Posted by Did you know there are around 37.8 million influencers around the world?
Influencer marketing, being one of the leading marketing strategies of 2023, is being leveraged by many businesses to promote their products or services.
According to HubSpot’s Marketing Strategy and Trends Report, 1 in 4 marketers are actively investing in influencer marketing.
However, considering the humongous number of influencers, it is tedious to pick out the ones that can be beneficial for your brand. Remember partnering with just any influencer does not do any good to your business. Collaborating with the right influencers is the key to successful influencer marketing.
In this post, we will share a detailed step-by-step guide on how to choose the right influencer for your campaigns.
5 different types of influencers
Before we get into the step-by-step guide on choosing the best influencer for your brand, let us have a look at the different types of influencers you can collaborate with.
Here is a list of various types of influencers you can choose from.
1. Nano-influencers
“Nano-influencers are those influencers who have a small yet dedicated social media following. Known for their highly-engaged audiences, nano-influencers have a following of 1K to 10K followers. This type of influencer is ideal for brands seeking to build awareness in niche markets.”Keith Eneix, President of RenewSkin.
2. Micro-influencers
“Micro-influencers are those influencers who have a moderate number of social media followers. The following typically range from 10K to 50K followers. Having a strong focus on specific niches, micro-influencers are ideal for brands wanting broader exposure and access to an engaged audience.” Says Kaloyan Dimitrov, Resume Expert, Career Expert at Enhancv.
3. Mid-tier influencers
Mid-tier influencers are those influencers who have the following of 50K to 500K followers. Being known for their vast experience in content creation, they produce tailored content that appeals to the target audience while maintaining authenticity.” Says Dan Charles, CEO and founder at Codarity.
4. Macro influencers
“Macro-influencers are those influencers with a large audience, ranging from 500K to 1M social media followers. These influencers are usually celebrities, TV personalities, industry experts, business leaders, or more. Influencer partnerships with them allow brands to tap into wider networks helping them reach a diverse set of customers.“ Says Jessica Shee from iBoysoft.
5. Mega influencers
Lastly, mega influencers are influencers having an exceptionally large following. With more than a million followers, these influencers have attained global recognition and celebrity status on social media. These influencers are ideal for brands wanting to establish their presence on an international scale.
The image below showcases the different types of influencers based on their followers/subscribers.
That being said, let us now learn how to choose the right influencer for your brand.
7 Steps to Choose the Best Influencer for Your Brand
1. Understand Your Target Audience
Just like every other marketing campaign, choosing influencers for your influencer marketing campaigns begins with understanding your target audience.
Start by creating buyer personas by collecting key information, such as location, age, interests, social media channels they are active on, their pain points, and so on. By knowing your audience’s interests, you will be in a better position to choose the influencers that cater to your desired audience.
For example, a brand that sells a SaaS-based recruitment software would fail at influencer marketing if it collaborates with an influencer that has a generic audience. In contrast, if it partners with an influencer who has an audience of HR professionals and business leaders, it will receive better engagement and increased ROI.
2. Define Your Influencer Marketing Goals
Now that you have a fair idea about your target audience and the kind of influencers you wish to collaborate with, it is time to define your influencer marketing goals.
Ask yourself what you wish to accomplish by working with influencers. Do you wish to increase brand awareness? Do you want to drive engagement on your posts or traffic to your website? Are you looking to maximize your lead generation efforts and product sales?
Check out the screenshot below that depicts the results of a study conducted by Insider Intelligence on influencer marketing goals.
Setting influencer marketing goals provides a direction for your campaigns. It plays a crucial role in determining the type of influencers you must work with and the channels you must utilize for promotions. It also helps you track the progress of your campaigns and measure their success.
3. Identify Potential Influencers in Your Niche
The next step is to discover potential influencers in your niche with whom you can collaborate. However, finding suitable industry influencers can be a bit challenging. Depending on your budget and available time, you can implement the following tactics to find desired influencers for your brand.
- Using Hashtags
Monitor industry-specific hashtags, niche-related hashtags, or hashtags related to customers’ pain points on social media. You can also leverage a hashtag tracking tool to identify and track these hashtags and connect with the influencers who are using them in their social media posts.
