Influencer marketing is a versatile strategy that blends the best of both worlds – marketing and PR. It can be used effectively by various groups, such as brands, marketers, PR-specialists, entrepreneurs and webmasters. Each of them can leverage the different levels of influencer marketing that suit their needs.
The current market reveals that this strategy has a lot of potential. However, not all experts know how to work with advertising through influencers, how to maximise its benefits and avoid pitfalls, even if they have some experience with it.
It’s time to bridge the gap. In this article, we will teach you everything you need to know to get started with influencer marketing.
What is Influencer Marketing?
The customer’s opinion of the product or service determines their willingness to buy or order it. That’s why promoting through influencers is so effective. A brand or a marketer can try to impact the customer’s opinion directly. But why should the customer trust them? Especially if the brand is not well-known or widely recognized. Anyone can say that their product is good. Of course, they would say that, because they want to sell it.
But if someone who has the user’s trust recommends the product, the situation changes. If the user has a strong sense of critical thinking, they will filter the opinion leader’s recommendation through their own judgement. If the user is easily swayed, they will blindly trust them.
In the latter case, the opinion leader converts the user into a customer. In the former case, the opinion leader gets the user’s attention. This is the essence of the strategy. Advertising through influencers will be noticed.
This strategy is a mix of traditional and modern marketing techniques. It also has a touch of native advertising. But this mix will only be appealing if it is seasoned with the right ingredients. And these ingredients are the hard work and knowledge of the marketer. They will be the focus of this article.
An opinion leader is someone who has influence over a certain group of people. It is a mistake to think that this only applies to celebrities. The concept is much wider, it includes bloggers, experts and successful professionals in their field. An opinion leader can be a company, a website, a community or even a forum. But in the classical sense, it is a specific person.
One of the main advantages of this strategy is that people tend to trust the opinions of other people. Impersonal advertising repels them. That’s why two out of three buyers check the reviews section under the product or look for them on other online resources. They don’t know the people who wrote these reviews, they don’t have a personal connection with them. They are not even sure if they are real or fake. But they will feel more confident if a buyer who has already tried the product gives a positive feedback.
And if such a feedback is given by a blogger, whom they have been following for a long time, admire and trust as a person, then their opinion will be shaped positively towards the product. Even if they search for more information about the product, a cognitive bias – “confirmation bias” – will kick in. All their subsequent evaluation will be skewed in favour of the advertiser.
Some influencers have a remarkable influence on their audience, as well as a huge number of followers. Take PewDiePie, for example. He has 111 million subscribers on his YouTube channel right now. And his audience mimics all his “catchphrases” and joins him in the “opener” at the start of every video. If PewDiePie praises your product, how much will your sales soar the next day?
He has done it before. For instance, the famous series of ads for the movie “As Above, So Below.” They got twice as many views as the movie trailer itself. How many people did they attract to the theatre? And back in 2014, PewDiePie only had 27 million subscribers.
Of course, this is an example of working with big brands and suitable influencers. There are many more tiers of opinion leaders. It is obvious that not every brand can afford to advertise with such a blogger, not to mention an independent affiliate marketer. But in this case, we illustrate the concept itself. And it is easily adjustable both ways.
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Influencer Marketing by the Numbers
To give the reader a better idea of the market segment we are discussing, we decided to present some figures. This way, newcomers will understand that this is not a new and untested strategy that is still experimental, but a current and effective practice.
The influencer marketing segment had a turnover of $16.4 billion in 2022. This is not a trivial amount. But this strategy is just one of the tools that marketers use. And there is no other tool with the same metrics in marketing.
The average ROI on ad campaigns focused solely on influencer marketing is one of the highest in the field. By 2023, there is $5.2 revenue for every dollar invested. This is an average, not a median. It does not mean that there are no unprofitable campaigns in the industry. But it does mean that the potential revenue is very high.
According to AdWeek’s research for 2023, over 75% of marketers use influencer marketing. And 67% of the companies have a separate budget, dedicated exclusively to this strategy. Speaking of big brands, among multi-million dollar companies, nearly a quarter spend more than $500,000 a year on influencer marketing.
Now the level of the strategy has increased even more. According to recent surveys, up to 67% of brands use Instagram bloggers for promotion. And how many support other sources? Yes, most projects are promoted through 4-5 platforms at once, but there are also those who prefer one favourite. Also, surveys show that now 90% of all marketers who use the strategy consider it an effective form of advertising. That is, only 1 out of 10 are dissatisfied.
Essential Principles and Trends of Influencer Advertising
Let’s dive deeper into the specifics of influencer marketing and dispel the myths that switching from traditional advertising to this strategy is a piece of cake. The two systems have more differences than similarities.
The first principle is – you need to be prepared. As in any advertising campaign, you need to calculate the budget, design the promotion strategy, create a profile of the target audience, identify their needs and problems and only then start looking for an influencer. The main blunder of many novice marketers is that they first search for an opinion leader and then think about the subscribers on their channel.
