Assignment Three - Lifestyle or Popular Culture Review

Under the Influence

 Scrolling through social media, I see friends, family, companies, and celebrities all posting about their latest vacations, products, or what they ate last night. This is what social media was meant for, to share your life with the world, however you choose to do so. Along with all of the friends and companies I follow, influencers flood my feed. A social media influencer is a person who has the power to affect the purchasing decisions of a consumer based off their knowledge of a product. Two influencers that I follow and watch on a regular basis across multiple platforms is KKFit. Twin athletes who are influencers for the athletic apparel company Gymshark.

KKFit is the name of the "brand" and social media accounts of these two girls, Kathryn and Kendra. I stumbled across them years ago on my search for inspiration to get in the gym. When I followed them they had probably around 20 thousand followers and have since grown to a whopping one million followers in just a few short years. The girls joined the Gymshark Family in 2017 and have flourished with the company since. They post regular workouts on their Instagram along with life updates and recent Gymshark release info. In fact, they are even allowed to offer opinions and criticism to Gymshark on the apparel, some of these opinions they draw in from their followers. They take special advantage of their stories in order to post daily, often times all day long. However, to me their most useful posts are those about the lastest Gymshark apparel. 

The Twins have always done a great job of going through each piece of new Gymshark clothing in order to give an unbiased and real life review of the product before it is even released of the product. I live and breathe by these reviews, and they have never done me wrong. However, one negative to these reviews is how late they can be to posting them. Sometimes they wait until the night before a release and with the time difference I am trying to juggle the video and the release or sale at the same time. They often get the clothes in a few weeks before and should be able to post sooner rather than later. All in all their social media use is great, they stay up to date and post regular content. Being an OG follower I often miss how the page used to be. They used to post daily workouts and now only post clips as they have released workout guides that you must pay for. I understand not wanting to release free content, but I often miss the old KKFit.

Social media influencers can be found on all areas of the spectrum. If there is something you're passionate about, there is an influencer for it. KKFit are just two girls out of many influencers who try to make a difference and keep consumers happy. They post regular and relevant content for their brand along with keeping a fun and empowering atmosphere for women in the gym.