Influencer Marketing - a new trend to follow

Influencer Marketing - a new trend to follow

Nowadays, many companies do marketing through social media since people spend more and more time on it especially after the outbreak of the pandemic in 2019. Shopping online has developed rapidly and meanwhile the amount of investment in influencer marketing has reached a new level. We can see that the influencer marketing is taking over the position of the best marketing strategy in 2021.

What is influencer marketing?

Influencer marketing is a strategy to promote a company’s products, service or brand image by cooperating with influencers from social media platforms. The influencers chosen by a company are those who have certain numbers of devoted followers and can influence their followers’ purchasing choices. The content created or behaviours shown on social media platforms by these influencers are in accordance with the company’s values. A right influencer can help a company to increase the sales and add value to the brand. In return, a company often pays influencers or supplies them with free products.

Impressive growing of influencer marketing

According to the statistics from Influencer Marketing Hub's 2021 Study, searches for "influencer marketing" on Google increased 1500% from 2016 to 2019. Influencer marketing go mainstream with an estimated g market value of $13.8 billion in 2021. It is hard to find a company who is not marketing though any social media platforms and most of them use the influencer marketing strategy simply because it is very efficient and remunerative. For every $1 a company spends on influencer marketing, it can bring back $5.78 on average. HubSpot reports shown that 75% of companies will put a budget for influencer marketing in 2021 and 62% of them will increase their budgets.

                        

Who are the influencers and how to choose them?

An ideal influencer is someone who has a considerable number of devoted followers willing to accept what the influencer proposes. Influencers sometimes cooperate with brands by creating original content or giving positive comments mentioning the brands or certain products they agreed to promote.

To choose the right influencers is an essential step for companies because it is the key to successful influencer marketing. Different types of influencers represent diversified values. Their followers, potential customers, often share the same values or appreciate the lifestyles or content the influencers have built. A company can work with several influencers on different platforms at the same time.

How to lunch an influencer marketing strategy?

Before finding the influencers, a clear marketing strategy is fundamental.

If you are responsible for a company’s influencer marketing, then you should ask these questions before you start:

1. What is your goal?

Set up a campaign goal and define the reasons why you want to work with influencers. Is it  to increase sales, build brand awareness, engage more people, or reinforce brand image? Which product or service do you want to promote?

2. What’s your budget?

How much do you want to spend and under what forms? Will you pay influencers by cash or offering them your products or services? How many free samples do you want to send out?

3. Which platform to use?

Analyse different platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Pinterest, TikTok etc., to make choices based on your needs. When entering a foreign market, the local social media platforms should be considered such as WeChat and YouKu. In China, most of the western platforms are banned.

4.  Who are my targeted influencers?

The influencers are classified by the number of followers. Do research before choosing them. Use audience demographic features to verify if the influencers have the right and active audiences. Choose relevant and value matching influencers to collaborate with and check the publishing frequency of high-quality content to keep their audiences engaged.

5. Work together with your influencers and track the results

Define how you want to reach the influencers and manage to maintain good relationships with different influencers. Be patient and follow up the results of your campaign to check if it worked well for your company. This will help to adjust your marketing strategy.

 

 Jing CHEN

688 words

 

 

 

 

 

Wikipedia, Influencer Marketing

< https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influencer_marketing >

 Werner Geyser, 《What is Influencer Marketing? An in Depth Look at Marketing's Next Big Thing》,  published on July 14th, 2021

<https://influencermarketinghub.com/what-is-influencer-marketing/>

  Izaak Crook, 《What Is a Social Media Influencer (And How Do I Become One?) 》, published on November 14, 2018

< What Is a Social Media Influencer (And How Do I Become One?) (appinstitute.com) >

Guest Author, 《 9 Factors to Consider to Pick the Right Instagram Influencer for Your Brand 》 , published on September 16th, 2021

<https://influencermarketinghub.com/pick-the-right-instagram-influencer/ >