I Created an Email Sequence to Market Through Influencers

Sharing a love for fashion with many others, I find myself stalking fashion gurus on Instagram quite often. I always watch their PR unboxing videos, where I often find leads for new brands and products I’m unfamiliar with.This is a great concept for marketing, but I always wondered how the influencers were able to receive those niche and underground gifts.

DMing is often the go-to-way to start communication with influencers, but it’s understandable that they don’t reply due to the high volume of messages they receive and direct messages are used more between friends. Whereas emailing sets a professional message that you’re ready to do business. More often than not, influencers have their emails in their bios for that reason. That’s why I created an email sequence for a brand that I love called Petite Studio.

Petite Studio is a woman-owned clothing business based in New York. They specialize in making luxury clothes for women under 5’4 (which is a club that I’m proudly a part of.) They describe their niche as “slow fashion” and their motto is investing in pieces that will last for years. They give off a vintage and streetwear vibe as well. Knowing these values of their mission, I used this information to find influencers with similar target audiences.

Using Instagram, I found influencers whose content gave off the same energy that Petite studio does to certify them as an ideal candidate to collaborate with. The ideal candidate in my eyes would be a fashion blogger on instagram who was obviously under 5’4 and specialized in petite fashion. This is important due to the fact that for one, the influencer has the same style as the brand so they will more likely wear the pieces and advertise to their followers who also share the same style. Win win.

Here’s How I Did it:

I started with searching hashtags that correlated with the brand’s aesthetic. I used #vintagefashion, #slowfashion, #petitefashion for example. Once I found pictures that used those hashtags-the page stalking began.

Engagement is important. If an influencer has 20,000 followers but typically receives a fraction of that in likes and comments, their following is likely made up of inactive accounts. I chose to focus on micro-influencers for the reason that they don’t get offers for collaborations as much as major influencers and they are more prone to accepting. I also chose a few select major influencers to be able to test the results with both. A successful affiliate campaign with one major influencer could be worth 3–4 micro-influencers!

It’s simple to use Instagram to create a contact list because 90% of the influencers I thought were great candidates had their emails in their bios — meaning they wanted to be contacted. However, for the remaining 10% I used Hunter.io to find their public information. You can also view how I created this CRM here.

Emails

I focused on three principles while drafting these emails:

• Compelling through the subject line: This is the hook that makes influencers want to open and read the message instead of the reader brushing it off as non-urgent.
• Short and sweet: Nobody has time, nor the energy to read an entire essay. It’s guaranteed that a long email will be opened and closed in a matter of five seconds. Making it simple makes it easier for the reader to understand who you are and what you are emailing them about.
• Personalized: Generic messages make it obvious to the influencer that you just copied and pasted an email draft to be sent to them. It’s not going to lure them in with interest whatsoever. Doing some research about the influencer and stating in the email what compelled you to message them in the first place is a much greater experience.

Introductory Email: PR Style

Communicating with someone through email can be challenging, especially for the first time. Establishing a friendly tone that coincides with the brand’s and using the three points I mentioned earlier, here’s an example of an introductory email:

Subject line: Join the 5’4 and under affiliate club!

I like to think that sending a light-hearted email as an introduction is more warming than sending an email with a more formal tone, also it helps you stand out from all of the other emails. But, of course it depends on what type of company you’re representing.

I started off by sharing how I found their email in the first place so they don’t think they’re on a random contact list.

I also introduced myself, the brand, and how it correlates to the influencer. I established a problem/solution scenario (not finding clothes that fit short people,and how petite studio specializes in that area) that then led into a call of action at the end.

It’s short, sweet, and gets straight to the point. Plus, who would say no to free clothes?

Follow Up Email: Set For a Week After Initial Email

Yes, following up may seem like you’re being bothersome when in reality they’re just as important as the initial email. It could’ve been sent to a spam folder, sent to the wrong email, lost, or simply brushed off accidentally. A follow up shows that you’re interested in your prospect and also acts as a reminder.

Subject line: Oops! Don’t Miss Out on Your Free Gift!

The follow up should be shorter, but still have purpose, containing the same idea as the first email-paraphrased. I also created more of an engagement by adding a link to the website’s about page to serve as a motivator.

Introductory Email: Brand Ambassador Style

I created a hypothetical scenario to reach out to influencers to become Petite Studio’s brand ambassadors. Using the same format as the PR package email, but different context, here’s my example:

Subject Line: Represent Us!

With this email, I wanted to focus on the hypothetical perks that come with being an ambassador to hook the influencer in. It’s more of a “how could working with our brand benefit you” rather than the other way around.

Again, I made sure to specify how I found them and what they did to make them stand out-showing that I did my research.

Follow Up Email: Set For a Week After Initial Email

After a week of no response, it’s time to issue a follow up as a reminder.

Subject Line: Bundle Up for Fall!

Since there wasn’t a response initially, this follow-up email contained a little something to engage an influencer with a fun gif of the clothing item that was described. It also showed an example of what would happen if they were a brand ambassador.

To Wrap Up

Dms are old fashioned now because they don’t convey a genuine connection between company and influencer. It also doesn’t broadcast the same professional tone that an email sets.

Using a variety of tools like Hunter.io to find influencer’s emails and Notion to create my CRM, I learned made this process more efficient for me and will do so for other companies as well.

To successfully market through influencers it’s important to remember to be short, sweet, personal, and make it valuable. Gathering those 4 ingredients creates a recipe for victory.