This thesis is aiming at investigating how macro social media influencers are affecting the consumer’s behavior of an individual within the cosmetic industry, with the outlined question: How do macro social media influencers affect consumers' behavior in the cosmetics industry? This thesis considers notions within community, social media influencers and consumers’ behavior field. An abductive qualitative research approach has been selected for this research, where data was gathered through individual semi-structured interviews, semi-structured focus groups, and semi-structured observations. Moreover, collected data from the individual and focus groups was analyzed based on the thematic coding approach, as well as in accordance with the presented analytical framework. The thesis concludes that macro social media influencers affect consumers’ behavior through their content and formed communities, to consume more and repeatedly, desire to reach a certain experience through consumption or behave in a certain manner individually or collectively.

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Background: In the digital era, the streetwear fashion industry has undergone significanttransformation due to the rise of social media. Traditional marketing methods have shiftedtowards direct consumer engagement through digital platforms, where brand authenticity andexclusivity are crucial for maintaining perceived value and consumer loyalty. Streetwearfashion, rooted in urban subcultures, relies heavily on these elements to establish and maintainits brand identity.Purpose: This thesis aims to critically examine how streetwear fashion brands utilize socialmedia to manage the authenticity paradox while driving exclusivity. It investigates the impactof these strategies on consumer behavior and brand loyalty within digital spaces.Method: The research employs a qualitative, exploratory design within an interpretivistparadigm. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample of12 participants, including influencers, brand managers, and consumers actively engaged withstreetwear brands on social media. Thematic analysis was used to identify key patterns andinsights from the data.Conclusion: The findings reveal that streetwear brands effectively use social media to projectauthenticity through transparent communication and cultural engagement, while strategicexclusivity is maintained through limited releases and exclusive collaborations. Thesestrategies not only enhance perceived brand value but also foster strong community ties andconsumer loyalty. The study highlights the importance of balancing authenticity withexclusivity to navigate the competitive digital landscape and sustain brand appeal

Modern media patterns show feminist narratives being used to market different consumer products in the name of female empowerment and emancipation. Typically, the industries targeted have historically been dominated by male perspectives and aim to perpetuate a capitalist consumer culture. The newly legalized cannabis industry in North America, has seen an increase in female participation both in production and consumption. This thesis takes Broccoli, an all-female produced magazine about cannabis, as a case to textually analyze how feminist narratives are used to appeal to their majority female and non-binary audience to a cannabis consumer lifestyle. In the analysis I have found that the magazine is critical to postfeminist notions of consumer culture, while simultaneously working within them in order to act as pioneers, holding a female-oriented space within the industry.

Submitted by Mariana Dornelles Vargas (marianadv) on 2015-05-25T17:54:35Z No. of bitstreams: 1 wedode.pdf: 3627779 bytes, checksum: 55a6860ad06d61a754ba43bf34960367 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-25T17:54:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 wedode.pdf: 3627779 bytes, checksum: 55a6860ad06d61a754ba43bf34960367 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012 / Nenhuma / A presente pesquisa tem como proposta a estruturação de metodologia de projeto chamada de Open Strategic Design (OSD) que teve por base o acervo de conhecimento produzido pelo design estratégico, e por motivação a necessidade de que essa metodologia estivesse alinhada ao contexto social contemporâneo, marcado pela lógica de consumo, pela interação hiperconectada e pela natureza simbólica das representações. Compreende-se o design como retórica que organiza os elementos de contexto (cultura de consumo e mediação tecnológica) e de linguagem (projeto, inovação aberta e design estratégico), e que, como tal, pode formular percursos estratégicos diferenciados. Daí resultou a construção de uma plataforma digital de projeto aberto e coletivo, o wedode.com, base da realização da experiência de aplicação e teste da proposta de OSD. A coletividade que participou da experiência produziu material que possibilitou a crítica da metodologia de projeto e insumos para alteração na plataforma usada. / The present research has as purpose the structuring of design methodology called Open Strategic Design (OSD) that was based on the collection of knowledge produced by the estrategic design, and motivated by the need for this methodology to be aligned with the contemporaneous social context, marked by the logic of consumption, hyper connected interaction and the nature of symbolic representations. We understand design as rhetoric that organizes the context elements (consumer culture and technological mediation) and language (project, open innovation and strategic design), and, as such, may make differentiated strategic paths. This led to the construction of a digital platform design open and collective, wedode.com, foundation of the application experience and testing of the proposed OSD. The group that participated in the experiment produced material that allowed criticism of the project methodology and insights to be used to change the platform.

