Zoella, big bunch of fan community. this

Zoella, a famous socialmedia influencer who have a huge number of followers on her social medianetworking. At the same time, she has 11.

2 million and 2. 6 million followers onInstagram and Facebook respectively. She post various theme of videos such asbeauty, fashion and lifestyle online. The platform she normally post her videosis on Youtube. The social media platforms to interact with her audiences areFacebook and Instagram.

She is such an influential social media users to shareabout her opinion on her digital profile and influence her big bunch of fancommunity. This is an example of successful influencer from United Kingdom. Different countries have different social networking influencers accordingly. This same goes to Malaysia. The strategy to develop their personal brand onlineand the content which they shared online helps them to have a big amount of readerswith the same interest such as food, fashion, beauty, lifestyle, travel and soon.

In the era of advancementtechnologies emerge, people can easily access to Internet. The communication ofone-way conversation through phone or message has altered to the culture ofcollective information communication due to the development of internet (Labbaika, 2015).  Internet leads to the platform of social media. Socialmedia has changed the way of communication between people which involved in two-waycommunication in quicker pace, shorter time and in direct way. Social media is a newrevolution from traditional marketing platform on the aspects of connection andinteractions between people due to the growth of technology (Soo, 2015). In theaspects of marketing communication, the traditional promotion mix used in aone-way communication of disseminating information transformed to social mediawhich involved promotional mix as an integrated marketing communications.

Withthe development of online communication on social media, a broader marketingcommunication was enabled (Mangold & Faulds, 2009, as cited in Labbaika, 2015). “ Increasingaccessibility to internet has motivated people to utilize more of social media, particularly in marketing” (Labbaika, 2015, p. 5). The communication culturehas been restructured with the expansion of social media which results in thenew online environment of creating opportunities to ordinary people to becomethe content creator who distribute the content themselves.

This is so calledsocial media based entrepreneurship (Vilander, 2017). Everyone has the rightand available to have an account on the platform of social media. Every socialmedia profile represents a personal branding of himself. People can have theirown personal brand on the social media like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube and the list goes on. One can market himself in person, on paper andonline. Branding ourselves using online in particular should checked whatappears online is consistent with what we want to market ourselves (Brooks& Anumudu, 2016). The focus of this studyis mainly on the platform of Facebook and Instagram.

“ As of the second quarterof 2017, Facebook had 2 billion monthly active users” (Statista, 2017). The total number of dailyInstagram users is 400 million which last updated on 5th February2017 (Aslam, 2017). Facebook and Instagram are the top 3 out of top 15 most famous socialnetworking sites and app with updated recently on September 5, 2017 (Kallas, 2017). Both Facebookand Instagram which are the examples of visual media platform can delivermessage in the form of images, videos and words to show the orientedillustrations of the users (Johnson, 2017). The social media is alsochanged the way of disseminating information from the past which the brandmessage is communicated by media to the customers to presently, the consumersare the group of people who telling and sharing their personal or second-handstories to their own social media web (Booth & Matic, 2011). According to Johnson (2017), “ Personal branding isthe process by which an individual actively tries to manage others’ impressionsof their skills, abilities and experiences” (p. 1). There comes the career ofsocial media influencers who promote themselves as personal digital brand usingsocial media.

“ Personal branding is the practice of marketing oneself tosociety” (Brooks &Anumudu, 2015, as cited in Johnson, 2017). As mentioned by WilliamArruda, personal brands should have three important qualities such as clarity, consistency and constancy. It should be a channels or mechanism which highlightall the strengths of an individual (“ When branding gets personal”, 2010).

Asmentioned by Brooks and Anumudu (2016), people with strong brands are clearabout what they good at, they know who they are. Their strong strengths madethem become outstanding, and a cut above of other people. Referring to Peters(1997) as cited in Lindahl & Ohlund (2013), individuals should own theirbrand to show up among so many people out there in the digital era and be thespecial one and able to compete in the competitive market. One must identifywhat makes you different from your competitors. There are a lot of ways todevelop one’s personal brand, with the development of Internet, it leads to thesocial media which allows individuals to perform their personal branding. “ Personal branding isdeployment of individuals’ identity narratives for career and employmentpurposes” (Brooks & Anumudu, 2016, p. 24). Referring to Erikson, McAdams(2008) as cited in Brooks & Anumudu (2016) identity development is definedas how an individual presents himself through internalizing, evolving and integratingself-story.

