Influencer marketing is a form of online marketing that more and more brands are adopting. This phrase has been trendy for a while now mainly due to the fact that it is regularly brought to the forefront by the media or in social media.
However, there are still people who don’t really understand what influencer marketing means. Indeed, some people encounter the phrase for the first time and instantly think: “What is influencer marketing?”.
So, I’ve prepared this article to give you a guide on what it is, how it helps your business and how to create a successful strategy using this marketing method.
1. What is influencer marketing?
Before defining what influencer marketing is, we need to clarify what an influencer is. This term is given to a person who, through their words and actions, has a significant impact on a niche audience.
Thus, this person succeeds in influencing the choices of the community he or she addresses through the content he or she creates and publishes on social media.
Influencer marketing is an influencer who delivers the messages of the brands they work with to their followers so that the community makes a buying decision based on the trust given to the influencer.
With influencer marketing, a relationship is established between the brand and the target audience of the niche the influencer is building, adding value to the messages and increasing the brand’s sales conversion potential.
2. How many types are marketing influencers?
Influencers can be divided into many categories, especially if we talk about the fields in which they work, for example food, fitness, travelling, etc. But to better define which are the main categories of influencers, they are divided according to the number of followers.
- Nano-influencers – represents the category with a community of between 1,000 – 10,000 followers. Even if it is a smaller community, chances are they have the highest engagement rate.
Typically, people in the first category work on a low budget or barter system. So if your marketing budget is limited, you can start with such a collaboration to test what impact it has on your business. - Micro-influencers – is the category with a community of between 10,000 – 100,000 followers. By expanding the number of followers, they bring a very good visibility of the brand in the community.
Moreover, micro-influencers have a high interaction rate that is liked by contributors. - Macro-influencers – Community with between 100,000 – 1 million followers. This category usually includes public figures. They can guarantee tremendous exposure, but the conversion rate is lower compared to niche communities.
- Nano-influencers – Community that has over 1 million followers. This category is dedicated to stars, celebrities, especially from the music and film industry.
Although they have a fabulous number of followers, the level of trust in recommendations is low and the costs are extremely high. Followers usually know that at the heart of that content promoting a brand is a collaboration that the artist or public figure has entered into.
3. What does an influencer do for your business?
This person who is referred to as an influencer plays an important role for your business because they can change a consumer’s buying behavior in your favor.
Depending on the needs your business has, an influencer can have an impact on:
- notoriety – participate in the growth of your own community through new fans or subscribers and traffic to your site.
- sales – can generate leads that later turn into new customers.
- target audience – helps you reach a new audience that trusts your products.
- content – they can deliver new content that you can use across all channels to engage your potential customers.
4. Where do you find influencers?
If you want to collaborate with a micro-influencer, the easiest way is to write directly to them on the social network you see them being most active on.
However, if you want to contact an influencer with a larger community, it’s best to use other methods as they receive many messages daily and the chances of them reading yours are very low.
So, here are some methods to reach the influencer you want:
- Turn to influencer agencies.
- Work with an online marketing or PR agency.
- Identify the right one through the Explore section on Instagram or Trending on YouTube.
- Follow the hashtags used by them.
- Visit specialised platforms such as:
5. How do you choose the right influencer for what you offer?
Before looking for the right influencer, it’s a good idea to set your expectations of them. What do you want to get out of working with an influencer? What is the purpose for which you have chosen this method of promotion?
You need to identify which of your company’s problems will be solved by working with an influencer. Moreover, it is important to know what the pluses and minuses of your business are so that you are transparent with yourself first.
For example, if you’re just starting out and you want to be known, you appeal to a certain category of influencers. But if you’re already known as a brand and you’re launching a new product for a new category of audience, then you need an influencer to match.
So, if you’ve set your goals and expectations, it will be much easier to identify the right influencer for what you offer.
As you begin your search, keep in mind that the influencer will only agree to work with you if your product fits their lifestyle. If you own a fast food restaurant and want to promote it, you certainly won’t be calling a fitness instructor.
At the same time, you need to make sure that influencer’s audience is interested in your product and that there is potential for conversion in purchasing it.
Furthermore, track their activity and identify the pluses and minuses that you consider advantageous or avoidable in working with you. Track the quality of content, community engagement and the platform on which they have the most interactions with followers.
6. Advantages and disadvantages of a niche influencer
Depending on the audience you are targeting, you need to be very careful what you focus on. The biggest advantages of a niche influencer are that they are very close to the community and have a high degree of credibility, and the chances of conversion are very high.
By being a community based, you are assured that your message as a brand reaches exactly how and where you want it to. And more often than not, the results are what you expect.
What’s more, working with such influencers costs much less than working with other influencer categories.
However, the downside is that niche influencers usually have a small community of followers, so you won’t reach very many people at once. If you want to increase brand awareness or accelerate sales, this community may not help you as much as expected.
