Genuine or Constructed? The Authenticity of Zoella’s Identity Within The Context Of Her YouTube Community

Once the internet heralded in Web 2.0 and the focus became on connecting people with “the architecture of participation” (Arya & Mishra, 2012, p. 28), online communities began to form as individuals networked with each other. Within these communities, leaders emerged, and then these leaders become the nucleus from which new communities formed. These leaders often take the form of online personalities, and the influence they have over their communities of fans is substantial. This leads to often them being categorised as “influencers” – having an exclusive and powerful influence over the communities that form around them, although some dispute the term (Loh, 2018). Their impact and growth, as well as the status they hold in the broader online community, can be examined from the perspective of them being a ‘microcelebrity’. According to Marwick (2017), a microcelebrity is an individual who is “well known to a niche group of people” and present themselves as public personas like a traditional celebrity where they develop emotional rapport with audience members, viewing these followers and audience members as fans. One such microcelebrity is Zoe Sugg, a 30-year-old British beauty vlogger with an audience of over 11 million subscribers as of April 2020 (YouTube, 2020b). The nature of social networks has made the possibility of being microcelebrity much more accessible, giving individuals like Sugg access to a large and interest-aligned audience. This paper will primary focus on the community forming around Sugg on the social network and video sharing platform YouTube. Whilst Sugg’s identity and community exists across multiple YouTube channels, this paper will focus on her most popular and now disused YouTube identity, Zoella, and the community that congregates around it. Zoella’s YouTube community connects with the markers of authenticity in her online identity despite her artificially constructing them to retain her microcelebrity status. This authenticity is composed of relatability and accessibility, whilst the construction of authenticity can be described as a self-branding exercise and other specific tactics, all focused on building and maintaining the audience that she commands influence over.

An Interactive Identity

A significant part of Zoella’s perceived authenticity with her audience is her accessibility, and this accessibility is intrinsically linked to the interactive nature of the networked communities she is a part of. Social media sites like YouTube allows for mediated interaction across both time and space, meaning micro-celebrities not only develop parasocial relationships with their communities, but interactive quasi-parasocial relationships. Dibble et al. (2016) draw upon the definition of parasocial relationship as a “enduring, long‐term, and usually positive, one‐sided intimacy at a distance that users develop toward media performers, based on repeated encounters” (p. 24). Based initially around the phenomena of television, the principles apply in social media, albeit with one key difference: it’s not always one-sided. Microcelebrities like Zoella interact with their fans – not every single one, especially since Zoella has an audience in the many millions – but there is at least a possibility of interaction. The avenues are there. For Zoella, this interaction may be simple – for example, favouriting a comment – or more engaged, such as answering a question in a video or meeting fans in person. Either way, Zoella’s personality on YouTube hinges on her ability to be interactive with her fans. She addresses them directly with pronouns (Sugg, 2017) and regularly answers their questions (Sugg, 2014, 2018). This leads her to be seen as authentic, as she is giving time and energy to interact genuinely with her fans with no seemingly ulterior motive. However, this interactivity and ability to connect is stressed by YouTube as a crucial aspect of channel growth and maintenance (YouTube, 2017) and thus functions as an exercise in maintain her status.  The accessibility of Zoella’s interaction within her community has created an identity for her that is seen as authentic, despite it having a second, more tactical function.

“Let Me Into Your Life” – Intimacy And Relatability With An Audience

Another aspect of Zoella’s accessibility ties into a specific sense of intimacy she shares with her audience. Revealing personal information online for a sense of intimacy online is common among microcelebrities – those on Twitter reveal personal information to create this sense of intimacy (Marwick & Boyd, 2011), and Abidin (2015) extends this to microcelebrities regardless of platform. A study of the most subscribed YouTube channels found that when a microcelebrity disclosed more personal information about themselves, they were perceived as more ‘authentic’ and ‘real’ (Ferchaud et al., 2018). Videos of Zoella discussing her anxiety have views in the many millions – the most popular with over 4 million (Sugg, 2012) – which shows she also partakes in this phenomenon, and she often shares stories about her fears or feelings. These microcelebrities act as if you are their friend, and they invite you into a personal sphere that blurs the lines of professionalism and renegotiates affective labour (Abidin, 2015). Zoella is exhibiting a performance of her private life (Jerslev, 2016), and an intimacy and authenticity that has not been seen from traditional celebrities pre-Web 2.0. This fracturing of what we have traditionally understood as independent areas of identity – the public and private sphere – is not unique to microcelebrities, as ideas of privacy have changed as teens develop identities online (Marwick & Boyd, 2014) as a result of interacting in new networked publics.  However, microcelebrities like Zoella experience this on an extremely high level, and it is necessitated as part of the privileged position afforded to them from their communities. It’s a cornerstone to the influencer economy that Zoella is a part of and her success is dependent on the commodification and construction of her intimacy (Berryman & Kavka, 2017). What is critical again in this case that partaking in this intimacy is a necessary part of Zoella’s identity in these communities, and it is a community-sourced value – but builds and maintains her status in these communities – both of which indicate upholding that value doesn’t necessarily come from authenticity and reflects the conflict of authenticity inherent in Zoella’s identity.