The influence that assertto the readers is created by a brand identity that involved the perceptions andfeelings towards the identity (Peters, 1997, as cited I Lindahl & Ohlund, 2013). The intention of an individual to express personal identity maytransformed to public and it became digitally enabled by the public (Brooks& Anumudu, 2016). Mentioned the way to havea successful personal brand and create brand influence is to provide a goodquality of practical info, opinion and advice to the audience. A goodreputation is an outcome of the combination between their own expertise and the” connectedness” which can attract the readers. The successful individuals willdeliver a continuous and ongoing delivery of value. Therefore, it issignificant to tailor the content shared to the needs of the readers (Harris& Rae, 2011).

It is also significant to manage the perceptions of theindividual efficiently and take a control on what people think about theperson. The image that portray on online social media channels become more andmore important because the time that spend online is increasing especiallypresently in online, virtual and individual era (Lindahl & Ohlund, 2013). The benefits of usingonline brand promotion is using small amount of money to market one’s brandmost effectively (Belk, 2013 as cited in Brooks & Anumudu, 2016).

Thecontent that personal branders allow the conversation of the followers such asinteraction, comments, ratings or any other forms of participation. Who are social media influencers? Social media influencers shape the attitude of their followers with the use ofsocial media. They signify independent third party bench markers in their ownway and influence their audiences using social media (Freberg1, Graham, McGaughey , 2012). Due to enlargement of the community ofsocial media influencers who use social media platforms to communicate withtheir followers indicate the substantial power that hold by them on theperceptions towards brands and companies (Booth & Matic, 2011). The influencers can helpthe company in engaging with the targeting audience using different socialmedia channels. In another saying, they strengthened the brand awareness of thecompany (Booth & Matic, 2011).

The development of the Internet encouragingpeople who have the same interests together which triggered the socialnetworking influencers to have an impactful voice in the current market (Booth& Matic, 2011).  The company who used theinfluencer power are utilised the brand strategy of allowing the conversationwhich bring the impacts of changing perception and identify the expectations ofconsumers and convey the clarity into the dialogue. It is very importantbecause it helps the company to arrange the strategy of marketing, advertising, public relations and social media or any other ways to emphasize the corecharacter of the company through the relationships that build up between thereliable relationships between company and the audience (Tsai, n. d., as citedin Booth & Matic, 2011). According to Hall (2010) as cited in Booth (2011), what make difference between the influencers is the amount oftheir extended or indirect connections which is not only limited on the direct” friends” “ followers” (Booth & Matic, 2011). Social media is aplatform for both influencers and audiences who are also known as followers tobuild up relationships and allowing conversations between both parties (Booth & Matic, 2011). This applied to social media influencers to work on their personal brandingonline.

They put on strategy to manage their social media. Lacy (2012) as cited inJohnson (2017) stated improve one’s profile, be authentic with theirpersonal brand, interact with readers, keep a theme and have a constanttimeline to update their social media profile are the essential elements tomanage the visual social media platform on the purpose of personal branding. Whatmade people differ with each other is the way they portray their image as abrand by projecting their uniqueness and personal values (Collins, 2012). As social media users intheir own personal brand, with every post made on social media able to framethe message which try to convey to the audiences. The framing of message willbring effect on dissemination what they try to say.

Through the socialinteraction on social media, they have their own unique voice since the waythey construct and express their thoughts is different according toindividuals. The strategy that used in social communication is depend on whatthey want to achieve. In order to have large impacts which is influence morepeople and beyond the circle of their own friends, social media users need toget really in-depth understanding of what encourages the readers to consume themessages you wrote online and share it with more people. The point that allsocial media users need to take note is no matter what post on social mediawill give impression and perceptions that embedded on the mind of readers whichwill give effect on the career because the future employers will track thethings the candidates’ profile to decide on their employability (Westerman, n. d.).

