Influencer marketing is here and it’s here to stay. We’re often asked by our portfolio of clients across beauty, lifestyle, food & drink and health & fitness if it’s a worthwhile part of the PR and Marketing mix – and we answer with a resounding YES!
So first of all, anyone can be an influencer, so what is a good influencer that’s worth working with? In a nutshell, a good influencer is someone with loyal and engaged followers who are open to products and services in your market. This type of marketing involves working with communicating key messages about campaigns, brands and products in content which is shared across their social media platforms in a variety of ways. Sometimes this is for the love of the product, the persuasion of the PR and/or payment. Influencer recommendations creates word of mouth and a sense of proof about the validity of the product, which gives credibility and often leads to sales.
Here are five reasons we recommend including good influencers in your marketing mix:
1. Highly targeted – influencers don’t necessarily have to be celebrities with zillions of followers. It’s common for our clients to work with nano influencers (under 10k followers) and micro influencers (10k to 50k followers) because working with these influencers is a great way to connect with a highly engaged and interested target audience, making them more likely to buy your product.
2. Creates content – Working with influencers is a great way to create static or video content, which can be shared across your own social media platforms as well as theirs. Often, even with paid influencers, it is cheaper than creating and shooting the content yourself.
3. ROI – Research has shown that influencer marketing is yielding a fantastic return on investment. Savvy consumers are perhaps a little wiser to traditional advertisements, and this subtler form of marketing is paying dividends. In fact, 86% of women use social media for purchasing advice and 49% of consumers depend on influencer recommendations[1].
4. Authenticity – Even when the work with an influencer is paid-for, consumers don’t necessarily see it this way, giving it a more authentic feel. When asked consumers will usually say that they trust the influencer that they follow to be honest in their assessment of a brand/product. It takes a long time to build a loyal following and gain the trust of an audience so it makes sense that influencers only want to tell their audience about things they really believe in.
5. Opportunity – we often start talking to influencers about activity on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok and then find out that they have a blog or a podcast, or that they write for some magazines and online publications and suddenly a whole world of new opportunities opens up!
From the return on investment to the engaged audience and authenticity, we’re convinced that influencer marketing is here to stay. It’s important to understand how to work with influencers to make the most of this opportunity so get in touch to find out how we can help. When it comes down to it, influencer channels are like highly specialised mini-magazines with advertising (paid posts) and editorial (organic posts). What influencers recommend is seen as third-party endorsement for products and services and is usually highly persuasive.