A second aspect of Zoella’s authenticity is her relatability is the fact she behaves “just like us” and that she is relatable on a day-to-day basis. This primarily concerns notions of arrogance and vanity, and that she doesn’t believe she is more superior to her fans (García-Rapp, 2017). The authenticity of a YouTube microcelebrity is their claim to distinctiveness and is developed through their affective and relational labour (Cunningham & Craig, 2017). If Zoella is not seen as relatable, she loses the support of the community that maintains her status (Jerslev, 2016). The authenticity of a microcelebrity is so ingrained in the social media zeitgeist that an individual’s need for popularity corresponds to the level of expression of this relatable authenticity they exhibit (Lim et al., 2015). Again, this shows that whilst the community sees her relatability as authentic, she is forced to maintain it for her status and that can lead to inauthentic displays of relatability.

Relatability Part 2: How Zoella Makes Elitism Seem Attainable

A second aspect of the relatability of Zoella is the notion that she has no traits that assign her a more elite status than that of her viewers, and that her status is attainable. Where traditional celebrities are often restricted by industry establishments, wealth and other privileges, the perceived removal of such barriers and gatekeepers online means there is an attitude that “anyone can become famous” (García-Rapp, 2017). Microcelebrities are entirely responsible and ‘own’ their fame (Jerslev, 2016) which gives them a credence of authenticity and relatability. Beauty vloggers like Zoella especially position herself like us – and if you work as hard as she did, you too can be just like her (García-Rapp, 2017). She’s seen as a big sister among her community – there is a sense she’s different to other celebrities with similar audience sizes (Berryman & Kavka, 2017). Looking at how attitudes of fame and success exist online, García-Rapp (2017) notes that the communities position effort and self-motivation as the reasons for a beauty vlogger’s status – and “those who do not achieve success are blamed for not wanting it enough or not working hard” (p. 128). This attitude, of course, ignores the reality that the most popular 5% of any given society, for example – including an online society – definitionally can only be filled by 5% of that population. However, it permeates through western internet culture, and as such, Zoella and her community must adhere to the principles of egalitarianism – that everyone has equal opportunity and it’s entirely up to the individual to make the most of it. It has been shown that online communities form the same hierarchical structure as other social groups and that the perceived freedoms that the internet has are not necessarily greater than that of broader society (Himelboim, 2011). Marwick (2013) argues that the very culture of Web 2.0 follows that of the ideals of Silicon Valley, and whilst it envisions itself as a revolutionary new force, in reality it is merely an extension of the cultural forces that existed prior to it. Therefore, it’s important to note that this egalitarian ideal – the accessibility of fame, is not universal. In Korean communities, for example, it’s common for microcelebrities to not have this aspirational value set, whilst still operating as fully functioning self-branded individuals (Song, 2018). For Zoella with her predominately western value-set, this is not the case. The conclusion from this is that the culture of the broader community contextualises the values of smaller subcommunities that form within it, which in turn dictates the values of their self-appointed leaders – the microcelebrity. This could manifest as selection strategy, where only the individuals who display these attitudes will become popular, but it becomes a presented performance in order to maintain and increase a microcelebrity’s relatability, else the microcelebrity does not survive (García-Rapp, 2017) and this forces the construction of authenticity.

