Source : https://www.commbox.io/utilizing-influencer-marketing-to-deliver-awesome-customer-experience-the-definitive-guide/
Influence marketing has quickly become one of the best digital levers for companies and brands. It is a particularly effective strategy to improve a brand’s visibility, to reach an ever larger audience and to acquire new prospects.
In 2021, more than 4.2 billion people used social networks for about 2.5 hours a day (53% of the world’s total population). For this reason, the size of the influencer marketing market has been growing steadily and was worth $13.8 billion in 2021, 20 times more than in 2015.
It’s no wonder that 93% of marketers are now using influencer marketing.
Mainly followed because of their authenticity, entertaining personality or expertise, these influencers have real prescriptive power on social networks, with YouTube and Instagram topping the list of most used platforms to follow an influencer; then TikTok.
56% of Internet users declare having made a purchase after seeing a publication posted by an influencer they follow and buy all the more easily if the influencer seems to know the product, the brand or its sector of activity well.
For a brand, influencer marketing is therefore an effective tool to make itself known to new targets, arouse interest and generate conversion. HubSpot’s 2021 Influencer Marketing Snapshot reveals that 82% of professionals consider the leads generated by an influencer marketing campaign to be of higher quality and 58% see an increase in their visibility thanks to this strategy.
Furthermore, in terms of return on investment, influencer marketing far outperforms traditional advertising with a ROI 11 times higher.
The different types of influencers:
Influencers are classified by typology and mainly according to the size of their communities. The size of the influencer’s community is still a relevant point for brands. Little by little, the engagement rate is also becoming a key element in influencer marketing. For an agency or a media, engagement can sometimes be more representative than a large community. This is how influence can be measured in certain people.
- The mega-influencer or All star influencer
We can speak here of a public personality. The notoriety of the mega-influencer is such that they gather millions of people around their content.
- Macro-influencers
They have communities of several tens of thousands to several millions of fans. Their main advantage is, of course, the size of their community but also the great diversity found among these influencers.
- Micro-influencers
A definite advantage of micro-influencers is the engagement they generate. You have to rely on them more and more to get interesting feedbacks.
- Nano Influencers
Nano-influencers may have small communities, but they are highly engaged!
Now on to the several steps for a successful influence campaign:
- First, you need to define your objectives
You have to set the objectives of the campaign; these will guide the message that will be broadcasted and will be decisive in the choice of the influencer. It can be to obtain more visibility for the company, for a particular campaign or for one of the products or services. In this case, it will be necessary to target influencers who have a large community or who do product placements. The objective of the influencer marketing campaign can also be to generate leads, by downloading a content, or to create conversion, with a promotional offer for example.
- Then, you have to check the consistency between the target and the influencer
Today, it is obvious that consumers are more and more aware and that there is a crisis of confidence with brands offering too much commercial content. This is also true in the world of influencer marketing. The more obvious and natural the collaboration between a brand and an influencer seems, the more successful the campaign will be.
It is therefore necessary to analyze the editorial line of the targeted influencer in order to determine if the collaboration would be in line with the company’s brand image. It is necessary to determine if the tone of the influencer, the content they propose, the formats they use, the values they promote are in agreement with the brand and will allow the offer to be correctly highlighted. The objective is simply not to create dissonance.
- Then you need to define the budget
The budget is then an essential component of the influencer marketing strategy. To define it, a market study will be necessary in order to know the rates charged by influencers, according to their notoriety, the type of campaign and the platform used.
However, contrary to what most people think, a majority of influencers do not require financial remuneration from the brands they collaborate with. This is even more true for nano and micro-influencers.
A brand can thank an influencer by offering him visibility on its networks or on its website or, which is quite common, by offering him the product or service that is the subject of the campaign. It can also invite him to an exclusive event or even collaborate in the creation of a new offer or product. Regardless of the compensation method chosen, the important thing is that both parties are satisfied with the compensation decided upon.
- And lastly, monitor and analyze results
In order to determine the effectiveness of an influencer marketing campaign, a performance follow-up is necessary throughout the collaboration in order to optimize the campaigns afterwards; starting with a pre-campaign inventory, measurements during the campaign and finally an analysis report at very the end of the collaboration, according to the key performance indicators defined during the negotiation with the influencer, in line with the brand’s objectives.
If it is a visibility and acquisition campaign:
- subscriber growth
- engagement rate
- evaluation of the audience’s sentiment
- evolution of the number of visits to the brand’s site, landing page or store
- growth in the number of emails collected
- number of messages received
- number of leads generated
If it is a conversion campaign:
- number of content downloads
- number of sales made
- revenue generated
So is influencer marketing still important in an ever-changing marketing landscape?
Yes, influencer marketing is a promising acquisition channel that companies should explore. These collaborations can help your brand emerge or differentiate you in an increasingly competitive market. Nevertheless, it is by carrying out regular actions in your favor that these opinion leaders will succeed in influencing the purchasing behavior of their audience. Its success lies in building authentic relationships between the brand and the influencer, and should ideally be long term.