Investigating the impact of the characteristics of influential people and their pages on the behavioral intentions and purchase intentions of followers in social media

This research was conducted to investigate the impact of the characteristics of influential people and their pages on the behavioral intention and purchase intention of followers on the Instagram social network. This research is applied with a survey method. The statistical population of this research is Instagram social network users, 385 of them were randomly selected using Cochran's formula. The data collection tool in this research is a questionnaire. Spearman, Kolmogorov-Smirinov, Bartlett correlation, factor analysis, and structural equation modeling by SPSS and SMART-PLS statistical software were used for data analysis. The findings showed that behavioral intention and extra-social relationships have a positive effect on purchase intention, and homophily attitude has a positive effect on perceived trustworthiness and expertise. Also, physical attractiveness has a positive effect on extrasocial relationships, and social attractiveness has a positive effect on trustworthiness, perceived expertise, and extrasocial relationships. In addition, social interaction positively affects the flow status and information quality satisfaction with the Instagram page, and visual content positively affects the flow status and satisfaction with the Instagram page. The results showed that modeling the characteristics of influential people in social media can play an effective role in the purchase intention of users of these media.