Influencers'use of rhetoric in social media posts: A study on instagram

Today, the foundations of the internet were laid due to the constantly developing and changing technology that brought digitalization. The development of web environments over the internet has brought about the concepts of social media and social networking. For this reason, an important platform called social media has emerged in a short time. The structure of social media that allows interaction has allowed people to create their own profiles and socialize with other people. Marketing is in an important position for brands because it enables brands to sell products/services and create an image. Brands that have realized the power of social media to reach people and the ease of access to people have separated from the traditional marketing approach and created digital marketing in this context. People trust the experiences of influencers who affect people's interests, likes and consumption practices by sharing on Instagram. Brands have discovered this feature and have made efforts to cooperate with influencers. In this way, a new type of marketing, a digital marketing form called influencer marketing, has emerged. In this study, an examination was conducted on the written and visual rhetoric of influencers' product/service promotion. In the study, an examination was conducted with three persuasion techniques belonging to Aristotle's rhetorical understanding. The purpose of the study is to determine the rhetoric technique predominantly used in influencers' product/service promotion on Instagram. In this study, which was conducted to know and distinguish the rhetoric of influencers' product promotion, it was concluded that ethos and pathos techniques were used intensively in the content of the shared texts.