Choosing The Right Influencer Type
The buzz word in marketing today is "social influencer". And brands are lining up to work with these online gurus who are going to bring massive sales to their brand. Immediately.
But that's really not the case. And it shouldn't be the expectation by brands. Social influencers work for brands in a very similar way to traditional advertising - they help positively reinforce a brand's image and bring awareness to consumers - who may need to be marketed to multiple times before leading to a higher sales purchase interest.
In this blog, Hollywood Branded shares both our infographic and video guide to influencer marketing strategy for brand marketers.
What Social Influencers DON'T Do
So if in fact, social influencers DON'T lead to instant sales in most cases for brands... what DO they do? Well, just like with traditional advertising, there is a common saying (who knows where it truly comes from... we've done research and well, hmmm...) that it takes 7 times for a consumer to see a brand advertised before they will actually be influenced to make a purchase decision. And of course, if you are advertising to someone who isn't going to EVER be interested in the category of product you are advertising, that narrows the field quite a bit.
But social influencers can help be a game changer with that traditional model. The idea is that a social influencer's followers PROBABLY are in a similar time in life age, or have similar interests to that of the influencer. And if a brand manages to get the attention and interest of the social influencer to chat about that product on their social platform, it's going to lead to a lot of very relevant potential buyers.
And those potential buyers - we mean influencer followers! - get all warm and fuzzy from that nice soft referral by the influencer, versus a boring old ad.
After all - the influencer MUST have liked the brand enough to lend their credibility to it, right? Well that's the idea at least. It's WOM (word of mouth) marketing at its best!
Those influencers help products not just have attention caught - but actually influence future purchase decision making.
The Power Of The Influencer
We can't argue how powerful a social influencer can be - however hiring a random influencer alone is not enough, brands need to know the type of influencers that’s right for your brand. And a lot of that is based on the brand's budget too. Because gone are the days that social influencers are free for brands to work with, except if the brand has something really really cool and with value that is tradeable.
So as a brand, know there is a fee that will be charged. Our agency typically builds out programs based around a CPM model - which is the dollar cost per thousand to reach 1,000 of the influencer's followers.
The pricing scales based on three factors:
- The engagement level of those followers. Lower engagement can mean the influencer has a lot of fake or dead accounts following them - and you don't want to be paying for that! Or they just kinda aren't so good at creating content their followers like enough to comment on or click that they like it.
- The number of social platforms the post(s) will be on. More social platforms mean more followers. But sometimes those followers are the same. So as a brand know you aren't necessarily reaching a total number of unique individuals - there is crossover. But at the same time, since on some platforms if a post isn't boosted it reaches less than 10% of the fan base... just because the social platform SAYS there are that many followers - it doesn't mean that many people will see the post.
- The type of content. Is it just a hashtag and call out? Easy! Is it a photo? More work. A video - well THAT is quite the production. From scripting to a film crew with microphone and lighting to editing to props and people... that's quite the undertaking. And it should be expected to cost more.
What Type of Influencer Do You Need?
Check out the infographic below for in-depth explanation about different types of influencers
Why You Should Have An Influencer Marketing Strategy Expert?
Influencer management (really, it’s a lot like herding cats) requires a lot of juggling and hand holding, and plenty of content tweaks along the way. All which add up to a lot of energy and time spent to make sure all elements come together at the end, perfectly executed for your brand.
So unless your team isn't planning on sleeping and wants to add yet another to do to your already overly full list, consider bringing on an influencer marketing expert to lend a helping hand. Why? SIMPLE... Because they are experts in creating influencer outreach and sell-in, content scripting and hashtags, product shipping, post approvals, and detailed metric reporting on the program’s success! And they are relentless in their follow ups. Did we say follow ups? We meant follow up follow up follow up follow up. Influencers typically need a lot of follow up.
So Now What?
Influencer partnerships mean your brand can work with digital influencers on a host of different social platforms, with bloggers or with vloggers for either single posts or comprehensive brand ambassador development.
Interested in learning more customized influencer program for your brand? Check out our Influencer Marketing guide below or simply set a FREE complimentary consultation with our agency's CEO, Stacy Jones. 
