How Savvy Brands Are Leveraging Influencers Throughout Their Marketing Mix
Dust Off Your Marketing Textbooks, We Are Talking About the Four P’s of Marketing
Oftentimes when we sit down with brands and marketers, they want to know how they can excel at partnering with influencers — to generate that holy grail of authentic engagement and conversion. But oftentimes, the conversation is too focused on just one part of the marketing mix — promotion.
Some key considerations as it relates to the full Four P’s of Marketing:
Promotion: Influencers, Duh!
This is probably the most straight forward — as the influencer marketing industry continues to mature, we are seeing more and more industry verticals come on board to find the right influencers (we define influencers as passionate people who can create compelling enough content to garner an audience on various social channels — and not simply celebrity endorsers) to collaborate with.
Most notably, we have seen a rise in interest from verticals that have traditionally been more tepid when it comes to social media, such as Financial Institutions, finding value in tapping influencers as part of their broader marketing strategy.
Product (and Packaging): Personalized and Built to Be Camera Ready
Brands that have a physical product that can be gift-able have an edge — we have seen a number of brands, particularly in the Fashion and Beauty verticals, strategically build product and packaging that is personalized to the influencer they partner with. This provides influencer an added reason to post — with added emphasis and emotion — about the brand/product — as influencers are continually looking to craft a personal story for every post.
By providing a custom product, with special packaging, the brand is truly partnering with the influencer to tell a story about their product —and the influencer can do this without alienating their audience with an overly ‘branded’ post.
We find that the influencer is also more likely to keep the post up (in certain cases, influencers may want to remove a branded post after some time so their feed does not feel overly commercialized to his/her audience), or provided added value (additional posts / instagram stories, etc.) as an expression of true excitement around the brand and product. We also find that the audience, in turn, show greater engagement with the content —the same way you might engage if one of your friends received a custom Louis Vuitton perfume and case! It is precisely this authenticity that drives real impact with consumers — not just product placement.
Place: Instagram-Ready Retail Concepts
While traditional retail has been hit hard with the rise of eCommerce as a preferred way for younger generations to shop, savvy brands are launching retail concepts that are built not to distribute product, but to extend the brand and allow for product testing IRL — which many consumers still need before they decide to click buy.
Retail stores (and restaurants and coffee shops) like next-gen direct to consumer brands Everlane, Glossier, and Away’s are built to be influencer and Instagram friendly, down to the last sugar packet (see left)!
Similar to the thinking behind the custom packaging and product, the idea is to create an environment and experience that inspires influencers and consumers alike to post and drive more social activity around the brand.
Price: Transparent Pricing Supports WOM via Influencers and Consumers
Pricing is the toughest lever for marketers to change — particularly as it is so linked to all other areas of a company’s business — but it is precisely for that reason it raises eyebrows and generates such attention from the press, influencers and consumers alike.
ACTIVATE is a fully end-to-end influencer marketing platform, covering influencer discovery, program workflow, measurement, and analytics. Last year, the ACTIVATE platform enabled over 75,000 influencers to collaborate with brands.
Want to learn more about Activate? Just drop us a note at research@activate.social.