At the same time, there’s even the possibility that they don’t have experience working with a brand and don’t know the right ways to showcase your product to your audience.
That’s why it’s important to set realistic goals and look for the right influencer for your current needs. These can change over time, so your strategy may be different each time.
7. How do you ensure the authenticity of influencer marketing folowers?
It is very important to make sure of the authenticity of the followers who have formed the community the influencer is promoting and relying on in this activity.
Since this trend emerged, there have also been numerous scandals whereby big influencers have been found to have opted to buy followers through various platforms.
Thus, brands were paying for influencers’ promotion services to a fictitious community of bots and fake accounts.
To find out how many of your followers are real, how they have changed over time, where they come from and other audience details, check out the following accounts:
Another precautionary method is to track the ratio of the number of followers to the number of likes and comments on posts. For example, if an influencer has 100,000 followers but only 100 likes, it’s definitely a red flag.
It’s also wise to pay attention to the frequency of posts and the type of engagement that account has. If there are no actual comments posted by people in the influencer’s community, then there’s a problem again.
8. The most popular social media channels for influencer marketing
Influencers are trying to keep up with social media trends and be present on all platforms. However, most of the time each influencer specializes on one channel where they spend 80% of their time online.
In terms of platform notoriety, the most accessed platforms are:
- TikTok – Short, entertaining video formats have become increasingly popular so brands have adopted this style to interact with Generation Z youth.
That’s why a tik tok influencer marketer is highly sought after this year to represent brands to audiences. - Instagram – The channel of choice for both the public and influencers. In addition to short-form video content, Instagram comes bundled with specialized content in the photo section.
- Facebook – The place where the majority began to develop a community. Although many social networks have emerged in the meantime, Facebook remains one of the most relevant networks that brings the desired conversions.
- YouTube – Whether you want to learn something new or want to listen to a podcast, more and more artists and brands are making an appearance on this platform.
9. Ads and influencer marketing
No matter what your business, it’s very important to make yourself known to the public. If you run a business, you can use an influencer. But who do they turn to in order to get themselves known and get to the point where they are sought after for collaborations?
The most relevant way for influencers to get known is paid advertising. This way they will reach the desired brands and form a community that shares the same principles and values.
So, with Facebook Ads, Instagram Ads, Tik Tok Ads and ads on any platform you increase both community and personal brand awareness as an influencer.
That’s why we at unosoft have developed various courses and materials for you to help you on this fascinating online journey.
10. What is influencer marketing not?
Influencer marketing is, in fact, a tool through which companies create a communication bridge with their audience, facilitating the rapid messaging process and promoting products from a perspective that appeals to consumers.
An influencer marketer is not your brand ambassador. Typically, ambassadors are customers who are happy with your products and services and recommend them to family and friends without expecting a reward and without entering into a relationship.
An influencer marketer is not an affiliate marketing agency. The two categories can exist simultaneously, but have different benefits to the person performing them.
Most of the time, affiliate marketers promote your product in a different context (videos, articles, their own posts) to earn a commission if purchases are made through them.
11. How do you create a successful influencer marketing strategy?
To determine which strategy is right, you need to consider the following steps:
- Determine the purpose of the promotional campaign.
- Choose the social media platform you want to promote on.
- Identify the right niche for your business.
- Choose who you want to work with – micro-influencers or influencers with a larger community?
- Set the expectations you have of your advocacy campaign.
- Set a budget that you are willing to invest in this campaign.
- Decide what timeframe you need to work within to get the results you want – do you want immediate results or do you want awareness over time?
- Identify the message you want to convey to your audience.
- Adapt your strategy as the campaign unfolds, based on the interaction of your followers and the impact you have on them.
12. How do you measure the results of an influencer marketing campaign?
Campaign results are primarily exposed by the social media platform on which the campaign takes place. However, among the methods of measuring impact you should look at the following aspects:
- Website traffic – The best way to monitor traffic is to give the influencer a unique link to promote. That way, you’ll see how many hits and conversions were generated by that link.
- Insights posts/stories – Ask the influencer to provide you with campaign stats to promote your brand. In these stats you will discover the number of impressions, exists, replicas, reach, engagement, likes, comments and unique accounts that saved the post.
- Followers – When an influencer is successful in promoting brands, the latter will have an increase in followers compared to the pre-campaign period.
- Hashtags – if you have a hashtag dedicated to your campaign and want to monitor how many people are using it, you can find out directly from the platform.
13. Conclusion
Every brand is fighting for the attention of users of social media platforms. Digitization has become more and more widespread across all services, so the number of new users on these platforms will increase daily.
An influencer marketer manages to reach your target audience while maintaining a natural feel and language that is commonplace to their community, so promoting your products is not just a regular advertisement, but a friendly recommendation.
That’s why it’s important for brands to consider the advice of online marketing agencies that are always on trend with the latest news and have expertise in this broad field called marketing.