The second point is to remember that you are working with a person, not a brand. Yes, many influencers are professional, have a lot of experience in advertising integrations and their own teams with managers who resolve disputes. But most of them are rather creators who know as much about advertising as any ordinary person. And they don’t know how to deal with the technical and financial aspects. And some also don’t understand how to price their services, so they just state their rates randomly.
And now the third point – and it’s a paradox. Don’t limit the influencer’s freedom to present the advertising content. Even if they are bad at advertising, you should only give them the key points that need to be mentioned. But how they will do it, with what words – it’s up to them. This is their audience, their subscribers, they have their own way of communication. Don’t try to make them “read from a script”, don’t impose your integration scenarios if the blogger doesn’t agree with them. They really know best. This advice should not be taken as a rule. If you see that the prepared integration is more likely to damage the project’s reputation than to boost it, make changes. The main message is that you should trust the blogger more about how to talk to their audience.
The fourth point is to decide in advance the method of finding an influencer. This is the most time-consuming point. Unlike traditional digital advertising, you eliminate a ton of tasks. Targeting settings, behavioural factor analysis, choosing the timing of entering the market, sources, budget allocation for creatives, rate adjustment, developing ads for different segments within the overall audience, spy-preparation and much more. But all this work doesn’t vanish, it just changes its shape. And that new shape is finding an influencer. All of the targeting, all of the target audience research, all of the customization is about finding an influencer. So pay close attention to that. And decide whether you will use a blogger search service, an agency or whether you will find a person yourself.
Types of Influencers
Now it’s time to explore the options that the modern market offers. We have briefly mentioned that influencers come in different types. But we have not yet explained how many. Let’s do that now. First, let’s categorise all opinion leaders into three groups based on how they influence the audience.
Authority. Bloggers who influence their subscribers through their “fame”. This category mostly includes celebrities. Even if they are not knowledgeable about the topic they are talking about, people trust them because of their overall reputation. If a famous athlete says that taking a loan from a certain bank is a smart choice, people agree with him. Even though he is an athlete, not a financial or credit expert, he has not analysed the market and he is not skilled at such tasks. This option is suitable if you need an audience that does not look for evidence. But keep in mind that products whose flaws are obvious without analysis and some practical knowledge are not fit for advertising through influencers with this method.
Knowledge and competence. Bloggers who are respected experts in their field. It can be anything, finance, trading, credit, cryptocurrency, investing, design, music, film, fine arts – anything. These bloggers have a positive and a negative side. The upside is that the method of influence is stronger, the expert can present their opinion on the advertiser’s offer rationally and back it up with solid arguments. And even a person who is critical of information, trusts the expert in the field. After all, he is more qualified. But the downside is that the audience of experts is usually much smaller. So, when working with such a specific group, you have to reach out to several bloggers at once.
Relationships. Bloggers whose influence is based on the fact that subscribers simply like them. The most mysterious group. The effectiveness cannot be foreseen. It depends more on the nature of the offer. A striking example of this type of influencer is PewDiePie, who we have already mentioned in the review. The level of influence is also important. That is, how much the subscribers like the blogger and which segment of the audience they belong to.
Besides this classification, consider the classic one of audience size. It refers only to the actual audience, not the potential one. That is, subscribers or followers. Different companies and projects use different gradations for this method. The most common one is like this:
Nano. Less than 5 thousand subscribers. Usually, such bloggers do not offer advertising services, because they are not in demand. But there are exceptions. Nanobloggers can be approached by any market player, they are all “affordable”. But even marketers with a small budget order services from several such performers at once in their advertising campaigns. Otherwise, the traffic influx will be too low. Plus, they are usually novice bloggers, so their influence on the audience is not established yet.
Micro. Up to 100 thousand subscribers. The main group for work in affiliate marketing. Marketers turn to them precisely. But big brands turn to microbloggers only in cases of a massive advertising campaign, when hundreds of opinion leaders are involved, not just dozens.
Medium. Up to 1 million followers. The most preferred group of marketers and brands. Affiliate marketers hardly work with them – they are a bit pricey. Only if we are talking about a large advertising campaign with a long-term partnership.
Macro. Over a million. Brands turn to such bloggers. No, there are no exceptions to the rule. And an ordinary affiliate marketer, a private entrepreneur with a small project can also allocate a budget for a single integration. It’s just that in this case it is unlikely to pay off.
Another way to classify influencers is by the platform where they run their channels, blogs or pages. Some opinion leaders are not tied to a specific platform. They have accounts on several platforms at once. But in 90% of cases, these are celebrities. And advertising with them is only accessible to big brands.
Bloggers often have several platforms, but only one is the main one. And some platforms are used only nominally. They seldom offer any value for advertisers. So, we can rule out WhatsApp and other messengers, as well as some social networks that are less suitable for influencer marketing, such as Twitter. Advertising works well on them in general, but through opinion leaders – it is hardly used.
