Enviro-Bragging: When Influencers Should Not Be Humble about a Brand’s Sustainability

Abstract

Influencer marketing is a critical component of many strategic campaigns, but most research on social media influencers has examined influencer attributes (credibility, attractiveness, follower count, etc.) or congruency with the brand or cause. Challenging the conventional wisdom that green advertising should be humble and answering a call to develop novel green messaging strategies, we conceptualize a new strategy called enviro-bragging. We find this aggressive form of advertising is best suited for green influencers collaborating with brands that dominate their product market. We use signaling theory to show that influencers can function as signals of a brand’s environmental commitment and identify a differential effect of influencer- (versus advertiser-) generated green ads depending on the firm’s relative market position. Interestingly, while we find a significant difference in influencer impact when the brand is dominant, we find no difference when the brand is not dominant. We discuss our results in light of their theoretical and managerial implications.