Can Influence Be Bought?
A Strategic Model for Successful Influencer Marketing (Part 2)
Influence is indeed for sale, and you can’t swing a dead cat without hitting a mommy blogger, food expert or brand advocate selling their time, words and audience. It’s how they make their income.
Some estimates put spending on influencer marketing at just over 5% of total digital marketing expenditure. That may not sound like a considerable amount, but the total digital ad spend worldwide as of Q2 2020 is upwards of $332.84 billion. Further, the influence trend is set to grow exponentially.
Traditional media, like print and television, can separate out their content from their revenue mechanism. Online influencers rarely have a separate mechanism which means their influence is what they sell.
Making money from having built an audience is an influencer’s right and should be fully supported. The trick, for both the influencer and the brand, is to achieve this without injuring either party. This means that authenticity and credibility must remain intact.
When brands and influencers work together to deliver the entire journey to influence, from reach through to action, you will have a successful marketing campaign. If the brand only cares about the reach, they’ll achieve it at the influencer’s expense. Influencers will only remain…
