Description
Are you here for the right reasons? If you’ve ever watched ten minutes of any of the shows from ABC’s The Bachelor franchise, you’ve heard that question. And if you’re a regular viewer, you’ve probably noticed that the meaning of this question has changed overtime. What used to be a somewhat believable reality television show about young twenty-somethings vying for the love and affection of ABC’s cookie-cutter lead, has shifted drastically over the last two decades due to the rise of social media and smartphones. Due to this convergence, the authenticity of The Bachelor has been compromised. The show is now powerful marketing tool used by contestants hoping to capitalize off the narratives and personas constructed by producers by obtaining brand deals and sponsorships that align with their online persona or personal brand.
Analysis
The Bachelor gave its first rose out in March of 2002, this was four years before Myspace was the number one social media network on the internet, and before Facebook even existed. (Ngak, 2014) Print media was dominant in this era, but as social media and smartphones emerge, contestants gained a new medium to win over the audience.
Alex Michel was the first bachelor choosing Amanda Marsh as his finalist (Wolf, 2002). Despite being the pioneers of ABC’s hit reality TV show, Michel has no social media that I could find through a google search. Marsh has done some interviews with the press since her Bachelor debut, but currently has less than two thousand followers on Instagram-- and based off her feed, seems to lead a life of someone who’s never been a public figure. Almost all the Bachelor leads and contestants prior to the social media era had almost no social media presence, a stark contrast to today where it seems to even be cast on a show like The Bachelor, being at least a micro-influencer is a requirement.
When I search leads and contestants that were on the show at any time during the social media era, the vast majority had significant followings. One of the biggest motivators for contestants in today’s digital era is sponsored posts. Some contestants are earning between $1,000 and $20,000, and sometimes more if they have over a million followers (Parker, 2023). Social media is especially advantageous to those who leave the show in the early weeks because it gives them a platform to continue to obtain a following and captivate their audience well past the shows end.
Take Ashley Iaconetti Haibon (aka Ashley I.) for example, who first appeared on Chris Soules’ season of The Bachelor in 2015. Iaconetti is one of the best examples of someone who left before midseason, but still managed to use her social media and her TV persona created by editors of the show to leverage a successful career. Today, Ashley has 1.2 million followers on her Instagram, two podcasts, a YouTube channel with over 14 thousand followers, a myriad of brand sponsorships, and a children’s book co-written with her husband, that contribute to her continued success.
Those who watched the show back in 2015, will remember Ashley as somewhat of an underdog. She was portrayed as a sensitive and tearful virgin, a character and persona hyperbolized (if not completely constructed) by producers. While some found her excessive crying in her struggles to find love to be tiresome, she garnered a wholesome fanbase that was rooting for the virgin girl who’s never had a serious boyfriend to get the rose.
In Ashley I’s first appearance on the show in 2015, Facebook was about 10 years old and Instagram was five years old. In September 2015, Instagram ads launched globally and by May of 2016, Instagram launched IG Business Pages, (Lee, 2023) this was a feature that Facebook had already launched and had over 40 million participants (Jalan, 2023). Another important factor during this time is that according to Pew Research, in 2015 64% of American adults owned a smartphone of some kind in comparison to the spring of 2011 where only 35% of adults owned one (Smith, 2020) Ashley’s season aired coincidentally right in the middle of this rapid convergence of social media, smartphones, and reality TV. This era is what created the blueprint for the social media influencing we see today. Most contestants are micro-influencers, using the show to amass a larger following, to make other industry connections, and secure brand deals and sponsorships that align with the marketing and branding for their personal brands.
At the time of this research, the 27th season of The Bachelor was airing so I decided to do a quick scroll through Reddit to find the names of a couple contestants who were mentioned the most in comments and look at their social media following to see how it grew over the course of two weeks. The contestants I chose to track were Kaity Biggar and Gabriella Elnicki Kaity had 42.9K followers on March 7, 2023 and by March 20, had 83.3K gaining over 40 thousand followers. Gabriella had 35.2K followers and by March 20 had 61.8K. They are both still currently on the show as finalist so the likelihood of reaching over 100K followers on Instagram by the season’s finale seems favorable.
