How Influencer Marketing Can Help Grow Your Brand
Influencer marketing is one of the newest marketing strategies available today but has quickly become one of the most important. Influencer marketing to level up your brand reach works—with the right approach.
With the rise of social media, an entirely new type of marketing has emerged. Today, brands take advantage of the reach and engagement of known and emerging names to promote their products and services. This strategy is particularly effective in reaching younger target markets but is a viable option for any demographic.
There’s no way we could have predicted the staggering growth of influencer marketing over the past few years. Research by Insider Intelligence shows that nearly 75 percent of US marketers will work with influencers this year. In fact, what some marketers might discount as a niche strategy is quickly becoming a digital marketing fundamental.
Are your current strategies able to reach audiences with both precision and impact? Through influencer marketing, your brand can carefully target niche markets by working with influencers in that area. Exceptional engagement lets this strategy significantly impact your brand’s outreach and even helps drive organic social media marketing.
With this new tool, your brand can unlock rapid growth. However, you also need to know how to use it. The right marketing agency can help integrate influencer marketing in synergy with your brand. In addition to developing the right strategy, working with a professional ensures access to the analytics needed to assess and guide your efforts.
It’s now clear that influencer marketing is anything but a fad. Instead, it’s something your brand may need to stay competitive. And you need to know that you’re doing it right.
Platforms that embrace influencer marketing
Influencer marketing can deliver excellent results—but how can you make it work for your brand? Influencer marketing strategies cover a wide range of platforms, websites and apps. The variety and versatility of these platforms let you find a perfect fit for your brand. Of course, the best campaigns will target multiple platforms to capture as much of your market segment as possible.
Today, there are countless platforms where influencers share content with the public. Some let you reach as many audiences as possible, while others are more specialized. The most popular today include:
- YouTube
- Snapchat
- TikTok
- Twitch
These platforms vary widely in the type of content they host and the specific demographics they serve. Identifying the right choice for your brand is critical—there’s a big difference between outreach through LinkedIn versus TikTok.
Instagram remains the top choice among marketers. With its straightforward interactivity, the highly visual platform lends itself perfectly to influencer marketing. The industry agrees: 96 percent of marketers involved in influencer marketing cite Instagram as their platform of choice in a survey by SocialPubli.
However, many niche platforms and websites target specific demographics, lifestyles and hobbies. So, depending on your brand, you may miss out on the most lucrative opportunities by sticking to mainstream social media.
Keep influencer marketing in line with your brand
It’s important to keep in mind that influencer marketing is just one part of your brand’s marketing strategy. Maintaining consistent branding is vital as well. You don’t want to let an ill-fated foray into influencer marketing upset your existing brand identity. You need to be sure that both the specific type of marketing and individual influencers you work with are the right fit.
To start, how well-established is your brand identity? If you don’t have consistent messaging across existing promotional channels, it could be worth taking a closer look at your branding. With the proper support, you can develop a cohesive brand identity that helps new and existing customers better identify with your business.
Are your current marketing campaigns turning potential customers into sales? Influencers help establish credibility for your brand with specific audiences. Data from the Digital Marketing Institute shows that 49 percent of consumers rely on influencer recommendations to make purchasing decisions. (Does “TikTok made me buy this” sound familiar?) Having your products used and promoted by influencers lets your audience know they can depend on your brand.
Finding the right combination of messaging, platform and influencer can be a significant challenge. First, you need to be sure that you’re reaching your target audience. You also need to ensure that your messaging is delivered correctly. This requires careful strategic planning and deep understanding of your brand.
Working with a professional marketing agency could be the right way for your brand to approach influencer marketing. Identifying opportunities, fine-tuning your messaging and establishing agreements are all tasks that require specific skills and experience. Influencer marketing presents a significant opportunity for your brand that you may need support to unlock.
How effective is influencer marketing?
The reason so many brands are turning to influencer marketing for their campaigns is simple: it works. Consumers trust influencers more than branded social media content, and it shows. A survey by Matter Communications highlights that difference: 61 percent of consumers value information from influencers versus 38 percent who trust branded content.
Younger generations are even more likely to trust influencer marketing, with 66 percent of consumers in the 18 to 29 demographic saying that they are more likely to follow recommendations from influencers. As generations that primarily use social media make up more of the market, this advantage will continue to grow.
Working with influencers lets your brand benefit in some unique ways. Influencers have an intimate connection with their audience. This allows your brand to really reach your potential customers. Your campaigns will see higher engagement from customers who feel a genuine connection.
The unique nature of personal and intimate influencer content blurs the lines of promotional content. Consumers encounter advertising everywhere they turn. Yet, the prevalence of premium ad-free models and ad-blocker software show how far they’ll go to avoid it.
Influencer marketing lets your brand get around the negative perception of promotional content. Instead of disregarding your ads, your potential customers will stay alert and engaged with quality content from a trusted source.
Influencer marketing has an exceptional ROI
ROI is the first detail to check off when finding ways to build your brand. Any marketing effort must justify its cost, and influencer marketing is no different. In many cases, influencer marketing can provide the best possible ROI for your marketing spend.
