Influencer marketing is one of the best strategies to build brand awareness and get your products or service seen by thousands, even millions, of people. Working with an influencer agency can help streamline the strategy process and result in a positive ROI - when done correctly.
Influencer campaigns are most than just sending products and waiting for magic to happen. The key to a successful campaign is to find the right partner who can tell your brand story, connect with a target audience, and ultimately, increase sales conversions.
Deciding whether or not your business should invest in influencer marketing is not an easy task. This blog post will go over some helpful questions to ask before starting an influencer partnership.
When assessing influencers for your campaign, you must first determine if they naturally align with your brand values.
Take a look at the influencer’s previous content, feed aesthetic, and audience engagement. This will give you an idea of their niche, style, and what they are all about. It will also indicate whether the person will be able to promote your products or service in an authentic way – a key factor in achieving a successful campaign.
If it doesn’t feel quite right, it probably isn’t. Thankfully, there is no shortage of influencers that you can move on to.
Taking a look at an influencer’s audience is just as important, if not more important, than the influencer themselves. You have to make sure that their followers can be your ideal customer.
For example, if you deal with activewear for women, consider reaching out to fitness influencers, health bloggers, or online trainers. These influencers likely have a follower community that is already interested in health and fitness content, which aligns with the product you offer. If your product is at a higher price point though, or is geared at women, you'll want to pull the influencer's demographics to ensure that the majority of their audience matches the gender and household income level of your target audience.
When it comes to conversions, vanity metrics like follower count or likes mean very little – but we’ll dive more into that in the next question.
It’s true that people are still buying fake followers in hopes of becoming successful influencers. Thankfully, it’s pretty easy to determine if a person’s social media audience is fake.
For instance, if their follower count is growing unbelievably quick but their engagement remains the same or decreases, it’s a pretty obvious sign that their audience growth is not authentic. True influencers – who actually influence people, tend to have steady growth in their following numbers.
Tools like HypeAuditor can also help you check any Instagram account for fake followers and engagement.
When it comes to follower count, bigger doesn’t always mean better. Engagement rate is a key metric to evaluate an influencer’s ability to generate potential leads through your campaign.
One of the best ways to assess an influencer’s engagement rate is to browse through the comments section. This will not only give you an idea about the quality of the influencer’s audience but also whether they interact with their community on a consistent basis.
While micro and nano influencers tend to have higher engagement rates, marketing trends are showing that mega influencers still have a slight upper hand when it comes to actual conversions. Ultimately, your campaign goals and budget will help you decide which type of influencer to leverage.
While Instagram is the clear winner for influencer marketing campaigns, other platforms should not be ignored.
Many influencers also have their own websites, blogs, or YouTube channels. Why not see if the influencer can also publish a review on their blog or film a video tutorial for their channel?
In general, the lifespan of blog or video content far exceeds that of a photo, giving you an additional opportunity to expand your brand reach.
Before reaching out to an influencer, browse through their previous posts to see the types of products or services they’ve promoted in the past. An influencer’s previous collaborations will give you an idea as to how they would carry out your campaign.
This will also help you determine if their creative approach aligns with your brand messaging, and of their ability to promote your brand in an authentic way.
Making sure your influencer partners understand FTC compliance is an important legal component of your marketing campaign. After all, it’s a business partnership!
The FTC’s guidelines are extensive, so it’s important for both businesses and influencers to have a thorough understanding of disclosure requirements. Some of the key points to be aware of include:
• Influencers should always disclose if a product or service has been gifted.
• Using terms like “ad” or “sponsored” in both Instagram captions and stories.
• Tagging the business partner in all sponsored content.
• Using Instagram’s paid partnership disclosure feature.
Before you work with an influencer, you’ll need to determine how you want them to showcase your products or service. This can affect how much they will charge for a sponsored post – so it’s important to consider usage in advance. For example, maybe you are looking for an influencer to use your product in a tutorial. This will require more work on the influencer’s end so they will likely increase their rates to create this type of content. Or you could be planning to feature an influencer's content in an ad, changing the usage from organic to paid which comes with a premium
Ultimately, you need to look at your marketing budget and consider the possible gain from the influencer partnership you’re interested in.
With so many influencers online today, it can be overwhelming to find the best partner to promote your brand. Asking these questions will help narrow down your list and set up your campaign for success.
Are you ready to take your influencer campaign to the next level?
Let us help you find the perfect fit for your business.
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