Influencer marketing is something that businesses can no longer ignore in this day and age. It can be described as the promotion of a brand or products and services through individuals (influencers) who have influence over potential clients. It is one of the fastest-growing marketing tactics, with studies showing that 40% of consumers have purchased something after seeing it being advertised through someone they follow on social media sites like YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter.
Keyword Analytics and Google Trends also indicate that interest in influencer marketing has grown more than 90 times from 2012 to date. The legitimate and seemingly authentic recommendations from influencers tend to enable brands to increase brand engagement and exposure. So, how can your business benefit from influencer marketing? Here are some tips you can work with to make the most of this marketing option.
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Have Set Goals
To run successful influencer marketing campaigns, you must first define your goals. Use a marketing timeline template to create clear goals for each step. Different firms want different results from influencer marketing. This can be anything from lead generation, generating revenue, or increasing reach, engagement or brand awareness. Set goals will help you know how to execute the campaigns and also understand the key metrics that you will use to assess performance. For instance, if you want to increase brand awareness and engagement, you can measure shares, comments, likes, and impressions to get to know the number of persons who have engaged or seen your content.
Define the Target Audience
When setting goals, it is also important to have a clear idea of the audience you are targeting. There are plenty of factors you need to put into consideration when developing the target audience. These include demographics, age, location, interests, and many more. It is the only way the campaign will reach the right people. This will also help you choose the right influencers who will help elevate your business to the next level. For instance, if you want people to join and spend time at GG.Bet, it is only right to pick an influencer who enjoys betting and can represent the brand well.
Do Due Diligence
Make sure you conduct thorough research before working with any influencer. The influencer marketing field has seen a spike in influencer fraud due to the popularity of the marketing tactic. Fake influencers are bad news, as they engage in fraudulent activities, like buying followers, comments, and likes. They also inflate their follow account and engagement in a bid to attract brands who pay for ineffective sponsored content. This is bad for your business because you will not be engaging with a real audience. Carry out extensive background research on the influencers you want to work with and scrutinize their social media profiles before contracting them. You can calculate the engagement rate and also check to see if they have worked with any reputable brands in the past. Always choose an influencer with a “high-quality,” engaged audience that will match the interests of your target audience instead of the influencers with the largest number of followers.
Work on Building Long-Term Relationships
Before embarking on influencer marketing, it is important to know that you will not achieve overnight results. Your business should come up with a campaign bearing in mind that it will be more successful if you have a long-term relationship with the influencers you choose to work with. This means that you should not only go for the “huge” influencers, but it is also wise to engage micro-influencers who are still growing their following. This will benefit you in several ways, like:
- Saves time because you will not have to look for a new influencer each time you want to launch a campaign.
- Builds trust and creates authenticity- an influencer is considered more genuine if they continue to endorse your brand with every campaign.
- Builds recall- after some time, your target audience will start associating your brand with the influencer. This can lead to recall which can increase purchase intent.
- Access to content- a long-term influencer can give you access to evergreen content you can share on social media feeds, emails, websites, etc.
Embrace Video Content
Consumers in a 2020 survey reported that they would like to see more video content like how-to tutorials and question & answer videos, among others. Embracing video content could see your brand grow bigger and better. Request the influencers you are collaborating with to produce top-notch videos when creating content for your business. These videos should ideally target the emotions of the audience and help solve their problems. Use different social media platforms, including Twitch and TikTok, and find influencers who will produce promotional and entertaining content for your brand or products.