The latest benchmark report from Influencer Marketing Hub backs up this fundamental fact, showing an average value of $5.20 for every dollar spent on influencer marketing. SocialPubli’s survey makes it clear that marketers recognize this fact. Influencer marketing provided the highest ROI of any strategy for 42% of respondents.
Influencer marketing encompasses various models that have your brand spending money in different ways. Sponsorships for video and live-streaming content are common, as are referral agreements that tie your spending directly to results. Depending on your product, giveaways are another way to get influencers involved with your brand.
The wealth of options lets many brands take advantage of influencer marketing. Brands in any growth stage can fine-tune agreements to suit their marketing budget and goals. Early-stage businesses can access effective marketing without significant commitment, while established brands can leverage their marketing spending more efficiently.
Running referral programs with influencers
Influencer marketing provides flexible options for your brand, much like other digital marketing strategies. Among the most common are referral programs. Influencers promote your brand through their unique content and receive a certain percentage of sales generated through their promotion.
Custom referral links or discount codes deliver minimal risk and are an easy way to gauge influencer strategies. They also make it easy to accurately track the sales and leads you generate from each influencer. Your brand only pays for successful sales or sign-ups, so you know your marketing spending is justified.
Many large brands run referral programs with a wide range of influencers. However, this strategy is accessible to smaller brands as well. By carefully choosing the right influencer to work with, your brand can target the niche most likely to respond to your specific products or services.
In fact, finding the right match for your brand can have a more significant impact than total reach. Nano-influencers are a trend that’s driving the entire industry. While they have fewer than 5,000 followers each, they often drive engagement better than larger influencers with hundreds of thousands or even millions. This is backed by a study by Hype Auditor that reveals these more intimate and tight-knit communities provided more meaningful engagement.
Guest posts, contests and more
While referral programs make up a sizeable part of influencer marketing, they’re far from the only way your brand can take advantage of this trend. Referral programs aren’t for every brand, and diversifying your efforts can help ensure an impactful marketing strategy.
Has your brand ever implemented contests or giveaways in its marketing campaigns? Influencer marketing is an excellent vector for these promotions. The level of engagement and additional organic social media growth is precisely what your brand needs during these types of promotions. In addition, working with an influencer to promote a contest helps extend your reach and ensures that your efforts target the right audience.
Social media is generally at the center of influencer marketing, but conventional blogging still sees significant use. Influencer guest posts are a great way to drive traffic to your website. The arrangement is mutually beneficial, with both you and the influencer broadening audiences.
Working with the right influencers lets you create better content for your brand’s website. That content delivers more of what both potential customers and search engines want. Collaborating with influencers is among the best blog marketing strategies.
Measuring the results of your marketing efforts
Developing your influencer marketing strategy isn’t a one-and-done effort. You also need to assess the impact of your ongoing influencer marketing campaigns. Verifiable insights into campaign results guide future efforts to ensure maximum impact for your marketing spend.
You can monitor various KPIs across your influencer marketing campaigns to judge their success and make effective decisions. Some of the most critical include:
- Cost per post (CPP)
- Cost per thousand impressions (CPM)
- Cost per click (CPC)
- Cost per engagement (CPE)
- Cost per view (CPV)
How you determine the effective cost of leads and conversions through these campaigns will vary depending on your agreement and the platforms in question. Some arrangements, such as referral codes, are easier to quantify than others.
Do you have the right tools, knowledge and experience to capture and analyze key marketing analytics? A digital marketing agency can ensure that your campaigns capture the right analytics to provide valuable information. You’ll be able to accurately evaluate which types of influencer marketing and individual agreements are most beneficial for your brand.
If you’re not confident in your marketing analytics, then you can’t be sure about any decisions you make. You’re far from alone if that sounds like you. According to data from Venture Beat, as many as 45 percent of marketers can’t vouch for the quality or accuracy of their marketing analytics. Working with a professional marketing agency ensures that data can serve as the foundation you need to continue growing your brand.
Taking the Right Approach to Influencer Marketing
Collaborating with influencers is an exciting way to reach audiences and achieve massive ROI. Indeed, with the right strategy, your brand will build genuine connections with niche audiences. Remember the imaginative ways you can work with influencers at different budget points, including referral programs, discount codes, contests and guest posts.
Wondering what influencer marketing can do for your business? Get started today.
- Brainstorm your key brand values and describe who you want to reach.
- Take an honest look at your brand and jot down reasons an influencer would want to promote it and why they wouldn’t.
- Share this with your Mindspin consultant to plan your next move.
Our comprehensive digital marketing agency provides the branding and strategy leadership you need, including determining the best-fitting influencers, platforms and marketing approach for your business. We’ll dig deeper into your brand story and target audience to create engaging messaging that builds excitement while providing the analytics to show each success.
It’s time to build your brand and ensure it benefits from all relevant marketing strategies, including the many advantages of influencer marketing.
