These days, anyone can make money online by building a brand around being themselves – or not – as Liver King, an extremely buff fitness creator recently found out. Liver King, is the social media personality of Brian Johnson, a muscular and often shirtless TikTok star who promotes “ancestral living” as something he does to be “strong, healthy and happy (autoimmune-free, eczema-free, allergy-free, fatigue-free”. For Johnson, this means eating platefuls of bull’s testicles, raw animal livers and cows’ brains.
He sells his lifestyle in the form of nutritional supplements, personalised dietary advice, as well as workout exercises – and he also promotes different services and products to his 1.7 million followers on Instagram and 3.8 million followers on TikTok.
That is, he did until leaked emails revealed that Johnson’s looks were not so much explained by the performance of his products, but by a monthly US$12,000 investment in steroids, which he hid from his fans. Liver King is now being sued for US$25 million by his followers who feel they were tricked into buying his muscle-building supplements.
These days mega-influencers are no longer the only stakeholders of an ever-growing industry. Instead, monetisation options on social media platforms have exploded, meaning that more and more people now make a living online. As mapped in a recent study for the European Parliament, subscriptions, donations from live streams and the selling of merchandise or digital content online is big business.
Through their content, creators establish trust, relatability and authenticity with their audiences. This one-sided relationship that a social media user engages in with a media persona is known as a “parasocial relationship”. This is where users form attachments with public figures that feel (and are) very real. Research shows that these kinds of relationships can influence a person’s beliefs, attitudes and purchasing behaviour as well as levels of trust in various groups.
23/01/2023