Lifestyle sport has become a significant sociological phenomenon, with millions participating worldwide. Using windsurfing as a case study, this thesis focuses on core members of this subculture to discover their motivations for involvement and the degree to which they are willing to sacrifice other areas of their lives in order to participate. The thesis explores the contention that this level of sacrifice amounts to resistance to the dominant consumerist culture of our society. The study examines the way subculture members manifest an embodied critique of urban experience that takes place outside of that environment in natural spaces, using time that consumerist imperatives would have them in the earn-spend spiral dictated by that ideology. It does this through a twelve month ethnographic study, with the author as a complete participant, then as a participant observer, completing formal interviews with a number of selected core members of the subculture. Through interviewing and observation it became clear that it is only possible for subculture members to participate through the consumption of considerable quantities of the material objects associated with the activity. This means that participants are resisting consumerist culture through the consumption of consumer goods. This contradiction goes to the heart of the ways that consumerist ideology co-opts resistant behaviour. The study shows that windsurfers are resistant to consumerism in a number of ways. The rejection of traditional sporting values, the use of time in opposition to dominant practices, the rejection of wealth as the primary measure of success, and resisting cultural expectations are all manifestations of this resistance. The niche visual media of the subculture creates a dreamworld of natural perfection and freedom. The way that the visual culture mediates the paradox central to my thesis is by valourising a lifestyle, and those who adopt it, rather than selling consumer goods.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of History, 2005. / Title from first page of PDF document. Document formatted into pages; contains [1], ii, 93 p. Includes bibliographical references (p. 86-93).

The rise of social media in general and Instagram in particular has enabled a new type of celebrities, called micro-celebrities, that nowadays are being increasingly used by companies to endorse their products or establish their brands. While celebrity endorsement as a type of stealth branding together with some other marketing techniques characteristic of postmodernism were predicted to be unveiled and scorned by consumers (Holt, 2002), there are signs that through the practices of micro-celebrities, the language and logic of marketing have become even more ubiquitous in our contemporary social life (Khamis et al., 2017). The purpose of this research is to investigate the interplay of Instagram micro-celebrities with brands of the social media marketing ecosystem with the aim to add to the understanding of the spotted contradiction. The research adopted the case study design. Some preliminary interviews with advertising agencies and brands allowed to construct two independent cases where Instagram influencers were used in campaigns by brands of different scale. Semi-structured interviews with brand owners, marketing specialists of advertising agencies, Instagram influencers, and their followers were used to collect qualitative data. The obtained information was further analyzed through the lens of Bourdieu’s social theory and Lacan’s theory of the four discourses. The research reveals that despite Holt’s conclusive extrapolations, stealth branding techniques are exponentially growing not only in their popularity but also in efficiency. The study also suggests that even though today’s consumers indeed require an appendage to the product being consumed in the form of symbol or particular tacit knowledge (post postmodern consumer culture according to Holt) the dialectical model provided by Holt seems to be hasty enough to build since we manage to distil some current processes characteristic not only for post postmodern and postmodern period but also for modern and pre modern ones.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:29:52Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2008-03-07Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:20:23Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 trinca_tp_me_mar.pdf: 1087789 bytes, checksum: 70e7d08a84a84f1a4ee18a165d7e0ac3 (MD5) / Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) / Presenciamos diariamente no contexto das sociedades ocidentais industrializadas a frenética e obsessiva importância dada ao corpo e à moda, ambos se entrelaçam aos padrões de beleza disseminados pela indústria cultural, o que propicia uma crescente corrida ao consumo de novidades estéticas. Diante disso, objetiva-se compreender, por meio de uma análise histórico-social, o desenvolvimento do fenômeno do culto ao corpo e à aparência, tendo em vista as práticas cotidianas da cultura do consumo aprofundadas no capitalismo avançado. Considerando que há uma correspondência entre a produção cultural e as experiências e modos de subjetividade nas sociedades capitalistas contemporâneas e à luz de uma perspectiva materialista - embora dialogando com autores de diferentes abordagens epistemológicas - procuramos identificar como a lógica da mercadoria e da racionalidade instrumental se manifestam tanto na moda quanto na busca de um corpo ideal. / We witness every day, in the context of the industrialized western societies, the frenzied and obsessive importance given to body and fashion both intertwined with the beauty patterns disseminated by the cultural industry, what propitiates a growing run to the consumption of aesthetic innovations. In that sense, the goal is to understand, using a historical-social analysis, the development of the phenomenon of the cult of physical fitness and appearance, considering the daily practices of the culture of consumption deepened involved with the advanced capitalism. Considering that there is an equivalence between cultural production and experiences and subjectivity manners in the contemporary capitalist societies and through a materialistic perspective - although dialoguing with authors from different epistemology approaches - we tried to identify how the logic of merchandise and instrumental rationality appear as much in fashion as in the search of an ideal body.

The aim of this study is to investigate the interrelationships between place and taste through a multi-sited ethnography of music consumption. Place and taste are important theoretical constructs that have been studied extensively across the humanities and social sciences. Yet, there is a scarcity of research that attempts to bring together these constructs in the fields of marketing and consumer research and beyond. In particular, prior consumer culture theory (CCT) research has not taken into account the spatial processes through which consumers enact, perform and further develop their tastes in the market place. More significantly, little empirical research illustrates how different consumption spaces tend to orchestrate and shape consumers’ tastes. As such, this study focuses on the context of music consumption and aims to explore spatial taste formation processes via consumers’ aesthetic experiences in popular (festival) and classical (concert hall) music places within the fields of indie and classical music consumption respectively. The emergent findings are structured upon four chapters (papers) and develop specific research objectives which revolve around the overarching aim of the study, namely the exploration of the interrelationships between place and taste. This study brings together both structural and experiential dimensions of taste and highlights the ontological significance of phenomenological understandings of space and place for marketing and consumer research.