Influencer marketing is a loaded term. For gen Z, it's a sizeable part of their life on social media. For the non-digital natives, it can sometimes conjure up the idea of pseudo celebrities in swimwear swearing blind that they use a product that they are clearly holding upside down, with only the pay cheque in mind. Cynics assume an adolescent market of teenagers who rush to buy said product just because a reality TV show has said they should.
There's no absolute truth here. One demographic's divine liking is another's deep distrust. The debate rages as to whether paid influencer marketing is over, a bit worn, or utterly worthwhile. And don't get us started on nano-influencers...
In fact, celebrity marketing has a long history, some of it more than respectable, but some rather dull-witted activities have tainted the whole idea a little.
But influencer marketing can still be a useful part of your plans, without you having to feel dirty about it. Influencers aren’t necessarily celebrities, simply individuals who have a community which your company wishes to target and who are trusted in that community to deliver good, authentic content. And that content might be yours.
By sharing and recommending your content, an influencer can drive the profile of your products and services. And awareness and interest in your company and what it does is what starts to fill up the sales funnel.
Essentially, it’s an extension of word of mouth - where that word of mouth used to be peers, friends and family, it has now been extended to those we admire and respect but don’t know, mostly by the mechanics of social media.
In getting influencers to work for your brand, there are a number of routes, dependent on how the individual tends to operate. While you may want strict control of your brand and how it’s presented, the influencer may want equal control over what appears on their feed. There’ll need to be a bit of give or take (or an increase in their fees if you don’t relinquish some control).
You may find your brand ‘delivered’ in one or more of these ways:
Gifting
An influencer receives free products or services in return for them being mentioned. It’s often the most derided version of the genre, since it calls to mind greedy celebs who’ll do anything for a free lunch, but in a more business-like context, it still has some power. A more developed form of the process is for influencers to become brand ambassadors, where the use of your offerings is clear and long-term.
Sponsored content
This might be a blog post or a sponsored social media posting on the influencer’s accounts. So long as the nature of the sponsorship deal is clear, this is perfectly respectable. There’s an understanding amongst audiences that, while the content might not be as candid as it could be, there is still a genuine connection between the influencer and your products. The inverse of this is for an influencer to be commissioned to create content for your own blog or social media accounts as a form of sponsored content on your own spaces. They might also support hashtag campaigns to drive a level of awareness.
Social takeover
An extension of the above is when the influencer does a ‘social media takeover’ and posts on your accounts. This can mean you lose control of the messaging (for a day), but on the assumption that nothing combative would happen and the loan of their audience will mean that enough of those followers stick with you to be worthwhile.
Contests and giveaways
This is just an attempt to get your product or service direct to potential customers. The trade is that they are supposed to give you their data/information (subject to you all following the GDPR rules) in exchange for the possibility of a freebie. The influencer gives you access to their audience to allow that to happen. It may be that the influencer is happy with the data grab and the added-value to their audience. You can also offer affiliate codes or links which offer discounts on products (perhaps with a revenue share with the influencer).
None of these services are free (the cost ranges from the value of what you give away to the fees you may have to pay), so it’s important that you understand where it might be effective.
Just like any decent campaign, you need to know who you are targeting - who do you want to engage with your message? You may already know your audience well, or you might need to create personas to help you understand new markets, but the audience you want to grow must match the audience held by the influencer. They have to have influence where you need it, and have values that match your own.
You’ll also need to make clear what your strategic objectives are and monitor the success, or otherwise, of your campaign. Consider things like:
Brand awareness
More people knowing who you are and what you do.
Building reputation
The right influencer can alter how people think of you. Someone noted for their credentials or integrity in a certain field can lend you their halo.
Engagement
Building the numbers who follow and engage with your social media accounts and digital products, which might be listening to your podcast or signing up for your newsletters.
Sales growth or lead generation
Simple ‘buy this’ messages can have a significant impact.
Building new audiences
If you want a new demographic, previously unaware of your splendidness, then an influencer can introduce you.
Whatever the targets, you have to choose the influencer carefully. They have to bring certain qualities to the table, frustratingly, not all begin with an ‘r’:
Relevance
An influencer needs to be relevant to your brand. If you are running a travel brand, then someone noted for their indolence might not be the connection to make. They need to have attracted an audience relevant to your business.
Reach
They have to have an audience of significant numbers. The drop-off between their followers and those who jump over to join you will always be significant. They have to have enough to go round.
Resonance
Their audience has to be active and engaged. Huge numbers of passive watchers are no use to you. Look for high levels of comments and conversations, shares and recommendations.
Trust
Your influencer must have a degree of integrity so that audiences trust their recommendations. If it’s clear they are just doing it for the cash, it won’t help at all.
Finding an influencer with the qualities you need isn’t easy but they’ll be there, somewhere, on social media using the hashtags that you use, with the audience that you want and the engagement you need.
Once you find them, then make them part of a coherent campaign, with content and a social media strategy to support it (rather than a random experiment) and measure the impact as thoroughly as any other paid-for campaign.
And it might just deliver the audience and scale you were hoping for.
