Investigating the impact of heuristic factors on consumer's perceived youtube influencer credibility and their purchase intention

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the heuristic factors which associate with Youtube beauty influencer’s perceived information credibility. These heuristic factors, namely source credibility, social advocacy and interactivity, helps the viewers to quickly evaluate the believability of the influencer’s message. This study also examines the asassociation of perceived information credibility with brand attitude, brand credibility and purchase intention for cosmetic products in Vietnam. A quantitative approach was applied as questionnaires were delivered via online and offline to a sample of 270 females from the age of 19 to 22 years old who are frequent viewers of beauty contents. After data has been collected, the valid data went through various statistical tests such as descriptive analysis, reliability test, exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and structural equation models (SEM). Analytical results revealed positive association between all heuristic antecedents of perceived information credibility as well as its association with respondents’ attitude toward the brand and brand credibility. Purchase intention was also found to be positively associated to the two latter variables. Theoretically, this study not only further reaffirms the celebrity credibility literature but it is also adding to the influencer digital marketing literature, the new marketing trends in Vietnam nowadays. In addition, it would provide practitioners with proper perception of how the main viewers of Youtube beauty contents evaluate beauty influencer in order to increase their purchase intentions which is indirectly associated with that influencer’s credibility. Future studies are recommended to widen the scope of this research and look into other segments of cosmetics users such as millennial women from the age of 24 to 36 years old or investigate other heuristic factors that may effect influencer’s credibility.