Authenticity As A Deliberate Strategy – The Self Branding of Zoella

A further aspect about the performed identity of Zoella is that it is remarkably stable and consistent, not unlike the brand of a business. Her videos are edited, constructed identities, not just performed. This creates a notable conflict between the values exhibited by Zoella’s behaviour and her community: she is simultaneously accessible and relatable as a personality, but she does this within the confines of an identity that is both constructed and restrictive. The fact she is performing an identity is not a matter a concern, as Pearson (2009) argues that the identities that are found on social media networks are “deliberately constructed performances”. This aligns with the nature of identity as a performative phenomenon. The foundational view of how identity and performance are interwoven comes from sociologist Goffman (Campbell, 2018; Pearson, 2009). Goffman’s view of identity – a performance depending on context – reveals how the identities of microcelebrities is a complex, conflicting phenomenon. He notes that an individual will take on a particular set of behaviours, performing a role to a certain group of observers in a certain setting (Goffman, 1959). Whilst originally developed in the context of face-to-face interaction, the same principles apply online, where individuals take on different identities based on the social network they are on and the people they are communicating to (Campbell, 2018). However, microcelebrities are a little different, as due to the nature of their self-branding behaviours, their personalities are ultimately restricted to “one” performance. For the case of Zoe Sugg, she’s been performing the Zoella identity since the inception of her channel in 2007, with very little change. It’s worth noting that Sugg stopped posting on the Zoella identity on YouTube in June 2018 and now posts as Zoe Sugg (YouTube, 2020a).

A lot of behaviours undertaken by Zoella on YouTube reflect the behaviour of a carefully curated brand. The very words vloggers like Zoella choose when speaking in their videos are carefully optimised to improve their search ranking and discoverability, and ultimately increase their audience size (Abidin & Brown, 2019). They specifically add highly searched keywords into their speech, as well as “strategic verbal expressions, language choice, speech pace, enunciation, and minimization of background noise” (p. 23). This reveals just how precise and pervasive the self-branding is as part of microcelebrity and Zoella’s identity. Self-branding is the application the marketing strategies usually applied to that of a business, and viewing the self as a “stable commodity” (Marwick, 2013, p. 166). The third factor about the constructed personality of Zoella is that it can be often consistent and at intensities that does not lead to a nuanced representation of their identity. These stringent performances mean they are effectively playing a character for long periods of time and adopting it as part of – or in replacement of – their identity. This comes as part of their self-branding tactics (Song, 2018) and gives them very potent, specific personality traits, very similar to that of a corporate brand. It raises the question – is the community that forms around Zoella connecting with an idea, or a human? Is the sense of networked community one that is built around and with the microcelebrity, or derived from them? These conflicts and ironies do not go unnoticed by academic literature on the subject. Jerslev (2016) notes that “microcelebrity produces the self as brand and commodity” (p. 5240) and that Zoella merges both the branded commercial aspects of her identity and the authentic intimate self. It is a conflict that seems inbuilt into the nature of a microcelebrity: they must have a relatable, accessible identity, but the commercial reality of their status means that identity becomes a carefully constructed performance regardless of context. Upon the examination of the nature of Zoella’s authenticity, the presentation of it is the key value for her community – her audience connects with the markers of authenticity even if Zoella’s construction of those markers don’t necessarily come from a place of genuine authenticity.

Conclusion

Online communities in social media networks has brought with them new ways of understanding and experiencing identity, and the experiences of community leaders as rendered by microcelebrities is just one such example. For the case of YouTube microcelebrity Zoella, her identity is specifically linked to the community that forms around her and is dictated by the values and expectations contained within. She has a experience of a performed identity that emphasises the values of relatability, accessibility, and a specific constructed personality. She must be intimate and available to her fans, as well as portray the values that equalises her with her fans lest she be seen as elite. However, the constraints of her status, and the scale of it, results in a self-branded, constructed personality that seemingly conflicts with the fluidity of organic authentic identities. However, Zoella’s YouTube community connects with the markers of authenticity in her online identity despite her artificial construction of them to retain her microcelebrity status. Almost beholden to their communities, Zoella – and microcelebrities as a whole – are a unique phenomenon as part of the way Web 2.0 facilitates connection between individuals, where their identity – and authenticity of it – is genuinely received as such despite being deliberately constructed. 

Reference List

Abidin, C. (2015). Communicative intimacies: Influencers and Perceived Interconnectedness. Ada, 8, 1-16. https://doi.org/10.7264/N3MW2FFG

Abidin, C., & Brown, M. L. (2019). Microcelebrity around the globe : approaches to cultures of internet fame. Emerald Publishing.

