Influencer marketing used to be limited to a select group of devoted bloggers. Social media influencers’ emergence, market saturation, and even fraud involvement appear to have happened recently.
If you’ve previously looked into influencer marketing, you could have run into conflicting advice, with proposals ranging from leveraging social influencers to suggesting they’re not necessary for success.
It’s harder than ever to navigate influencer marketing strategies. But we’re here to help you make sense of it all. Read on.
How to use influencer marketing for business
The list of tips below should potentially help you organize your marketing efforts if you’re ready to start building up an influencer marketing strategy.
Determine your goals
Influencer marketing is most frequently used to raise brand recognition and boost sales. However, you must be more detailed if you want your plan to actually succeed and provide noticeable outcomes.
It’s possible that you have a walk-in store and wish to enhance lead generation. Or perhaps you’re introducing an entirely new product that would be more appropriate for a somewhat different market than the one you currently serve.
The two examples have well defined aims. Your influencers may struggle to help you achieve your goals if they are unclear, and it will be difficult for you to monitor your progress. What are you trying to accomplish here, you might ask yourself? Establish quantifiable, actionable goals and be clear about your needs.
Choose your channels
You must choose a platform before deciding who you wish to collaborate with. It’s advisable to start out on one platform and just branch out to others later if you’re just starting out.
Facebook and Twitter are typically not so good choices, so that should help you choose your decision. The first is infamous for having a poor organic reach, which poses unique difficulties for influencer marketing. Unfortunately, the latter is a marketing black hole.
In general, Instagram is a terrific option, but it’s crucial to pick a platform that you are comfortable with and where you already have a following.
It’s also crucial to consider your target demographic and the places they frequent. Even if you believe that Instagram would be the ideal option for you given your experience with the network, adopting that platform won’t make sense if your target audience isn’t there.
Use this strategy if you’re still unsure where to begin:
Examine a few leading businesses in your sector to see where they succeed and where they seem to struggle. If you see a pattern, it might simply be that some social media platforms suit your specialty better than others. Put that information to your own use.
Plan your budget
Establishing your budget will enable you to choose the influencers you’ll work with and the campaign’s fundamental structure.
Let’s first become familiar with the going charges for various influencer categories. You don’t want to chuck money out the window because they differ so greatly.
Free products are frequently used as payment for micro-influencers, which may be the most cost-effective and effective strategy for a startup business. The celebrities at the other end of the spectrum have enormous fan bases, but any kind of cooperation are expensive.
Don’t be cheap. The lesser your payment, the less incentive influencers will have to produce favorable results for you. If money is short, get inventive and offer incentives to influencers (cost per conversion, cost per engagement, etc.).
Try looking among the individuals who are currently responding to your content for your ideal influencers. Fans that already support your business would be thrilled to have the chance to spread the word about it.
Work with the right people
Influencer marketing is more difficult than it was a few years ago. As this form of marketing evolved, so did the types of influencers that were created, each of which had a distinct purpose.
Micro-Influencer
Their fan base, which is typically confined to a specific niche, can number anywhere between a few thousand and tens of thousands of people. They provide sincere, genuine content, and as a result, their audiences are frequently quite engaged. Micro-influencers are therefore excellent for enhancing brand emotion and increasing brand trust.
Bloggers
Successful bloggers and vloggers typically have a large audience and operate a well-known page or profile. That helps to both raise brand awareness and increase conversions (mixed with other types of influencers). Remember that the most dominant aspect of them is their personality. Don’t restrict their ability to be innovative. By allowing people to be themselves, you’ll get the finest results.
Celebrity
These people are well-known and have sizable fan bases. Imagining the Kardashians. They are the group to turn to for general brand marketing, trust-building, and brand awareness. However, working with them is pricey. But it will be worthwhile if you can afford it.
Major Influencer (KOL)
They are the foremost authorities in their particular fields, frequently on a particular subject. KOLs are well-respected and have a large fan base of followers who are deeply interested in the topic at hand. KOLs are therefore excellent if your target audience is in a highly specialized industry, but they are also terrific for broad advertising and high-quality conversions.
Be picky
Work with influencers is challenging. While it’s critical to select the influencer category that best fits your requirements, you also need to be on the lookout for scams. Due to current market saturation, they have increased in frequency.
In addition to examining their rates, be sure to review their profile, peruse their posts, and keep an eye on their involvement. While engagement is a little trickier to buy than followers (though not impossible).
Consider whether an influencer has already posted about topics comparable to those you want them to. Look for any prior work done for brands similar to yours to see how well those posts fared. If you want to spend a significant amount of money on influencer marketing, doing this kind of research will save you a lot of hassle.
Final Thoughts
Influencer marketing will include similar steps to most marketing efforts, including research, identifying needs and goals, budgeting, identifying the suitable influencers, analysis, and revision. They demand effort and ongoing attention, but the effort is worthwhile.
