How KOL was born

Talking about KOL in the age of digital marketing.

JIANING QIAN 13^th Feb.

Preface

I am familiar with digital sales and live operation. I majored in TV directing during my undergraduate, and I also have intern work experience at Zhejiang TV shopping channel and as an event planner at Chinese local e-commerce company ALIBABA. According to live show to promote products is a most common way to expand your brand influence. After graduated from university, I joined in a start-up company to hold a position at account manager and director. Our group devoted to service some e-commerce brands to help them expand brand influence.

Introduction

With the development of digital business models and the rise of the digital industry, offline physical stores are suffering unprecedented shocks. Therefore, e-commerce brands are gradually entering the horizons of consumers. With the advancement of Internet technology, a variety of live broadcast software has emerged, which has also become a channel for merchants or enterprises to conduct product marketing. At the same time, a new profession emerged, what we want to talk about ‘KOL’, better known as Key Opinion Leaders. They are what consumers are gravitating towards in hopes to filter the clutter that digital advertising has created. The digital age has seen a shift in marketing with the emergence of KOL. (INFLUENCER 101,2019)

Why KOL can influence people

Unlike TV shopping, e-shopping platforms expand the business development channel to more platforms. KOL’s marketing method is to publish product recommendations through its own public social platform, so that users see the traffic generated in the future to maximize the effect of publicity. These KOLs often do not have a fixed brand contract. They will carry out live promotion according to the brand that needs to be promoted and encourage viewers to buy. Unlike the TV shopping host, KOL often has a large number of fans to follow him. Products recommended by TV shopping hosts often haven’t used them beforehand. However, KOL will evaluate the products to be promoted in advance and compare them with equivalent products, so they will be more responsible to the audience, so that why KOL always win more audiences. KOL’s mass foundation comes from their original accumulated data, it can even be said that the original work published by these people originated from their own interest in a certain field, especially in make-up industry.

KOLs are not only connect with their audience, but in most cases, they also have a specific target demographic. The reason why make-up has become a trend is related to its customer base. For a market with very mature online shopping and e-commerce operations in China, there are many excellent KOLs that have emerged from the public’s perspective. Li Jiaqi, a Chinese make-up KOL called ‘Lipstick top 1’, who holds world record of applying lipsticks. He is also included in the 2019 Forbes China Under 30 Elite List. For lipstick, a product that occupies the female market, Li Jiaqi is very good at capturing consumers’ psychology. Also, there are many male consumers who do not know lipsticks will watch his video to choose lipstick for their girlfriends.

Future development trend of KOL

As a person who can bring influence to the public from the public perspective, KOL will inevitably move towards professional standardization. Nowadays, many KOLs will be signed by brokerage companies and receive professional vocational skills training. This is not only an upgrade of an industrial chain, but also a responsibility for consumers.

Choosing the right KOL for each brand will also become a reasonable marketing strategy. The right KOL will become the image of the company like a brand spokesperson. KOL will be an important part of brand marketing. In the context of digital business models, KOL will become an increasingly mature career development phenomenon in this field.

The future KOL will be more than just a blogger active on his social platform. They will be packaged as an artist, but still retain their original intentions. Professional skills training is to help them better identify brand needs and serve customers. This will help them attract consumers more broadly based on their original fans.

Overall, the function of KOL cannot be ignored, because they evolved from consumers to representatives. They will have a say in this brand more than ordinary star effects.

(721 words)

Reference

1. INFLUENCER 101,What Is KOL In Marketing? https://www.hyprbrands.com/blog/what-is-kol-in-marketing
2. Donahue, D., Kotz, B., Curran, R. M., Anderson, A., & Kotz, H. (2004). U.S. Patent Application No. 10/394,165.
3. 方超. (2018). 电商网络主播特征对消费者态度影响研究 (Master’s thesis, 安徽大学).
4. 李宜真. (2019). 網路紅人說服效果之研究.
5. 10 KOL MARKETING TRENDS IN CHINA FOR 2020 https://www.digitalmarketing-conference.com/10-kol-marketing-trends-in-china-for-2020/