Launch Your Own Influencer Marketing Campaign

In order to launch an influencer marketing campaign for your product there are a few do’s and don’ts. An influencer is someone on social media who has a significant following. They post aesthetically pleasing pictures and talk about their lives. Their followers trust them to tell the truth and expect them to be knowledgeable on certain topics. Businesses have found that working with influencers to promote their products can be helpful. When influencer marketing campaigns are done right, they can boost sales and bring in more customers. This article is going to detail what that plan looks like and how to get started.

Table of Contents

Create A Plan

When using influencers for marketing, the first step is to create a plan. One of the downsides of marketing with influencers is that at times, the campaign can turn sour quickly and without warning. Using the wrong influencer can cost your brand and hurt your business. The best course of action is to spend time researching and sketching a plan for how you would like the campaign to go.

Create Goals

The first step is to set up goals for yourself. This includes what you hope will happen with the influencer’s campaign. Are you hoping to gain more customers overall by partnering with this person? Do you hope to improve your own engagement for your website and social media profiles? Are you planning to build new relationships with consumers? However you plan to do this, make sure you have clear ideas of how this influencer will help you get there.

Create A Budget

Another step in setting up goals for an influencer marketing campaign is creating a budget. The great thing about working with influencers is how inexpensive it can be. Depending on who you decide to work with, they might not even ask for money. A cheap option is to hire a micro-influencer. These are users who have about 1k to 100k followers. If you are hoping to keep the payment low, you can also offer other benefits for the campaign. They might be interested in receiving products before they are sold to the public. You could give them free trials or discounts. Provide gift cards or certificates to your websites. Offer to give recognition to them on your pages. Any type of special treatment can help a brand deal. This also helps build a relationship with your influencer because they feel special.

Choose Within Your Budget

Whichever way you choose to strike a deal, make sure it fits with the budget you want to use. If your product and brand is not well known, micro-influencers are the way to go. Ask yourself the four R’s when looking at micro-influencers. Find out their reach, their resonance with their followers, their relevance to your product, and the ROI. They can expand your consumer reach with their followers. They are also cheaper in this way because they are not looking for massive brand deals. This is where those handy gift cards come into play.

Create the Content

Finally, when deciding on a plan, make sure you have an idea of what the content will be. Which products are you going to promote? Which products might need to be promoted over others? When you create the content, decide who will be doing the work. There are a few avenues for this. You could create the content yourself. This means that the influencer will be receiving a detailed plan and outline of what exactly needs to happen. This can be a good option for a few reasons. Influencers can make mistakes, and some might not even follow the FTC guidelines. Due to this, creating your own plan can be helpful to avoid scandals and allow your brand to prosper. In other ways, it can be a downside because followers may see this as an ingenuine ad. They follow these influencers to see genuine content. So, an ad where the influencer has a script can be hard to believe in.

Let the Influencer Work

For your social media influencer campaign, there is the option of allowing the influencer to create the ad themselves. This can sometimes be the better option because the ad will be more genuine and more in tune with what the followers like. You can always provide some direction on how you would like it to go but leave the details to them. The influencer knows what followers connect with and can create the ad accordingly. It is good to note that you have to be very careful with this. Make sure the influencer checks every detail with you before the post is made. That way, you avoid scandals that cost your brand.

What is Popular with Some, is Not Popular with Others

While you decide who will create the content, figure out what it will look like on certain platforms. Is the influencer popular on Instagram? If so, an aesthetically pleasing picture will be the best choice here. Is the influencer popular on Facebook? A well-produced video might be the best option. It all depends where the campaign will be, so make sure you do research on what kind of post is successful.

Finding the Perfect Influencer

When looking at influencer marketing campaigns, always be thorough with finding the right influencer. If this is done incorrectly, it can be detrimental to your brand. If done well, the influencer can help increase your sales. One of the cons to an influencer campaign is that there are a few traps you might fall into. Make sure to look for an influencer that has genuine followers instead of bots. If the account has a high follower count but a low engagement rate, this may mean the user is paying to become an influencer instead of getting real followers. Check the comments! If they have a lot of spam, this can also mean the account is not valid.

Relevant Content

You also want to check for relevancy. The trends change every day so it is important to pick someone who is relevant and will help bring customers to you. Make sure that whoever you pick also has a good reputation with ads. See if they can provide you with a portfolio of brand deals they have done in the past and check if it matches what you want. Find out how many times the influencer posts ads. If there are too many, it can show inauthenticity and followers are turned off by this. When an influencer is particular about the brands they choose, this can be encouraging for followers. They will see that the influencer really believes in the products they promote.

Follow Your Vision

Finding an influencer also means they should be right for the product. Try to find out what the influencer usually likes to post about. If they are big fans of baseball and you sell baseball bats, then they could be the right influencer. When deciding which influencer to pick, ask yourself what you want. This will go with your general goals for the campaign. Look at the influencer demographics and see if they match your audience. Find someone who your existing audience might be likely to listen to. Ask yourself what the influencer can accomplish for you. Then find out how the influencer can help you accomplish the goal. Lay these out for the chosen influencer so they understand the direction as well.

Different Ways to Research

Looking for an influencer can be time consuming. There are a few alternatives to doing your own searches. You can go through an influencer marketing agency who can help you find the right influencers. If you want to be more involved in choosing your influencer, there are some other options. You can use databases, networks, and marketplaces which will help you seek out specific influencers who are right for your product.

Reaching Out

It will depend on what kind of influencer you want to reach out to. If they are a micro-influencer, a direct message might do the trick. If they have more followers, they might post their business email and an agent to contact. However you choose to contact them, that will be the time to begin building a relationship with the influencer. Just like a customer, they need to feel appreciated and important to your business. Making an effort with them will also mean they may put effort into your ad.

Track Your Results

When the ad has been posted and received by followers, the final measure to take for influencer marketing is checking the results. With social media campaigns this can be difficult. This is why it is important to decide on which KPIs (key performance indicators) to use while you are setting up the plan. Some important KPIs to use are the engagement rate with the post, how many followers were reached, and the click-through rate with the link posted. Watch for increased sales as a result. You can also create a hashtag to use and see if your product became more popular. Using codes can be helpful for when people buy the product. These can be used to see if the purchase came with the influencer’s help.

The Importance of Tracking

Tracking results is very important because social media campaigns of this type are still relatively new. Marketers are still learning about this avenue of advertising. Brands have lost customers because of bad brand deals with influencer campaigns. Even if the marketing goes as planned, if the ad does not increase sales, then it might be best to move on to another plan.

High Risk Means High Reward

Influencer marketing campaigns come with great risk, but they provide great rewards if done well. It has been shown that if an influencer campaign ad does well, it can improve sales quickly. Followers trust influencers, so this automatically gives your brand an edge over others while helping your reputation. Make sure to create a solid plan to provide your influencer with when the work begins. Finding the right influencer will take time, but it is important to find the right one. Pick an influencer who has similar followers to yours. Make sure the followers are authentic and the posts are generating actual comments and likes. Begin by learning more about sponsored content and start your influencer campaign.