Interpretation
While I won’t deny that of course, there has always been the allure of fame and publicity since the beginning of reality TV, the research shows that there has been an undeniable shift in what that reality TV fame and success looked like in 2002, versus what it looks like today with the influence of smartphones and social media. With this major convergence in the last decade, any sliver of authenticity that existed within the show and the contestants 20 years ago, has vanished.
My findings also suggest that The Bachelor’s casting methods seem to cater to micro and macro influencers. Which, I can only imagine is a tactic for the ABC Network to increase viewer ratings, further compromises the show’s authenticity. The best example of this is Christina Mandrell, a contestant who was sent home in week three. Mandrell currently has 134k followers, over double what the contestants who are finalists currently on the show have. A clear indication of an influencer with a substantial following before going on the show.
Evaluation
As a previous viewer of The Bachelor, I did stop watching in part because I felt like the cast members just wanted to secure a FabFitFun sponsorship. After my research, I’m not any more inclined to return to the show. I am not alone in feeling this way-- as I scrolled through Reddit, I found a rant post as recent as two months ago bashing the show with the user sneering that “everyone knows it’s a gateway to a lucrative social media career.” (Reddit User, 2023) We as viewers have caught on, and it’s getting so excessive the show has become unenjoyable for many. This could be a reason why the current finalists haven’t reached 100k yet despite the season coming to an end.
Despite The Bachelor devolving into a two-hour long influencer advertisement, there is research that suggests that because people are now more aware of brands using influencers as a marketing strategy, we are becoming smarter about where we choose to support and where we spend our money. Gen-Z in particular are wary if they perceive influencers to be deliberately advertising products and unabashedly pushing brands.(Pradhan, 2023)
The good thing is, that this growing skepticism in the upcoming generations gives a glimmer of hope that later down the line it may inspire policies or even new shows on Networks that don’t cater to people with social media followings. Perhaps one day ABC and other reality TV Networks will renew some of the authenticity that it used to have.
Engagement
Collectively as an audience, we are aware that influencer marketing is proven to bring a boost in sales and inevitably breeds a trust crisis from consumers. (Shen 2022) Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do to change ABC’s casting methods apart from just not watching the show, but we can be conscious consumers. With that in mind, I would encourage viewers to think about the intentions of today’s casting executive and the contestants participating in this ever-evolving social media era. As viewers that can now engage with their favorite reality TV personalities by supporting their brands, we have the tools to do the research and decide who is worth investing our money and social media attention to.
Sources:
1) Ashley Iaconetti's Instagram. Instagram. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.instagram.com/ashley_iaconetti/?hl=en
2) Jalan, A. (2023, February 5). The evolution of Facebook: From 2004 to Meta. MUO. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.makeuseof.com/evolution-of-facebook/
3) Lee, A. (2023, January 2). Instagram's history: Full evolution of instagram timeline (2023). PostBuilder. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://postbuilderapp.com/blog/instagram-history-and-updated-timeline
4) Ngak, C. (2014, February 4). Then and now: A history of social networking sites. CBS News. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/then-andnow-a-history-of-social-networking-sites/
5) Parker, S. (2023, January 23). So, how much do 'bachelor' & 'bachelorette' contestants get paid? TV Insider. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.tvinsider.com/762296/how-much-bachelor-bachelorette-contestants-paid/
6) Pradhan, Debasis (2023, January 1)"Influencer marketing: When and why gen Z consumers avoid influencers and endorsed brands". Psychology & marketing (0742-6046)
7) Shen, Rong-Ping (2022, December 1). "Your posts betray you: Detecting influencer-generated sponsored posts by finding the right clues". Information & management (0378-7206), 59 (8), p. 103719.
8) Smith, A. (2020, August 25). U.S. smartphone use in 2015. Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2015/04/01/us-smartphone-use-in-2015/
9) Too many Influencers. reddit. (n.d.). Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://www.reddit.com/comments/1062dxt?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
10) Wolf, B. (2002, April 26). Amanda Wins The Bachelor. ABC News. Retrieved March 21, 2023, from https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=101234&page=1