Zendaya: Audience and Industries blog tasks

Zendaya: Audience and Industries blog tasks 

Audience

Smart Water brand case study

Read this Smart Water case study from Influencer Intelligence and answer the following questions:

1) What is the charity link to her Smart Water brand ambassador role and how does this link to the celebrity persona she has created?

She will work with the Global Water Challenge, a charity working to help achieve universal access to clean drinking water, by launching the smart solutions: global water challenge, inviting local organisations to apply for funding to GWC’s women for water action platform.

2) Read the analysis of Zendaya’s social media profile. What statistics support why she is described as ‘a high-ranking celebrity influencer’?

Zendaya appears in the list of high-ranking celebrity influences (alongside Selena Gomez, Bill Gates and Miley Cyrus), ranking in the top 10% of all Twitter accounts, with 25.4% share.

3) What details are provided about Zendaya’s audience?

endaya’s audience is 67% female on Instagram and 73% female on Twitter. Typically single, her followers are most commonly aged 20-24. English speaking, they are based mainly in the United States, followed by Brazil and the UK. LA, New York and São Paulo are her top cities. Occupationally, her audience work in retail, broadcasting, publishing, entertainment, modelling, design or makeup. 

4) What psychographic groups would fit the profile for Zendaya’s audience in this case study?

aspirers 

explorers

5) Why does the case study suggest Zendaya is a good fit for the Smart Water brand? 

Zendaya also has well above average equity, appeal and awareness scores and is one of the biggest names on the planet right now. She is no stranger to brand partnerships, but this marks her first drinks collaboration and continues her philanthropic project work.

Social media data analysis

Look at this analysis website for Zendaya’s Instagram account. Complete the following tasks:

1) Pick out three notable statistics from the site.

6442224 likes on average

buying a post on this profile could cost up to $1,298,441.

2) Scroll down through the data available. Who are Zendaya’s top mentions and what does this suggest about how she uses the account? 

• @louisvuitton
• @nicolasghesquiere
• @lancomeofficial
• @abdmstudio

3) How does Zendaya’s Instagram engagement rate of 3%+ compare with the average engagement rate for accounts with more than 100,000 followers? 

the higher the number of followers, the lower the engagement however Zendaya's engagement is pretty high.

Zendaya: audience questions and theories

Finally, work through the following questions to apply media debates and theories to the Zendaya CSP: 

1) Is Zendaya’s website and social media constructed to appeal to a particular gender or audience?

It is mostly targeting a female audience who are interested in fashion and makeup.  

2) What opportunities are there for audience interaction in Zendaya’s online presence and how controlled are these? 

There isn't much opportunities for audiences interaction in Zendaya's online presence as she has previously said she doesn't read comments on a vogue interview. Which therefore suggests that Zendaya doesn't interact with hher audiences adn her accounts might be managed by her team.

3) How does Zendaya’s social media presence reflect Clay Shirky’s ‘End of Audience’ theories? 

Clay Shirkys End of Audience proposes that there is no more audience anymore as “Every consumer is also a producer, and everyone can talk back.” and Zenedayas every move is being watched.

4) What effects might Zendaya’s online presence have on audiences? Is it designed to influence the audience’s views on social or political issues or is this largely a vehicle to promote Zendaya’s work? 

It is largely to promote Zendaya's work as she doesn't post and promote a lot of social and political ideas. Her Instagram posts are all about her work and sponsorships about luxury brands however she has made so tweets on Twitter on issues but not quite often.

5) Applying Hall’s Reception theory, what might be a preferred and oppositional reading of Zendaya’s online presence? 

oppositional : Is that she is a typical celebrity promoting and making extra money through her online presence

preferred: she is a celebrity who talks about social and political issues and her who online presence is about everything not only her work. 

Industries

How social media companies make money

Read this analysis of how social media companies make money and answer the following questions:

1) How many users do the major social media sites boast?

As of Q4 2022, Meta (META), formerly Facebook, had 2.96 billion monthly active users.1 Twitter (now X) stopped reporting monthly active users, but the last count in Q1 2019 was 330 million, while LinkedIn had about 900 million monthly active users as of Q1 2023

2) What is the main way social media sites make money? 

 advertising and promotions

3) What does ARPU stand for and why is it important for social media companies? 

Meta's ARPU comes primarily through profits earned from advertisers who use the platform to reach customers.

4) Why has Meta spent huge money acquiring other brands like Instagram and WhatsApp? 

WhatsApp boasts over 2 billion monthly active users, which to Meta management means an even greater stock of susceptible minds to sell as a unit to companies looking to, for instance, move a few more smartphones this quarter.11 Every acquisition Meta has made since, whether it was $1 billion for Instagram or $19 billion for WhatsApp, was conducted with the same goal in mind.

5) What other methods do social media sites have to generate income e.g. Twitter Blue? 

Other social media companies are also exploring new ways to increase their revenue. For example, after Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022, he changed the site's blue "verified" checkmark system. These checkmarks were once given to prominent or important accounts (such as journalists, politicians, celebrities, and newspapers, and other media accounts) to show that their identities had been verified and could be trusted.

Regulation of social media

Read this BBC News article on a report recommending social media regulation. Answer the following questions:

1) What suggestions does the report make? Pick out three you think are particularly interesting. 

• forcing social networks to disclose in the news feed why content has been recommended to a user
• limiting the use of micro-targeting advertising messages
• making it illegal to exclude people from content on the basis of race or religion, such as hiding a spare room advert from people of colour

2) Who is Christopher Wylie? 

Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie

3) What does Wylie say about the debate between media regulation and free speech? 

In most Western democracies, you do have the freedom of speech. But freedom of speech is not an entitlement to reach. You are free to say what you want, within the confines of hate speech, libel law and so on. But you are not entitled to have your voice artificially amplified by technology. 

These platforms are not neutral environments. Algorithms make decisions about what people see or do not see. Nothing in this report restricts your ability to say what you want. What we're talking about is the platform's function of artificially amplifying false and manipulative information on a wide scale.

4) What is ‘disinformation’ and do you agree that there are things that are objectively true or false? 

Giving false information to the public is wrong and there are things that objectively true and false 

5) Why does Wylie compare Facebook to an oil company? 

An oil company would say: "We do not profit from pollution." Pollution is a by-product - and a harmful by-product. Regardless of whether Facebook profits from hate or not, it is a harmful by-product of the current design and there are social harms that come from this business model.

6) What does it suggest a consequence of regulating the big social networks might be? 

If you have a platform that has the unique selling point of "we will allow you to promote hate speech, we will allow you to deceive and manipulate people", I do not think that business model should be allowed in its current form. Platforms that monetise user engagement have a duty to their users to make at least a minimum effort to prevent clearly identified harms. I think it's ridiculous that there's more safety consideration for creating a toaster in someone's kitchen, than for platforms that have had such a manifest impact on our public health response and democratic institutions.

7) What has Instagram been criticised for?

If it has just spent the past week showing you body-building ads, it could then hold off for the next two weeks. If you want to promote body building, you can. 

But from the user's perspective, they should not be constantly bombarded with a singular theme.

8) Can we apply any of these criticisms or suggestions to Zendaya? For example, should Zendaya have to explicitly make clear when she is being paid to promote a company or cause? 

Zendaya should make it clear if she is being paid to promote a company or cause because some of her audiences might aspire to be like her and by certain products she advertises for money however audiences might be disappointed in the outcome.