Want to look less like a clout-chaser online? Team up with someone smaller. A study in Psychology & Marketing looked at how people judge influencer collaborations. The researchers first went through more than 10,000 Instagram posts from 50 influencers. They found that nearly two-thirds of the posts tagged another account, and most influencers usually partnered with creators or brands that had fewer followers than they did. Next, they ran two experiments, using news stories about fictitious influencers. When a bigger influencer, in terms of number of followers, teamed up with a smaller one, people saw the bigger influencer as less self-serving and more genuinely interested in helping their partner. Partnering with a smaller brand also made the influencer seem less self-serving, but it didn’t make them look any more generous. For smaller creators, there’s good news too: teaming up with someone bigger doesn’t hurt your image. It just doesn’t earn you the same goodwill.

Source: Thomas, V. L., Fowler, K., & Taheran, F. (2024). How social media influencer collaborations are perceived by consumers. Psychology & Marketing, 41, 168–183. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21918