Establishing who Zoella's audience is aids in investigating how they use her content and products to fulfil the remit of a Prosumer. From the Lifestyle category, the most fitting would be Trendies and Groupies; these are people in society who yearn to just be normal, and seeking this advice through Zoella's content initially adheres to Prosumer tendencies. Due to this need for guidance, we can assume (and confirm by YouGov statistics) that her demographic is young women, specifically 18-25. Their slight left-leaning politics also conforms to their Income and Status Model stance of C2DE; this is authentic to her content as it is not political, this is perhaps a sense of escapism (Uses and Gratifications) to an idillic life she has created and perpetually represents, encouraging a participatory culture as involving her audience is par for the course in her job, but marshalling a sense of community and intimacy fulfils the gap that contemporary politics is making wider.
The amount of success Zoella has amalgamated, of course, has to peak and in many ways, it likely has. What critics have labelled as her 'irrelevancy' is due to her content becoming so familiarised, predictable and generally, boring. She is becoming swamped and out-shone by other, smaller YouTubers who will actively seek out their content, albeit with their strong distaste for her, just to complain about her. Evidence from this primarily stems from the tabloid-style caption 'SCAMELLA STRIKES AGAIN!!! (Zoella's worst career move yet)'.
Whilst this specific Youtuber adheres to the End Of Audiences Theory by actively creating content of their own, she also adheres to Baurillad's simulacrum of Post-Modernism as by creating content about content about content, you are effectively heightening the amount of the same thing that gets put out. But, this isn't all she does to adhere to this. As much as she is criticising Zoella, she has copied her content style; the same camera angle, the same subject content usually (hair and make-up), the same intimate setting
In a similar vein, some audience members may use Zoella's online media to construct their own identity; her internet fame has earned her many successes, one of those being the title of a pioneer to vlogging, taking an open stance on mental health awareness as illustrated in the 'Life' and 'Anxiety' categories which are used to explore her own intimate experiences, subsequently flagging to her audience that they shouldn't feel ashamed about talking about these issues, as it's evidently brought their role model a lot of success by doing so. Reasoning behind seeing Zoella as a role model would be that her ideologies are simple, and emancipated enough from harsh issues to align with, particularly given her audience is primarily young, impressionable women, which YouGov estimated to be between 18-24.
This broad communication may allude to the Uses and Gratifications Model as the personal identification given promotes that sharing thoughts and feelings is healthy due to the connection and relationships it establishes, just as Zoella has gradually accumulated with her fan-base. Within any of Zoella's articles, there is the use of brackets, and this emulates the form of gossiping which strengthens the sister-like bond between the content creator and the consumer, but also that how you communicate is irrelevant; all that matters is that you do!
Zoella acts as an agony aunt for her fans, and this includes audiences being able to construct their social life by being 'real', which is sampled through her vlogs as every activity she does with her friends are typical; there are hardly any affluent-based, pretencious weekend holidays, they are always simple little get togethers that are easily replicable for audiences.
This being said, her audiences are affected by Zoella's ideologies directly, due to exposure of the Cultivation Theory; an audience's exposure to the repeated consumerist factions are bound to eventually have an effect. The certain branded 'must-have' items and the photographic evidence of fresh-faced Zoe alludes to her prominent ideology of not only buying things, but buying new things is important, particularly to Groupies or Trendies from the lifestyle category, regardless if it distinguishes or camouflages them. It allows them to slot into mainstream society which furthermore appeals to their basic need to belong.
Alternatively, the 'Egoists' in her audience can construct their identity through the way in which she directly addresses the audience, encouraging social interaction, fulfilling yet another category of the Uses and Gratifications Model. This exclusitivity, despite the foresight of knowing there is a massive community behind her, promotes the ideology that 'self' is important, which is used to help the audience construct their own identity with the realisation that self-worth is prevalent and integral in a society in which movements such as feminism. etc, are becoming part of the norm. This artificial platform where people may feel secluded suddenly becomes an affectionate community through the direct address, be it verbal or physical (looking at the camera and leaning towards it) in most of her content, which promotes and illustrates the sense of unity, security and confidence.
Referencing Stuart Hall's Reception Theory, a preferred reading to this text may be the contentness and fulfilment as there is a sense of immaculacy to certain points of her 'Life' section such as her idillic, aesthetically pleasing interior design or traditionalistic relationship which may through a series of Echo Chambers prompt the ideology into the view of importance that appearance is key.
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