Withthe huge amount of followers on social media, social media influencers need totake it serious with every voice spoken online. The brand approach thatused by social media users to promote their own online personal brand is knownas the strategy on managing their social media (Westerman, n. d.). In building up a personalbranding, exploring own extraordinary attributes and flaws helps in effectivelyportray the self and it also must maintain in a continual progress (Johnson, 2017).

Thekey attributes to obtain success on social media for personal branding areauthenticity, consistency and presence. The process of building up the personalbranding might cost a long time (Vilander, 2017). The time consumed to developan online personal brand is long and the management and maintenance of apersonal identity story as a brand is skilled (Brooks & Anumudu, 2016).  In general, the aim ofthis research is to examine the effectiveness of social media in personalbranding among social media influencers.  1.

1 The Problem StatementThe online activities areincreased which shifted from offline because of the rapid upsurge of Web 2. 0. This caused the control over our own information became more difficult as thepast. The engagement to develop personal brand should complied with effort. Tomake one visible and stand out in a society is getting more complex, istherefore should pay more attention in the importance of personal branding(Reunes, 2013).

As stated by Schawdel(2009) as cited in Nieminen (2016), due to the development of Internet andsocial media turned into so popular, the personal branding which is limited tothe top celebrities or politicians shifted to become part of everyone’s life. Strategic planning of online personal branding on social media such asFacebook, Instagram and so on should be done to achieve a strong base ofpersonal branding. (Nieminen, 2016). According to Tufecki(2008); and Labreque, Markos & Milne (2010); Stevens (2016) & Wetsch(2012) as cited in Johnson(2017) the possible effect in long-term of negative message conveyedonline and human resource departments will concern the candidates throughsocial media platforms are being unknown among young adults that will happen ontheir future professions.

Based on the study of Reunes (2013), youngprofessionals do not pay much concentration on the opportunity of personalbranding.  This shows that knowledge ofpersonal branding online is still quite lacking. Therefore, the postings thatpost online and self-disclosures on social networking sites should be awareconstantly.

Inappropriate images, negative comments and the usage of alcohol ordrugs should be prohibited (Johnson, 2017).  Both of face-to-faceinteractions and online communications do affect people’s insights of their ownpersonal brand. So, the importance of personal brand online should emphasized.

In a competitive market, it is quite hard to get a job although good grades andlots of extracurricular activities the job candidates joined, because there aremany qualified employees-to-be among the marketplace (PwC, n. d. as cited inBrooks & Anumudu, 2015). In order to impress the interviewers, theuniqueness that the candidates should be start from personal branding whichpursue in person, on paper, and online. (Reference) According to Reunes (2013), the activities areincreasing alter from offline to online because of the development oftechnology causes the control of own information is becoming more hard. Personal branding has its roles in convey our own information and at the sametime, able to stand out in a society and visible to people. Social media is asuitable platform for own branding because it can broaden the opportunities ofjob prospects, partnerships and readers on the online work.

(Reference) It is true that whatperson pursue do not equally match with the reality might causes bad effect onhis credibility towards their surroundings. The reason is they are not honestand try to package themselves in the way of “ glossy” but not showing the realpart of themselves. The information can be reached to the audiences in a highspeed.

In the era of communication which can happened in very easy way andspread criticism, any mistakes will be enlarge and reputation will bedestroyed. Furthermore, the social media will fasten the process of disseminatingmessage to the world (Reunes, 2013). Internet works as aplatform of managing personal brands due to the Web 2. 0 technology. If socialmedia platforms is known as a market while the brands are known by the users ofonline media networking, they are engaging in the development of their ownpersonal brand by creating and promoting their brands online (Shaker & Hafiz, 2014). The social media influencers have the huge amount of followers on their socialmedia platform. They can influence many people with their thoughts and ideas.

