PR Maven®, CEO and Founder of Marshall Communications, develops and executes Marketing/PR/Personal Branding strategies.
Influencer marketing is on everyone's lips. Social media marketing is the use of endorsements and product placements by celebrities and businesses to change hearts and minds.
Think of Kylie Jenner endorsing a new face wash on TikTok or Roger Federer tweeting about this new Rolex in his watch collection. À been des égards, les consommateurs de tous les dayours font souvent plus trust aux impacturs qu'aux marques elles-memes, because les gens peuvent nouer des liens solides avec les personnes qu'ils srivan en ligne (memeles'cont). Think of it this way. Soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo has more followers on Instagram than people in the United States and Russia combined, making his thoughts, feelings, and recommendations very consistent and uniquely marketable.
Influencer marketing can be an invaluable tool in your toolkit, even if you're working with low-level influencers who are famous athletes. At the very least, this type of marketing should be considered depending on your business and budget.
Before you hop on the treadmill, ask yourself: is influencer marketing right for your brand ? To answer that question, you need to have an innate understanding of your brand's audience and how to reach those people online.
There are three "R's" to consider before working with an influencer:
1. Compliance. Is the content shared by the influencer relevant to your brand?
2. Availability. Does the influencer reach enough audiences to add value? Is this audience valid and involved?
3. Resonance. Will your content resonate with the influencer's audience and make potential partnerships mutually beneficial?
With all the boxes ticked, influencer marketing can be very beneficial for brands looking to expand their reach and increase their bottom line. Even influencers with a relatively small following can add value if they are relevant to a niche that is important to you. Accessibility is important. When a travel influencer has 10,000 engaged fans, that audience can be large enough to make a significant difference.
My agency categorizes influencers based on audience authority and reach into Mega, Macro, Medium, Micro, and Nano. Of course, the larger the influencer's audience, the more expensive it is to work with them. An influencer at the mega or macro level can cost millions of dollars. For example, Ronaldo earns around $2 million for a post on Instagram.
But hope is still lost. The lower rungs of the influence ladder can still benefit your brand. As long as you trust the process of maximizing your influencer marketing impact, the results can be very rewarding.
At Marshall Communications, we start your influencer search by identifying creatives with a strong online presence who align with your brand. It's important that influencers engage with real, passionate followers and not paid bots. We then create a list of “wanted” influencers and start interacting with them through communication, e.g. B. by liking or commenting on their posts.
Some influencers work with an agent who can share their recommendation rate, while others can be contacted directly to start a conversation. Pricing varies depending on whether influencers are creating content tailored to your brand or providing the images and text required for publication.
Do your homework early in the process. Influencer selection can be a very time consuming and costly process as you need to match your brand with the right creatives. You need to work with trusted people who add value, which takes time and effort from a research perspective. To streamline the process for our clients, we may also work with partners who can provide lists of potential influencers within certain budget parameters.
When you prove the process, you pay a return on your investment. There is a return on investment associated with influencer marketing as long as you are strategic and your strategy aligns with the overall strategy. Setting clear goals before an influencer campaign is important so that the goals and criteria for success are clearly understood. Adjust your expectations so there are no surprises or uncertainties later.
At the end of an influencer campaign, you can define results with details like impressions, likes, shares, comments and unique URL clicks. Depending on the campaign, your goal may be to increase sales or even increase public awareness and education. It all depends on your activity and budget.
Remember, influencer marketing and the three Rs can work for you. Doing your homework early will save you a headache later when you just want the excitement of a return on investment.
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