Tips for selecting the best influencer for your brand
One might suggest that influencer marketing is not exactly a new concept.
It can be likened to working with key opinion leaders also known as subject matter experts, industry analysts, journalists, and members of the supply chain such as retailers, to promote a product.
This traditional marketing technique is commonplace in certain sectors such as healthcare, where the code of conduct places high restrictions on the use of direct advertising and publicity. As such, pharmaceutical or healthcare brands look to the medical community to endorse their products using testimonial advertising and advocacy because of their influence. This Sensodyne advert is a good example.
The birth of social media celebrities
With the rise of the Internet, we have a new breed of opinion leaders known as “social media celebrities.”
Social media celebrities are not famous athletes, artists, film stars or models. But rather, regular everyday people who have risen to fame by the sheer volume of their activity on the Internet. From sharing fashionable pictures, to social commentary, video gaming and makeup tutorials, the Internet is awash with their activities and they are influencing attitudes and choices of people with similar interests.
Whether blogger, vlogger, social media enthusiast or activist, enlisting a social media celebrity to raise awareness for, and promote your product is termed “influencer marketing.”
A major difference between opinion leaders and influencers however, is that while opinion leaders endorse the brand they need not necessarily demonstrate their endorsement by using the product. But influencers have to do so, and their endorsements happen on social media.
Pros
Influencer marketing has rapidly gained prominence because of the “social” element. By working with influencers, brands are quickly able to get their messages across to a large audience. This wide reach is organic with the added benefit of boosting the brand’s search engine optimisation efforts.
Working with the right influencer also means that brands can effectively target the right audience. The icing on the cake is that influencer marketing campaigns can be easily evaluated using metrics such as reach and engagement. Nonetheless, influencer marketing has its downsides.
Cons
Brands which use number of followers as the major criterion for selecting influencers, may end up with influencers who are not exactly advocates for their brands. The danger here is the tendency for the influencer to fall short in delivering content. In these instances, “wide reach” may also not equate “right target audience.”
Whereas an influencer might have hundreds of thousands of followers, the influencer’s audience might not be a good fit for your product or service, making the influencer marketing effort counterproductive.
On the organisation’s part, for fear of putting out the wrong message, they may also tend to be too prescriptive with their briefs thus detracting from the campaign’s authenticity. Due to the growing popularity of the concept, influencers are also beginning to cost a pretty penny. The onus rests on brands to decide how much is too much!
Influencer categories
Influencers are generally grouped as mega — those with over a million followers, macro — individuals who have over 500,000 followers but less than a million, micro influencers have 10,000–50,000 followers and nano influencers have over 1,000 followers but less than 10,000.
Mega influencers are mainly celebrities — actors, athletes, musicians etc. Macro influencers are largely social media celebrities. The niche players or subject matter experts mainly fall within the micro influencer group. And Nano influencers are people popular within their community whose endorsements are believable.
It is noteworthy that these parameters are just a guide because some niche players are macro, even mega influencers.
Selecting the best influencer
Where the product has a mass appeal or is generic, then mega and macro influencers are the best option because they offer wide reach.
However, if you are looking to reach a targeted audience, then your best bet would be subject matter experts, that is, niche influencers. For example, if your product is a makeup line, then it is recommended that you partner a beauty vlogger to share videos with makeup tips rather than a fashionable influencer, simply because she has more followers.
Furthermore, working with an influencer who is a true brand advocate means that you can give the influencer more control enabling him/her to better deliver content without looking or sounding scripted. For instance, in December 2018, Nigerian food blogger, 1qfoodplatter (@1qfoodplatter) shared a special fried rice recipe using Blue Band.
The partnership was apt because the influencer was in control of the content. However, a one-off video is insufficient for an influencer marketing campaign.
This is why it is important to set key performance indicators (KPIs) for campaigns.
Whilst acknowledging that being too prescriptive could stifle creativity, it is important to set KPIs or milestones.
This is because whilst most social media celebrities might be popular for creating entertaining and random content, your organisation’s goal is to communicate specific messages. And so, influencers must be guided.
The KPIs must also be backed by an agreement. And the agreement should detail the deliverables such as; number of posts and stories to be published, frequency of posts, platform(s) on which they are to be published, location of posts, campaign time frame, number of original content to be created, and analytics report — comments, likes, shares, views etc.
Algorithms attached to social networks can limit reach. That means, whilst an influencer might have a million followers, the social networks allow only a percentage of the 1 million followers to see the influencer’s posts. Consequently, you are probably better off working with several micro-niche influencers as opposed to one blogger with large followers.
Micro influencers tend to have more loyal followers and higher engagement. And because they will create different content, it will be make the campaign more exciting and easier to sustain. Furthermore, micro influencers could also cost you a lot less, in the long-run.
