Influencer Marketing’s Golden Rules
Influencer marketing is the new Eldorado for marketers seeking to promote a product or service while avoiding traditional channels or paid advertising, anchored in the old pattern of interruption.
The phenomenon can be explained as follows:
Influencer Marketing is leveraging the power of influence of individuals on social medias. These influencers are called digital influencers, Net Idols or Key opinion Leaders (KOL) depending on where you are in the world.
Why is influencer marketing considered the new Eldorado?
Because this is where you find and get people’s attention. As simple as that. In most countries in Southeast Asia, populations spend more time on social medias that watching TV.
It is important to qualify influencers. There are actually three types of influencers that have to be used for different purposes:
Celebrities: Think of the sponsorship of a famous driver by McDonald’s or the sponsored publications of a tennis player on Instagram.
Specialists: One of the most promising niches. Just think of bloggers or Instagramers specializing in fashion, fitness or travel, for example. See the table below that shows the average number of Instagram subscribers for influencers by industry.
Complete Fans: We talk about brand advocates, people who preach your products and services to their network, without necessarily being celebrities, specialists in your industry and often not even paid (Who doesn’t like earned media?!).
Average number of Instagram subscribers by influencer, by industry. Source: Influence.co
Here are three key things to know before you embark on an influencer marketing campaign:
1. Have a proper budget
Some brands are willing to pay more than $ 100,000 for a simple post by a Kim Kardashian-West but do not believe this is the norm. According to a recent study by Influence.co, the average spent (in the U.S.) would be $300 per publication on Instagram, but there are of course variations by industry, and depending on the influencer with whom you plan to work.
Average price of a sponsored publication on Instagram, by industry. Source: Influence.co
Fashion photographers and influencers are among the highest paid, and influencers with over 100,000 subscribers make an average of $800 per sponsored publication while you may be lucky to collect $100 if you have 1,000 subscribers or less.
2. More followers does not mean more results
That said, fewer subscribers does not mean a less effective campaign. And targeting accounts with more than 100,000 subscribers does not guarantee better results either! As you can see in the table below, there is a dramatic decrease in the level of interaction as the accounts grow larger. Not surprising for anyone watching social media for a few years, notably because of the algorithm that filters the publications on Instagram (as on Facebook).
Average engagement rate, by number of Instagram subscriber. Source Influence.co
We return to the eternal debate of quantity vs. quality: should we target emerging or niche influencers rather than betting on the ultra-famous personality …
At Pample, we aim to help brands find influencers that fit their brand’s image but also to find influencer who truly engage with their audience. One would think that an Instagramer with 100,000 followers could bring great exposure to a brand but if the followers are not engaged, the result will be much lower than if they had been.
A short anecdote: last year, a Canadian tourist destination brought in some influencers from France, and as one might expect, it’s actually the “smaller” Instagramers who have obtained the best engagement rates on their publications.
3. Define performance indicators
As always, this brings us back to the basics of marketing, that is to say, establishing the objectives pursued, and how we will measure the success of our campaigns:
- Reach the greatest amount of people
- Reach a very targeted clientele
- Convert to an action (buy online, visit your website, etc…)
All of these objectives are excellent, but not necessarily compatible. Choose one, and only one, and then you will know what type of campaign to consider, and on which platform to bet (YouTube? Instagram? Blogs?). Once the goal is clearly defined, you can compare the cost per click (CPC) of this type of initiative to a similar campaign with Google AdWords or Facebook Ads.
Agencies that work in influencer marketing might include a multiplication factor for a publication by an influencer versus a standard advertising placement. That is, if 1,000 people have seen a publication of an influencer, it can be estimated that it will have more weight (by a factor of 1.5 or 2.5, for example) than if you had paid to reach 1,000 People via Facebook or Google AdWords. Why? It is a question of credibility, since today’s consumer is increasingly skeptical about a standard publication from a brand, whereas the one from a fashion, fitness or travel specialist is more favorably considered.
Signup for free to our Influencer Marketing Platform that matches Brands and Influencers at www.pample.co
