenuine, and from a public-relations standpoint, unethical.
Lil Miquela will not be the last of these computer-generated influencers. Companies are able to create the perfect persona to fit all their standards of beauty in order for customers to buy their products. There is no real human-decision making as there would be with other celebrity endorsements and companies will have the power to manipulate the audience into thinking their product is higher quality than what it is.
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| https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/09/media/china-xinhua-ai-anchor/index.html China's Virtual News Anchor |
What's Next?
Companies that create virtual beings like Lil Miquela are not stopping with Instagram influencers. There will be a rise in automated newscasters, as already seen at one Chinese government media outlet, and automated teachers to respond to human students.
As public relations specialists, it is important to follow these trends of computer-generated personas and recognize the large ethical concerns when it comes to them. Transparency and disclosure are the two most important values in mass communication and using content that comes across as genuine when it's not is a huge red flag.
There is a lack of transparency about who is generating the content for these virtual beings, who are being paid for the advertisements and commercials, and if the integrity of the advertisements promoted by the beings. Companies will have the power to mold their virtual influencers exactly to their target audience by adding characteristics and features not typically found by human influencers.
Public relations specialists need to start a conversation with their stakeholders to maintain trust because, in communications, trust is essential to do their job effectively.
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