Understanding Influencer Marketing

Chances are, you have at one time or the other, bought a particular brand of something - clothes, phone, cream, toiletry, etc for no real reason apart from the fact that your favorite musician, actor or leader endorsed that brand. Perhaps, you saw adverts where the cream was being applied by this favorite musician of yours. Maybe you saw that brand of clothes being worn by your favorite actor or someone you respect greatly. If you hadn't seen that advert, maybe you would not have really gone for that particular cream or cloth. You may have bought another brand or simply not bought any at all. But buy you did and that was majorly because these people you liked, trusted and respected also seemed to be using those products. In other words, you had been influenced....

Companies, products and service providers understand the tremendous power of these sorts of endorsement in influencing decisions. That's why they spend huge amounts getting celebrities and influencers to pitch their products. Endorsement and influencer marketing are quite similar in method and operation with only a few differences.

For us to really grasp the meaning and power of influencer marketing, it is necessary for us to know who an influencer is. 

An influencer is someone with an audience. The influencer is capable of affecting the purchasing decisions of this audience because of his or her skills, authority, knowledge, position, or relationship with these people.

The influencer isn't necessarily a celebrity or famous in the general sense. He may be your average, everyday Joe. What makes them unique though is the followings they've built via various means. The size of the following doesn't really matter, what matters is that he has a reputation with these people. They may see him as an expert in his field or as the most engaging in a particular topic. The followers come to know, trust, like and respect the influencer.

If we understand who an influencer is, then influencer marketing is the strategy of attempting to market your products, skills or services by leveraging the relationship and power an influencer has over his audience. It also refers to efforts to gain credibility, improve brands and generally get more exposure through collaborating with an influencer.

This type of marketing encompasses a broad spectrum of techniques, strategies and approaches. Generally though, successful influencer marketing involves:

1 Careful research: A successful influencer marketing campaign begins with research. You first have to locate the influencers you need for your particular products, skills and services.

You also want to tailor the nature of your influencer's audience to the industry you're in. Influencers with audiences built via a particular platform may be more suitable for certain products and services. Again, careful research is the key to finding out these nuances.

2 Smart budget allocation: Influencer marketing is usually paid advertising. If you're going to pay for the opportunity to leverage an influencer's audience, then you want to be smart about your spending. You want to deal with the influencers who offer you the most value for your money. You want to create an ongoing relationship with the influencers whose audiences are profitable even as you cut off those whose aren't. How do you differentiate between these influencers? You do so by:-

3 Tracking: If you don't track your influencer marketing campaigns, you have no way of knowing what campaigns or influencers are yielding and those who aren't.

There are several ways of tracking your influencer marketing efforts. If you're directly pitching your products or services to the influencer's audience, then you may want to track the average no of sales you get per campaign. There are several good tracking services that can assist you do this.

Or maybe you're not selling anything directly but just building your network or email list which you can market to subsequently. Then the number of people who opt in or subscribe to your newsletter per campaign will be the yardstick for gauging how effective the campaign is.

4 Scheduling, Frequency and Mode of contact: The scheduling of your marketing to an influencer's audience is also a factor affecting its success. You want to work closely with the influencer to find the best times to engage his audience.

You also want to employ the most effective forms of communication. Some audiences prefer e-mail. Others prefer webinars or podcasts. Still, some want to watch videos. The influencer should be able to inform you on these matters.

Once you've done this, then determine the frequency. Does the influencer's audience prefer communication once a day? Twice daily? Weekly etc. Once you find an influencer whose audience is profitable, make it a point to engage as frequently as the audience prefers even as you do so within budget.

The biggest issue marketers face is that of credibility and trust. In a world where people are being pitched to at all times via various methods, a lot have become understandably defensive.

Influencer marketing neutralizes this obstacle effectively. It is a bit psychological in nature. Often, influencers are perceived as having better health, choices, tastes, quality of life or status by their audiences. And these audiences come to believe that by imitating these influencers, they too will enjoy these benefits. This in essence is what influencer marketing is all about. With trust, credibility and authority already established in the minds of the audience, marketing of products or services becomes easy.

Integrate influencer marketing into your business. It really works!