- Leveraging Influencer Finding Tools and Databases
Invest in influencer finder tools, such as Mentionlytics, Upfluence, HypeAuditor, or any other tool to research and discover influencers based on your requirements.
- Hiring an Influencer Marketing Agency
Partner with an influencer marketing agency to handle your influencer marketing campaigns from start to finish. Right from finding the best influencers for your brand, and collaborating with them on deliverables, to its successful implementation, these influencer marketing agencies will be responsible for everything. This will free up for in-house marketing team’s time and allow them to work on other important tasks.
Prepare a shortlist of potential influencers you can collaborate with for your brand marketing.
4. Check If the Influencers Are Right Fit for Your Brand
Before going forward with influencer partnerships, you must check whether the chosen influencers are relevant to your industry and target audience. Ask yourself the following questions to determine if the influencers are a good choice for your brand.
- What is the influencer’s follower count?
- Do these followers fit well in your ideal customer profile?
- Which social media platforms are they active on?
- What type of content do they create?
- Is their content engaging?
- Do they have active engagement on their posts?
- Do they have prior experience working with brands like yours?
- How do they disclose their paid partnerships?
- What are their commercials?
The answers to these questions will help you identify the influencers who have the potential to boost your brand image. They are a perfect fit for your brand.
Further, checking the quality of the content that influencers create plays a crucial role in determining whether they are the best for your brand. Visually-appealing pictures, engaging videos, and well-written captions are some of the major aspects you must evaluate.
The content they create must be authentic, and honest, and must resonate well with your brand messaging. You must look out for hints of storytelling in the content as it builds trust, improves credibility, and fosters a sense of community.
5. Monitor Influencer’s Past Partnerships and Collaborations
Take out time to review their existing brand partnerships as it provides you with insights into their skills, the results achieved, and professionalism towards other brand collaborations. It helps you evaluate whether the said influencer would be an ideal fit for your brand.
For example, an influencer who has worked with clothing brands in the past would be an ideal choice for a small business selling hand-crafted shawls. By examining the kind of content, such as videos, photos, podcasts, and more they produce, you will be in a better position to decide on the kind of deliverables you wish the influencer to work on for your brand.
Similarly, examining past collaborations helps you assess the influencer’s commitment to delivering the desired brand posts. It aids you in understanding how they helped the brand achieve its desired campaign goals. You can rely on social media monitoring tools to gain insights into their past performance and campaign results.
The idea behind this research is to gain insights into valuable information about the influencer’s abilities and minimize the risks of campaign failures.
6. Keep an Eye Out for Red Flags
Before pursuing partnerships with influencers, it is wise to look out for red flags or warning signs and ensure the success of influencer marketing campaigns. Some of the common red flags include –
- Fake followers and engagement
- Odd growth in followers count
- An unusual amount of spam comments on the posts
- Unprofessional behavior
- Inconsistent communication
- Non-compliance with advertising guidelines
- Controversial behavior in past collaborations
- Constantly changing pricing structures
Identifying these warning signs will help you avoid the pitfalls in influencer relationships and collaborate with those influencers who are likely to deliver promised results without any delays.
7. Start Your Influencer Outreach
Now that you have found relevant influencers for your campaign, you need to reach out to them and build a connection. Write a personalized outreach message to capture the attention of the influencers and propose the partnership idea to them. Let them know why you wish to work with them. Do not forget to include how this partnership will benefit them as well as your brand. This will create a positive brand impression in their minds.
Opt for professional communication channels, such as an email or direct message on social media to communicate with them. Create a clear collaboration proposal that mentions the campaign goals, your expectations from the influencer, compensation structure, and other important details.
Do not hesitate to follow up in case you do not receive an immediate response.
Wrapping Up
Partnering with the best influencers can help you increase brand visibility, attract desired customers, and maximize your business revenue. However, choosing the right influencers for your brand can be a bit challenging. You must invest a significant amount of time and research the best influencers as it is the most important step in building successful influencer marketing campaigns.
By following the guide we mentioned in this post, you can select the perfect brand influencers and harness the power of influencer marketing to take your business to greater heights.