Also, in this review, we would exclude advertising through personal blogs on their own domains. The era of the blogosphere is not over yet, but it is close to it. And they are not really influencers anymore, more like webmasters. So we are removing this group as well. What we have left are:
Facebook influencers. Despite the constant growth of competitors, Facebook still holds the top spot in any social media ranking. And the advertising opportunities on the platform are vast. True, influencer marketing is less common here than on other platforms. But it remains an effective method to reach an aged and affluent audience. Prices are moderate.
Instagram influencers. This is literally the cradle of modern influencer marketing as we know it. The entire current trend has been set by Instagram. And if it loses to its big brother in terms of general advertising opportunities, then in terms of promotion through influencers, this Meta project – takes the lead. Hundreds of thousands of popular bloggers initially promote their account for one purpose only – to sell advertising. This is a whole new industry that is growing bigger and more massive. Prices are high, 100-120% higher than on Facebook. But the audience on Instagram also likes this type of advertising, is accustomed to it and considers it to be a part of the platform.
YouTube influencers. This is 100% the second best after Instagram in terms of the importance of influencer marketing. And let’s not forget that YouTube is almost twice the size of Instagram in terms of visitors. And the effectiveness of advertising integrations on video hosting is usually higher. After all, the format itself allows you to use more methods and tools to create interesting integrations. While on social networks – it’s just a mention in stories or posts. On YouTube, you can order entire videos or series of videos on a topic, specially designed reviews, gameplay, promotional streams (although, this example fits social media as well) and much more. The cost is the highest, but also the size of the integrations is much larger, the work of the blogger himself is more extensive. Therefore, the increase in traffic is often higher after integrations.
TikTok influencers. A social network that literally burst into the top a few years ago. And it persistently does not want to leave there, gradually pushing out even Instagram. Almost all influencers on TikTok have a way of influencing the audience – “relationships”. There are no authorities here, experts and specialists are rare. That’s why TikTok is so loved by affiliate marketers and small private entrepreneurs. And also for the fact that advertising prices for bloggers here are 3-4 times lower than on Instagram. But the effectiveness is also lower by about the same percentage. A millionaire on TikTok is not a “star”, not a major blogger – it’s quite an ordinary influencer. The whole point is that on this social network, thanks to the format of videos, popularity is gained quickly and each user is subscribed to a huge number of influencers.
Pinterest influencers. The last platform on our list has no influencers with the “authority” type of influence. It’s a domain for creators, so even obscure and unpopular creators who curate or post their picks and galleries attract a lot of attention. Plus, the platform offers a unique integration format – advertising pins. Creativity and advertising here are in the same blend. However, this type is not fit for every advertiser. Prices – a wide range, but median lower than even Facebook. And yes, do not start working with this platform without first learning the features in detail. It is different from standard social networks.
How to Verify an Influencer: Avoiding Scams
Where there is a lot of money involved, there is a lot of scam lurking around. And one in five marketers falls victim to it. If you don’t want to join their ranks, carefully check the chosen performer before giving them the advertising budget. And apart from blatant fraud, bloggers can often lack the level of influence you expect. Or simply fail to complete the task properly.
Verification criteria:
Fake followers. The most dangerous situation. Mostly prevalent among nano and micro-influencers. Larger bloggers can no longer use this method, as the platform itself would quickly expose them and ban their accounts. But with small bloggers, the platform’s methods of fighting often don’t work. That’s why bot services flourish. Detecting fakery is quite simple. There are three methods. The first is a comparison of statistics. Ask for the influencer’s account analytics report before making a deal. If the number of likes and ratings is low, it’s clear. 30 likes with 30 thousand subscribers – the conclusions are obvious. The second method is a manual check. Just pay attention to the content of comments. One-word comments, emojis, low semantic value, repetitive posts – all these are red flags. The third way – special services for checking accounts for bots.
Audience engagement. We need bloggers who can influence their audience and shape their opinion. So, they have to be interesting. The average acceptable engagement rate is 10%. If it is not reached, the blogger does not spark interest, maybe the traffic was incentivized, maybe they lost their creative flair or created only trendy, seasonal content. And a high engagement rate, over 25%, is already a clear sign of manipulation. Unless it’s a millionaire, it’s not worth getting involved. True, there are moments of peak activity for some bloggers. For example, the release of a long-awaited Triple-A game on a gamer’s channel. Then even 25% or higher engagement is quite reasonable.
Incorrect execution of the task. Always ask for the script of the ad before the launch of the integration. Yes, we said that you should not interfere with your rules in “someone else’s territory”. But a blogger can simply misunderstand your points, conveying not your message in their own words, but something completely different.
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Conclusion
You have the angle, you have the details, now it’s time to act. Shape the opinion of your clients towards the offer with the help of others. With the help of those who have more trust from them than you. The influencer marketing market keeps expanding. And your business can expand with it.
