By:

Devdeep Guha

Marketing Specialist 

LinkedIn Profile Link:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/devdeepguha 

Influencer Marketing today is a great tool for introducing businesses, promoting and boosting sales and products etc. via the social media platform. We all know the importance of online businesses ever more since the pandemic struck the world and its significance way ahead in the future as well. Here is a look at effective Influencer Marketing  for your Digital campaign.

Influencer Marketing and Building Social Trust

· What is influencer marketing- Influencers are popular people from social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TicTok etc. and they excel in their niche. They have extensive fan following and they know how to keep their fan engaged by creative posts, videos, short films etc.

· Why it works-Influences are trusted by their followers or fans not only for their skills but also their ability to communicate clearly and endorse products based on their own experiences. Many such product reviews help the followers to choose the best for themselves.

An Intel on Influencer Marketing In Today’s World

Being an influencer in 2015 was a piece of cake as compared to today’s social media competition. Many of these early influencers have turned full time bloggers and have earned enough brand partnerships to keep them afloat. The older generation relied on high quality DSLR images for content posting but now things have changed. With life in the fast lane, the generation after the millennials is focused on creating on lightly edited, phone images with bright contrasts. Hence, be it food blogging or lifestyle blogging, things will keep evolving at a casual pace. Influencers are needed at different stages of product campaign discussed as under:

Awareness Phase-main focus is your brands and type of audience to focus on. Segmenting according to genders or age groups can be decided this early and appropriate influencers can be assigned roles to bring about an outcome

Interest Phase-is led by eye catching content creation through which you can indirectly engage masses while they are not actually searching for that specific product.

Consideration Phase-this phase involves final decision on spending the funds on the product and product specific influencers who can convince the buyers factually can do the job well.

Action Phase-is the last one in the line and swipe up links and special offers can be used to catch a sale.

Planning An Effective Marketing Strategy

Sending out free products for random reviews would hardly get the job done. You need is a concrete influencer marketing strategy to keep -up with the competitors in your market.

How To Effectively Select Influencers for Your Influencer Marketing Campaign

• Research Is the Key-Do Your Homework

Research will keep your game focused, and result based so first, choose the platform you want to target first. You should ensure that your brand has a presence on this platform before jumping to this step because at this stage you will expand the brand, not introduce it. Next, with the help of listings, figure out where your industry or product is in demand so that you can choose an influencer to reach out to that particular community.

Determine weather you want big influencers with thousands of followers or micro influencers with under 1000 followers. Someone with 5000 to 10000 influencers would do the job. Think about the expected ROI of your marketing campaign at this stage. You will also be able to allocate a budget for influencer payment at this stage.

A survey published by Influence.co reported that average post by influencers cost $271 and for micro-influencers it was $83 per post. For large scale influencers the cost can go up to $763 according to the 2017 survey.

• Keeping The Content Interesting and Entertaining

This is a key point worth mentioning. Social media with boring content is deemed useless as it fails to attract buyers. Choose influencers who have a good number of audiences but also post engaging content. If the same influencer post your product in an engaging way, people will respond positively and eventually buy your product.

• Don’t Give It Away

You don’t have to reach out to influencers who deal with your product buyers directly and sell the same product specifically. You can think out of the box and explore influencers who can get creative with your product quickly. For example a makeup blogger not just want to review makeup product. Instead, cameras and other gadgets like ring-lights and studio equipment can also be their type of product. So it is a great idea to explore.

• Be Up for Support

Make sure that you support micro influencers and benefit from it in return. They not only offer loyalty when you approach them but according to a survey, they have an higher liking rate as compared to influencers who have followers between 1k to 10k. You can target multiple micro-influencers with the budget of large-scale influencers and if the job seems daunting there are companies like TRIBE, iAmbassador, Captivate etc. to get your job done.

• Originality Sells Out Like Hot Cakes

Being original can help you maintain your brand image and it matters. Reach out to influencers who have similar brand values and support the idea of originality.

Set A Budget and Management Strategy

Once you have an insight on all the other aspects of influencer marketing like setting a budget and sorting the final influencer list, you should devise a regular monitoring and follow-up schedule. For any campaign to be successful, you have to invest time for planning, successful execution and evaluation of results.

Decide On Goals and Message

This is crucial to any brand no matter what their campaign is about. The goals and message that goes out to the masses must be an original and comprehendible one. Many brands only focus on influencer marketing to increase sales or spread awareness about the new product. You can plan ahead for your brand and ensure that the influencer campaign synchronizes with the brand’s current and future image.

Strategic Review of Your Plan

Measuring success is important as any other step in the marketing campaign. It can be done by using specific hashtags to follow up with what is being posted. Affiliate codes or tracking links can also be used to track what is being generated by influencer marketing campaigns.

What to Conclude?

Marketing campaigns are fed by what is in demand by the masses. The need of the influencer marketing campaigns keep evolving year by year but the basics of marketing remain grounded for a great structural framework for the campaign. Things have indeed changed a lot in a few years and would continue to do so due to constant innovation around us. The need however, calls for a strategy flexible to change and once you catch up with your rhythm, you will be able to design multiple marketing campaigns for greater experiences.