Made In Instagram
Barely a week goes by recently without a new scandal or exposé on the influencer marketing industry, and rightly so — the industry as it stands is broken.
We’ve got unethical companies flogging diet pills to children, influencers breaking advertising rules and brands treating influencers like walking billboards, telling them exactly what to say, do and wear in order to get paid. It’s all incredibly inauthentic.
Made In Chelsea’s Andy Jordan is the latest influencer to speak out on the toll that the industry can have on the influencers that it churns out. Speaking to Panorama and the Victoria Derbyshire programme, Andy recalls being offered money to pretend to use all kinds of products and even to get invasive cosmetic surgery procedures — thankfully he declined the surgery offer.
His management were sending through jobs because they’d be making money from the process, telling him to promote protein supplements even though he didn’t go to a gym — going as far as making him to go a gym just for the sake of a photo. Looking through old Instagram posts, the brand in question appears to be Protein World, with Andy posing alongside various bottles of pills, with accompanying copy referring to vague (and questionable) health claims.
Working on a constructed reality TV show, combined with a constructed social media life can obviously be detrimental.
“I’d lost who I was because everything was directed by someone else.”
Earlier this year, Zoe Sugg also opened up about the anxieties involved in managing a large social media presence, scared to post or open up due to millions of followers dissecting her every move.
Media attention seems to be focused on how we can improve the experience for consumers, but what about the influencers? It’s time to Love Your Creators™.
Brands (and talent management in this case) need to play a greater role in ensuring brand partnerships are legit and authentic. Rather than shipping the task out to an agency who’ll pair the product up with anyone who’ll take the cash, there should be greater scrutiny over whether this person and their values marry up with your brand. Platforms that let influencers churn out dozens of pieces of content a month for different brands are not your friend.
You also need to give your creators the freedom and flexibility to be themselves. Don’t micromanage every step of the process and don’t tell them what to say, consumers will see right through it. Treating influencers as partners instead puppets is the true path to creating authentic content.
And there’s the fine line between creating a post that’s inspirational or one that’s aspirational — the goal should be to trigger something within your audience that makes them feel something. Overly styled images of people with six packs and gleaming white teeth are only going to evoke a sense of reduced self-worth.
Speaking to the BBC, Andy said;
“If you’re constantly surrounded by a world that’s better than you, or looks nicer than you, or has a faster car than you — that’s when you suddenly go, ‘Wow, I’m useless’.”
So if we really want to fix the broken influencer industry and turn it into something valuable that can truly work for everyone, everyone from talent, management, brands and agencies need to work together to deliver this kind of authentic content and stop making everyone feel like shit.
If we’ve piqued your interest and you want to have a chat about content marketing or social media, feel free to get in touch; sam@wearecommit.com.
