Where goes the line between influencing and educating?

More than ever, now in the year 2022, social media is influencing our daily life to an extent that is affecting our everyday perspective, and most importantly it affects our opinions. In Sweden, many influential people on social media who have a younger audience have been involved in the electoral movement with either inviting political actors to join their content of educating their younger crowd in political subjects, or using political parties and political actors in a paid collaboration for gaining new followers or perhaps changing their followers perception. In Sweden there is a known fact that interest in politics has increased, but the reduced confidence in established political actors has decreased.

A new strategy for political communication?

Political communication in social media has been mentioned in most social channels in recent times, such as Instagram and Youtube, just think about the Swedish parliamentary elections of 2018 where a lot of political influence could be spotted. Many influential people on social media who are followed by a younger crowd have become involved in the election movement with the intention of making the election issues more easy to understand. Political influence for younger people to be educated and get engaged, but there is a fine line over what is influencing and education. While changes in social media take place, so do changes in politics. Political parties now have a different strategy to market themselves to reach today’s crowd, if not most importantly they have adapted the strategy to reach a younger crowd and the first time voters. That a brand, which in this case is political parties and
Party leaders collaborating with influencers is called Influencer marketing and it has apparently taken off an important role in the parties’ election campaigns. For example, in the election of 2018, one of the biggest influencers and entrepreneurs in Sweden, Isabella Löwengrip with over half a million followers, invited the Center Party’s leader Annie Lööf for a live broadcast on politics. Isabella Löwengrip, who most likely is followed by a young target, probably promoted the Center Party more than the intention of educating her young followers.

Collaborations between influencers and political parties could affect the first-time voters

In today’s medialized society, it can be seen as a matter of course that political actors have migrated to social media, as most citizens today consume some type of social media and it is also the main source of information for many young people. This means that the young crowd who are not necessarily politically active are most likely to get even more influenced by the collaboration between the social media influencers and political parties.

Using influencers can be seen as an effective way for marketing brands. If political parties today are seen as brands, this can cause a lot of problems with the way they adapt their communication. As influencers and politicians approach each other – both rhetorically and in terms of collaborations – it is clear that our social media stars and influencers will gain more and more political power in the future. In autumn this year, the Swedish election will take place, and it is more important than ever to be transparent, realistic and most importantly, know the fine line between being influenced and being educated.