Arya, H. B., & Mishra, J. K. (2012). Oh! Web 2.0, Virtual Reference Service 2.0, Tools & Techniques (II). Journal of Library & Information Services in Distance Learning, 6(1), 28-46. https://doi.org/10.1080/1533290X.2012.660878

Berryman, R., & Kavka, M. (2017). ‘I Guess A Lot of People See Me as a Big Sister or a Friend’: the role of intimacy in the celebrification of beauty vloggers. Journal of Gender Studies: Mediated Intimacies: Bodies, Technologies and Relationships, 26(3), 307-320. https://doi.org/10.1080/09589236.2017.1288611

Campbell, J. (2018). Online Self-Identities, Social Norms, and the Performance of Self in Real-Life. International Journal of Virtual Communities and Social Networking (IJVCSN), 10(2), 24-40. https://doi.org/10.4018/IJVCSN.2018040102

Cunningham, S., & Craig, D. (2017). Being ‘really real’ on YouTube: authenticity, community and brand culture in social media entertainment. Media International Australia, 164(1), 71-81. https://doi.org/10.1177/1329878×17709098

Dibble, J. L., Hartmann, T., & Rosaen, S. F. (2016). Parasocial Interaction and Parasocial Relationship: Conceptual Clarification and a Critical Assessment of Measures. Human Communication Research, 42(1), 21-44. https://doi.org/10.1111/hcre.12063

Ferchaud, A., Grzeslo, J., Orme, S., & LaGroue, J. (2018, 2018/03/01/). Parasocial attributes and YouTube personalities: Exploring content trends across the most subscribed YouTube channels. Computers in Human Behavior, 80, 88-96. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.10.041

García-Rapp, F. (2017). ‘Come join and let’s BOND’: authenticity and legitimacy building on YouTube’s beauty community. Journal of Media Practice, 18(2-3), 120-137. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682753.2017.1374693

Goffman, E. (1959). The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Anchor Books.

Himelboim, I. (2011). Civil Society and Online Political Discourse: The Network Structure of Unrestricted Discussions. Communication Research, 38(5), 634-659. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650210384853

Jerslev, A. (2016). In the time of the microcelebrity: Celebrification and the YouTuber Zoella. International Journal of Communication, 10, 5233-5251.

Lim, J. S., Nicholson, J., Yang, S.-U., & Kim, H.-K. (2015, 2015/11/01/). Online authenticity, popularity, and the “Real Me” in a microblogging environment. Computers in Human Behavior, 52, 132-143. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.05.037

Loh, J. (2018). Why YouTube creator Hank Green wants to kill the influencer. Marketing Mag. https://www.marketingmag.com.au/hubs-c/feature-hank-green-kill-influencer/

Marwick, A. (2013). Status update : celebrity, publicity, and branding in the social media. Yale University Press.

Marwick, A., & Boyd, D. (2011). To See and Be Seen: Celebrity Practice on Twitter. Convergence, 17(2), 139-158. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856510394539

Marwick, A., & Boyd, D. (2014). Networked privacy: How teenagers negotiate context in social media. New Media & Society, 16(7), 1051-1067. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444814543995

Pearson, E. (2009). All the World Wide Web’s a stage: The performance of identity in online social networks. First Monday, 14(3).

Song, H. (2018). The Making of Microcelebrity: AfreecaTV and the Younger Generation in Neoliberal South Korea. Social Media + Society, 4(4). https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305118814906

Sugg, Z. [Zoella]. (2012, November 2012). Dealing with Panic Attacks & Anxiety | Zoella. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-iNOFD27G4

Sugg, Z. [Zoella]. (2014, June 15). Anxiety Q&A | Zoella. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjuk3WMZByo

Sugg, Z. [Zoella]. (2017, December 7). November Favourites 2017 | Zoella. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgvQzWAhoiw

Sugg, Z. [Zoella]. (2018, February 26). November Favourites 2017 | Zoella. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8k1JvSBHlc

YouTube Creators. (2017, June 19). Connect with your audience – featuring Nick Uhas. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBWGznmxwTg

YouTube. (2020a). Zoe Sugg – YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrUbqTCagwsaP2Fmr0p1TsA

YouTube. (2020b). Zoella – YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/user/zoella280390