Getting familiar with influencer marketing
If you think you are alien to the concept of influencer marketing, try to remember what was the oldest form of advertising. Yes, it was ‘word of mouth’. Word of mouth has been around ever since language and business have been intertwined. It was a simple, meaningful and effective way for products to get sold back in those days.
In short, you can think of social media influencer marketing as an evolved version of word of mouth and referral marketing combined.
Who and what are influencers?
Influencers are regular people like you and me. They are not stars or celebrities or famous TV anchors or models. The only difference between influencers and followers is that they love telling the world about everything they love. This could range from talking about their favorite clothing brands to being a mom blogger or even a traveler.
Take an influencer’s passion for food for example. In this case they would keep posting videos or statuses about where they are, what they are doing currently and what they are eating. They also rate the food and the restaurant they have been to. They do this so that their followers would also go out and try that particular food or not, depending on their influencers recommendation.
Yes, influencers have the power to promote any business. But they make sure they use it wisely. Most of them get paid for trying out a product or talking about a brand on social media. But the good news is that they sometimes work on the basis of a barter system which makes the deal free for the brand.
Anyone with a decent fan following who has a particular passion or a niche they want to target and knows how to go about making interesting posts on social media for their followers can become an influencer no matter the age. You might notice influencer pets as well on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube doing a pretty terrific job of keeping their audience entertained and engaged. Yes! Anyone can be an influencer.
How can influencers be used to promote a business
89% say ROI from influencer marketing is comparable to or better than other marketing channels. (Source)
While it is possible to get influencer marketing done free of charge, successful brands always happen to allocate a budget towards it. Whether you have a big plan or not, you do not need to manage the entire marketing activity by yourself. Take the help of an influencer marketing agency in Mumbai to streamline the marketing operation for you. Agencies that specialize in influencer marketing would be ideal. They will even look out for the best influencers, shortlist them and even come up with the perfect influencer strategy in conjunction with your brand campaign. There are 3 types of influencers – micro, macro and nano influencers. The tag changes for them depending on how large or small their fan base is. Social media marketing services in Mumbai take many aspects into consideration before selecting them. A few of them are age, gender, niche, number of followers, frequency of activity and also the quality of the influencer’s work.
How social media influencers can help you to grow your business in various ways.
Here are a few notable ways how influencer marketing can help your business grow:
- Partnerships:
Brands now prefer getting into partnerships with influencers benefiting both parties. But long term partnerships are only recommended when the influencer is providing enough value to your brand. And provided the influencer is also getting a good return. Furthermore, paid ads costs don’t seem to be decreasing. Hence brands have taken even more interest in influencer marketing.
- Being in Google’s good books:
When thousands of users start following your brand, Google takes it as a good sign. And so it makes this one of the reasons to push it to the first page on search. Well, you have your influencers to thank once again. But beware – Many brands also fall prey to the idea of buying followers on social media for the same reason. Remember that social media platforms always have an eye on suspicious and unrealistic activities like this and may freeze your account. So in this case it is always better to let influencer marketing let your business grow your followers the right way.
- Influencers have the power:
As mentioned above, this is true. Influencers have organic, social media power to transport your brand to cloud 9.
About 84% of consumers have made a purchase based on an influencer’s recommendation. (Source)
Everyone from kids to grandparents use social media today. There’s no reason why any brand should ignore the power of these talented influencers.
- Reach:
The larger the number of people your influencers will reach out to, the better. This means that your product or service has entered the lives of such a huge number of people. For example. An influencer with 1000 followers might do a good job if they can actually influence their fans into buying your product, but on the other hand an influencer with a fan following of 10,000 will have a better reach and hence will have more chances of getting your brand sold. Of course selling happens, but it need not be the only objective for your brand when it comes to influencer marketing and business growth.
A small but not an insignificant percentage of marketers.. 17% of them to be precise, plan to spend over half of their entire marketing budget on influencer marketing in 2022. (Source)
Influencer marketing is leveraged by a range of companies, from smaller organizations to much larger brands. The statistic above is a sign that influencer marketing has been accepted by many brands who trust and vouch for influencer marketing simply because they have attained success and growth because of it.
