Influencer Marketing in 2020 (What you need to know)

Influencer Marketing has been the "Buzz" word in 2019, and it's getting even more popular in 2020.

However, brands are still confused about how to think and to approach "Influencer Marketing." 

The #1 Mistake we see as we work with companies/Brands 

Brands say they have been unsuccessful is they treat influencers as "sales people" to sell their products/services. The real "TRUTH" is that that is entirely the wrong way to deal with influencers. 

Influencers are "STORY TELLERS" not "PRODUCT SELLERS"… there's a huge difference. 

The right influencers have a genuine connection with their followers, and this can be powerful for you if you know how to tap into this.

Just scroll influencers on Instagram and browse through profiles and check out people with 50k followers or more, and see how they are communicating.

If they are promoting product after product, then you want to run away from these influencers, AVOID them like the plague as from our research these influencers are burning out their Following daily.

However, the ones that communicate via "VIEW STORY" and the ones that actually try to connect with their following and talk about products and you may only see 1 or 2 products these are the gems that exist in the market.

These influencers are the ones that you want to ideally work with as they can talk about your product and service authentically and how it been able to "influence" their own lives, which hence would give an authentic brand view of your brand to their following. This type of connection is what you want to go after and create for yourself.

The art of "Influencer Marketing" selling

Where once the customer experience would end when they left the shop, today, potential customers interact all day every day with their favorite brands and influencers online. As a result, consumers can feel more like friends than potential sales for a commercial business.

Brands are required to step up and engage in a two-way relationship with potential consumers, fulfilling the notion of that personalized 'friendship.' If consumers feel undervalued, they'll unfollow and disengage. If brands manage to forge a relationship that feels authentic and genuine, however, those social media sales will start to flow.

There are six defined personas that are important for influencer marketing selling, according to a recent study by Pareto Law. These include:

• The Promoter
• The Motivator
• The Engager
• The Maverick
• The Nurturer
• The Supporter

Each persona adopts a different tactic of forging those all-important relationships with their social media followers. These varying methods – from language to types of post - are something which both brands and influencers can draw inspiration from.

The 3 Pillars of Influencer Marketing

When we work with brands, we walk them through this model, which may be helpful to you. (Comment below if you have tried it like this, or have any further input)

If you look at influencer marketing in this framework, it will make life much easier for you, and you will take out the "aches and pains" of influencer marketing immediately.

So let's break it down...

Pillar #1 - Content & Credibility

Let's think about this for a moment. Let's take 2 IG brand profiles, that sell the same product.

One IG profile is filled with your photoshopped, cool-looking pictures. The page looks very nice, but there are not many users using the product. You can clearly tell the brand put a lot of effort in post design, the product quality is legit, but the page lacks "realness"

The other IG profile each post is a post done by someone real and is populated with influencer generated content, and every picture relates with some use of the product by someone new and different. The profile screams "realness" that people actually use the product.

Which brands product are you more convinced to buy?

If you said the 2nd one, then you are right. Most decisions on IG are made because other people are using the product, and there is some proof that the product is popular, in use, and has good reviews. We like to call this the "Amazon Effect"

With our first pillar what we tell brands to do is first just focus on Content creation as the more content you are able to have influencers create for you (DM me to learn how we do this for FREE with influencers) then the more content your brand will own, and you will be able to repost it further increasing the "credibility" factor of your brand.

We normally go after smaller influencers as they are willing to work with you, and you can get them under a contract quickly, and you will own the content forever.

Pillar #2 - Distribution

Once you start populating your page with content, only then should you approach bigger influencers with 50k followers or more.

Now they may charge you a price, but you should ask for their media kit and also get screenshots of their analytics. Do not do any deal without knowing the numbers of how many impressions they can send you and what their best performing content looks like. This will allow you to plan the media buy with them.

As you get more content on your profile by other influencers, the bigger influencers will take your brand seriously because as much as you want to work with the bigger influencers, they need to want to work with your brand. This will only happen after credibility is established.

Pillar #3 - Optimization & Scale 

This is our favorite part; most people want to start here, but it takes time to work your way here, but on any Instagram profile, there are many places to place content.

1 - The View Story Option

2 - IGTV

3 - Your standard normal post (Picture or Video) 

4 - The small dedicated circles highlighting a various collection of stories 

Your job is to understand how much traffic each one of these areas sends when working with influencers, and trying to create a story across these assets over a four week period is what we do for our brands/clients we work with.

You are testing for "Impressions," "CTR," and, of course, "Conversions". Not every influencer is the same, so this is where you test and also compound. As you get more and more influencers under contract, your numbers will increase, and hence you will gain more sales if you do this process correctly.

Also, make sure you have influencers "TAG" your brand in the content as this is going to tell the Instagram algorithm to push your brand higher in the rankings, so it's easier to find amongst your target demographic.

In conclusion

Instagram, TikTok, and any channels or platforms have influencers. In today's market influencers are the most natural way and the most cost-effective way for your brand to reach a highly engaged audience that you didn't have to build, you need to be able to understand how to collaborate and be human.

Treat influencers like humans as too many brands treat them like a business deal, which the human factor does go a long way in this "social media" world we live in.

If you found this article helpful or have any questions about Influencer Marketing and getting your brand off the floor, DM me or email us at [email protected].

To your Success!

Sumeet Harish