Thevirtual space created because of Web 2. 0 technology allows users to updatetheir status in the form of images, text, videos, digital resumes and bio-dataor any user generated contents (Labrecque, Markos & Milne, 2011, as citedin Shaker & Hafiz, 2014). “ The key to being a successful influencer is to crafthigh-quality, engaging content that’s built on a foundation of trust” (Rostam-Abadi, 2017). Withlarge numbers of fans, there comes the social responsibility to share the rightmessages. This is because what they post online brings impact to theirfollowers to an extent.

The expansion usage of social media initiates moresocial media influencers.  What they tryto show is the unique self and the brand identity that they try to pursue. Theway they manage their brand made the difference. The approach to build up theirpersonal brand can influence the brand image that embedded in the followers’mind. The impacts brought bypersonal branding online could change the life of the social media influencerin good way or bad. Self-disclosure on their branding profile brings positiveimpacts and negative impacts. Positive impacts included brand recognition fromcompany while negative impacts consist their privacy is being violated. The research regardingbranding companies and products are great amount available while personalbranding is still considered as a new topic as compare to the branding ofproducts.

The deeper analysis of personal brand building on social media shouldtake into concern as using digital channels on creating online brand identitiesis needed (Nieminen, 2016).  1. 2  ResearchQuestionsTheresearch questions of this study are as following: 1. 2.

1       What are thefactors of social media influencers using social media for personal branding? 1. 2. 2       What are thestrategies that Malaysian influencers on online personal branding? 1. 2. 3       What are theimpacts of building up personal brand on social media? 1. 3 Research Objectives The research questions of this study are as following: 1.

3. 1       To identify thefactors of social media influencers using social media for personal branding. 1. 3. 2       To discover thestrategies that Malaysian influencers on online personal branding. 1. 3.

3       To explore theimpacts of building up the personal brand on social media. 1. 4 Significance of StudyThe significance of thisstudy on the uses of social media on personal branding is to contribute newknowledge on the effectiveness of social media on personal branding amongsocial media influencers.

The information related to Malaysian social mediainfluencers is quite lacking as compare to the influencers oversea. Theresearch currently in Malaysia which are currently available is less focusedfrom the angle of social media influencers like the factors of using socialmedia for personal branding, the strategies utilised on online personalbranding and the impacts of building up personal brand on social media as the objectivesof this research in which collecting the information from the influencersthemselves and knowing more from the influencers. There is more on the angle ofthe corporate company such as how to choose the social media influencers as thespokesperson of the company (Booth & Matic, 2011). The outcome of this studyis also to create awareness among the public on the importance of personalbranding which may be brings benefits in the current or future careerdevelopment by looking at the success example of social media influencers. Understandingthe reasons why social media influencers make use of the platform of socialmedia to self-brand and build up their own career can help the public to knowmuch more on the importance of personal branding. At the same time, thesignificance of this study is to increase the knowledge of the public on theimportance of personal branding. In order to build up a strong base of personalbrand, individuals will work hard to develop one’s abilities and portray extraordinarycharacteristics to stand out among the public.

Online personal branding mightbe quite hard as compared to offline personal branding. Portray oneself byusing only words and images to show people what you have. The commitment andeffort which put in to manage to social media profile and able to compete in acompetitive market is huge. With this study, we hope that we can bring newinsight to the public more on personal branding. At the era of advancementtechnologies, fully utilised the benefit of social media on personal brandingcan help in outreach to more audiences which helps in career development. Thestrategies which social media influencers applied in managing their ownpersonal brand can help in suggesting the public on the way to run their onlinepersonal brand.

The interest of this study is know more in-depth how socialmedia influencers managed to brand themselves and shifted from “ nobodies” to” somebodies”. The impact on using social media on personal branding can helpthe audiences to foresee the benefits and challenges on it.  1. 5  Scopeof StudyThescope of study is accumulated in the areas of social media, branding and thetarget audience is social media influencers. The study area of this research isat Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia which is one of the country of Southeast Asia.

Thisis because Kuala Lumpur is the capital of Malaysia. The events regarding to thebrand, fashion that will attend by the social media influencers are accumulatedat this city. The research will be conducted based on observations and in-depthinterview of six social media influencers which are mainly female. Based on myobservations, the number of female Malaysian influencers are exceeding the numberof male influencers because male influencers are rarely join in this industryand the number is small.