The final speakers in this session at the AANZCA 2025 conference are Kieran McGuinness, Hannah Adler, and Susan Grantham, further exploring the role of influencers in the TikTok and Instagram campaigns of the major parties during the 2025 Australian federal election. This project surveyed Australian voters for their experiences with political content on these platforms during the election, some months after the election. It received some 1661 responses from a diverse group of participants.
Participants used these platforms at minimum several time a week; around 50% used them several times a day or more. There were no substantial gender differences in this use. They were divided on whether the political influencer content they encountered helped them make a decision on who to vote for; responses were evenly distributed across options from ‘not at all’ to ‘very much’.
Similarly, they ask had diverse views on whether influencers should stick to their normal content or express their political opinions alongside such content, and on whether they should have to disclose whether they had received financial support from politicians or parties, and/or their political connections.
This is interesting since the Australian Electoral Commission has already investigated one such influencer, Abby Chatfield, for her political affiliations; her videos during the campaign, for instance, were largely serious and providing commentary on the election.
