As smoooth as it gets: En kvalitativ studie om svenska betaltjänsten Klarnas användning av strategisk kommunikation på Instagram för att marknadsföra kreditbetalning till unga vuxna.

Sammanfattning: Today, financial technology (fintech) companies implement marketing strategies targeting young and financially inexperienced adults to increase their habits of consumption using credit. Among the services provided by these companies, the concept Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) is the one that stands out within the context of marketing. Although this is a common concept within an industry, this essay chooses to use the major Swedish fintech company Klarna as a representative candidate. The purpose of this essay is to contribute with knowledge about BNPL marketing to the field of strategic communication. This is done by studying, analyzing and trying to understand the communicative actions made by Klarna when attempting to reach a young target group on social media. In order to do this, an analysis of the company’s advertisements on Instagram was conducted using theories of influencer marketing, visual communication and social semiotics. What was discovered was the use of communicative resources that together seems to create a pattern indicating an attempt to reach and attract a young audience of potential consumers. The communicative resources that were uncovered in Klarna’s social media advertisements together formed messages communicating being young as well as living a life of luxury, youth, relaxation and consumption. These messages were considered to be a way to destigmatize the use of BNPL services among young adults in general and generation z in particular.