Influencer content outperforms brand content. And as expected, 92% of marketers who use influencer marketing find it compelling, rightly so because people respond to it.
More than 50% of consumers globally have bought something in the past six months based on an online influencer’s recommendation. So, every influencer marketing agency in the country is buckling up to pitch their proposals to brands.
The only problem is, do you need influencers to drive your business forward? Let’s see why businesses partner up with influencers.
When do businesses need influencers?
The problem with many businesses is that consumers perceive them solely as a manufacturing factory rather than considering them as a group of people working to solve a problem. That’s why it’s so essential to personify your business so that people can connect with it.
Social media is an excellent tool for humanizing your brand, and numerous companies have already achieved their goals. But countless businesses are still trying to find their ground.
That’s where influencers come in!
Influencer marketing complies with one of the oldest marketing rules – people trust people, and people buy from people. So, influencer marketing can work well for you if you want to:
● Build a community
Influencers come with a group of loyal fans who listen to their opinions and trust them enough to invest.
That’s exactly why people jumped at the opportunity of buying cryptocurrency when Floyd Mayweather and DJ Khaled were invited to promote Centra Tech’s coins. Or Tesla’s founder Elon Musk who threw down mightly his support for the meme-crypto currency, Dogecoin.
Influencer marketing is a great way to build a loyal community of buyers. It’s cost-effective, too, because you’re both promoting your products and building a community at the price of one.
● Work with like-minded people
Forming a team and building a work culture is a gradual process. The best part about influencers is that you don’t have to train them to align with your vision. They already possess the values and morals that your brand is based on. All you have to do is partner up with them.
● Get your message out quickly
In July 2019, Ipsos released a report titled ‘Trust in the Media,’ which revealed certain truths about consumer behavior. 63% of consumers said that they trusted influencers’ opinions about products more than that of the brands that make them.
Influencers are as crucial as peers and family members when it comes to word of mouth marketing. So, influencer marketing is inarguably the quickest way to reach your customers with a useful product.
● Go where your customers are
In his article, entrepreneur Jason Falls writes, ‘fish where the fish are.’ Well, he’s right. Influencers are replacing traditional media. And with people successfully blocking online ads, the only way to communicate with your customers is through influencer marketing.
If you aren’t getting the desired ROI from your ad campaigns, consider pausing them for some time or, better yet, adding influencer marketing to your marketing mix. The right combination of ads and influencers might help you accelerate your business growth.
How to choose an influencer for your brand
Your business can end up with a lousy influencer. It may not necessarily be negative publicity, but suffering from poor engagement rates can also make you rethink your decision to work with them.
With influencer marketing being one of the star online activities of 2020, many influencers experienced a high demand for product promotion. Countless of them ended up posting a series of sponsored posts, which wasn’t taken well by their audiences. As a result, engagement rates dropped, and brands began to suffer losses.
Although many brands withdrew their investment, it left them with one question – what should we look for in an influencer?
Engagement rate
Many brands make the mistake of looking at the numbers in the ‘followers/subscribers’ column rather than looking at the engagement that the influencer receives through likes, comments, RTs, etc., when choosing an influencer.
Today, even likes aren’t the best measure of engagement because they can be easily bought. But comments still rule the metrics. If your potential influencer is getting 200k likes and only about 20 comments, they might be manipulating the numbers and may not be a good investment for your business.
Image Source: Linqia
On the other hand, working with an influencer who has say, 2M YouTube subscribers, is consistently hitting 2M+ views on every video, and getting roughly 40k comments is bound to give you a good ROI.
While engagement is important, remember that it’s just one of the metrics and should be reviewed as a part of the sum.
For instance, YouTuber and influencer Logan Paul receives millions of views on his videos, has 18 million+ followers on Instagram, and has the potential of reaching half a million RTs on Twitter with every post. But the list of controversies that he’s been a part of makes him a terrible face of the brand and, consequently, a bad investment.
Morality
Ethical influencer marketing is on the rise. With conversations about sustainability and the environment taking the limelight, buyers want influencers to talk about issues that matter to the community as a whole. And they wouldn’t wait a second before bringing down influencers who choose to keep mum on matters.
Marques Brownlee from MKBHD, a tech channel, has even made a video about his ethics policy to show how he prioritizes his principles over monetary gains. And his viewers appreciated the transparency despite a few jokes. That’s why a tech giant like Motorola still keeps sponsoring MKBHD every time they launch a new product regardless of the bad reviews.
As a brand, you need to find people who can amplify your voice and share your vision. If you are a sustainable food brand, you might benefit from working with influencers who promote veganism, are health-conscious, and preferably have pets.
Remember, cutting ties with influencers who don’t point north in your moral compass is crucial, and it will only benefit your brand in the long-term.
Relevance and authenticity
Influencers like Nyma Tang, Wayne Goss, Hindash, and James Welsch are what you call the macro-influencers of the beauty community. With millions of followers, one of the reasons for their popularity among their viewers is that they rank high on the scale of honesty.
Their viewers trust them to be genuine in their reviews, so one optimistic word from them can turn into outstanding results for businesses who work with them.
Image Source: YouTube
Having said that, they aren’t all perfect for every brand because they are relatively different even though they belong to the same beauty community.
For example, a skincare brand might want to go for James Welsch or Hindash, while a makeup brand might consider working with Wayne Goss for their influencer marketing. But a beauty brand that specifically caters to people with deeper skin tones might want to go for Nyma Tang as she holds a more significant influence among that segment.
Your influencers can make or break your campaigns. So, analyzing the various areas of their influence can help you find the right people to work with.
Audience base
The bigger the influencer, the higher the prices. But that does not necessarily mean that they have a better hold on their audience. On the contrary, big influencers tend to offer lower ROI.
Macro and mega influencers with 250,000 to 1m+ followers deliver only 20% better ROI for every dollar spent. Conversely, micro-influencers with roughly 50,000 followers deliver 30% better ROI on every dollar.
The reason is that smaller influencers have a more focused audience base and command high trust among them. Besides, they cost less, so they are an ideal choice for small businesses.
In a recent interview, Ryan Detert, the CEO of Influential said, “small businesses have shifted focus towards activating micro-influencers, which are classified as influencers with followers ranging from 1,000 to 50,000.”
He believes that small influencers have niches and create content that’s much more relevant to their audience as they are catering to a small demographic.
Wrapping Up…
Influencer marketing does not end with finding the right influencers and waiting for them to post about your business. You need to monitor their influence and study their history to avoid what happens to brands that collaborate with influencers who have publicly made racist and sexist remarks in the past.
Or… you can save yourself time and avoid a potential PR nightmare by working with a professional influencer marketing agency.
Bash Foo has the resources to connect you with reliable content creators who value your investment and have a loyal community that’s needed to deliver better ROI.
Get in touch with us to find the perfect influencer for your brand today!
The post Should You Find an Influencer for Your Brand appeared first on Bash Foo Digital Marketing.
