Influencer Marketing 101

Influencer marketing is still in its infancy and ever-evolving as social media trends continue to shift to prioritize things like video. Influencer marketing is not a quick fix but should be part of an overall marketing strategy. Here are a few steps to get you started.

Find Your Influencers

Follow hashtags and see who the key players are – the frequent flyers in those categories will float to the top. Also, find who is using location tags if you are planning a regional campaign. It is possible to buy followers, so steer clear of accounts that show a suspiciously high follower count but not much engagement on content. To see if an account is legitimate, go to “Followers” on the Instagram profile page and do an audit of the first several accounts to see if they are real. You can still have a successful campaign and make more of an impact with an account that has less than 2,000 followers who are active than an account with 10,000 followers who may not be as engaged.

Make Sure They Align With Your Brand

Is the influencer someone who is going to use your product? For example, we’ve helped produce delivery companies develop their influencer marketing program. While Instagram is full of plenty of foodies who dine out, we identified home chefs as our prime target as they would be more likely to cook with the produce and document their process.

Know When To Pay To Play

For some influencers, creating content is their full time job and they should be compensated as such. It takes a lot of time building and engaging a following of value. Once you identify those influencers you would like to work with, reach out to see if they have a rate card or media kit. The rate card can give you a better idea of fees of service and demographic information on their following. The benefit to working with an influencer in a paid relationship is the ability to set clear expectations for the number of posts and types of posts you would like to see. If you are not compensating the influencer in cash, you can offer products in exchange for a fair and honest review, but know there is no guarantee of posting.