Influencer Marketing Part 2 Download Script

Influencer Marketing

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@Circus_St | www.circusstreet.com

© Circus Street Ltd.

INFLUENCER MARKETING LESSON 2

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Hi, and welcome back. Last time, we got to grips with what influencer marketing is all about and what it could do for your business, but here’s a quick reminder.

On the face of it, influencers are social media users with a large following who promote products or services on behalf of brands, but you should also see them as a kind of mutual friend who can involve your brand in the trusting and authentic relationships they maintain with audiences, generating brand awareness and driving conversions.

But, it’s one thing to talk about something, and another to actually do it, so in this lesson we’ll be exploring how you can get your own influencer marketing campaign up and running. Let’s take a look at what’s coming up...



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Chapter 2: Influencer Marketing Strategy

Just like any other kind of marketing, influencer marketing needs a strong and decisive strategy if you want to make the most of it. You shouldn't be using influencers just because everyone else is, you need to think about how this type of marketing will serve your overall objectives.

Objectives are the general, high-level aspirations you have for your business. They usually relate directly to your bottom line, but you might set some others that specifically concern audience growth, reach and awareness, and engagement. So, have a think: what are your objectives?

From here, you can create goals. Goals keep you on the straight and narrow, describing the specific steps required for you to reach your objectives, and they’re expressed using terms like “increase”, “reduce” or “identify”. What’s more is that any goal worth setting your sights on needs to be SMART...

SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. When you’re setting goals, you need to be specific about what you’re hoping to achieve. They need to answer the questions: who, what, where, when, and why? They also need to be measurable, but make sure you don't set your targets too high. Aiming for the stars is great, but what's better is knowing your goals are actually achievable!

Next up, relevance. Your goals need to align with your overall objectives, they need to help you accomplish the thing you set out to do. Lastly, your goals need to be time-bound. Create a clear timeline with a start and end date. Sure, this is just part of being organised, but it’ll also create a sense of urgency and help you maintain your campaign’s momentum.

Now, let’s just go back for a moment and take a closer look at the measurable aspect. You need a way of knowing how you’re getting on with achieving your goals and objectives, and this is where KPIs, or Key Performance Indicators, come in. They’re a way of measuring something, and so, they should be represented as numbers - whether it’s a total count, an average, a ratio, or a percentage.

When it comes to influencer marketing and social media, audience growth could be measured by counting the amount of followers or subscribers you accumulate.



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Reach and awareness, which relate to the growth of your brand message as it appears in front of new audiences, can be tracked through the quantity of impressions you receive on campaign content, social media analytics, and survey results.

Engagement, on the other hand, helps you to understand how well your content is being received, and tangible KPIs can come in the form of likes, mentions, reactions, shares, comments, votes, link clicks or views. You could also measure conversions, used to indicate how well your campaigns are persuading users to take a desired action. These can be measured by looking at the volume of sales, traffic, sign ups, or app downloads you generate.

So, with that in mind, if you’re looking to improve engagement, a smart goal to set might be: ‘increase the average number of likes and comments on branded posts on Instagram by 20% in 6 months’. If audience growth is at the top of your agenda, something along the lines of: ‘double the subscriber count on our YouTube channel by June’ might be the one for you.

Just remember though, influencers are only one component of your brand’s digital strategy, and your goals and KPIs - and influencer marketing in general - are only worthwhile if they aim to make a difference to your overall business objectives. If, outside of your influencer partnership, you’re aiming to implement strategies that increase brand awareness, then your agreement with influencers should heavily feature elements of brand awareness too.

This way, you’re more likely to provide your audience with a consistent experience. When they see your marketing activity, no matter if it’s hosted on your brand’s channel or your influencer’s, it’ll focus them towards a single outcome, increasing the likelihood of the kind of conversion you’re looking for. If you’re pushing too many avenues of choice, chances are the key message will get lost, and you’ll lose the attention of your audience.



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Chapter 3: Finding an Influencer

Now you’ve got a clear vision of your goals and objectives for this type of marketing, it’s time to seek out an influencer that can help you achieve them. There’s no shortage of influencers out there, and no two are exactly the same, but if you have a strong understanding of what you’re looking for, you’ll be surprised at how quickly you can narrow down your options... When searching for your ideal influencer, start by thinking about what your business has to offer and the audiences you want to connect with. From here, figure out which channels your target audience occupies. This is where you’ll want to run your influencer campaign. If you’re a fashion retailer targeting 20 to 30 year olds, for example, Instagram might be the best bet. Whereas, if you’re a B2B tech company looking to demonstrate your expertise, maybe YouTube or blogs are the key. From here, you can limit your search down to the influencers popular on your chosen platforms.

You’ll also need to identify the influencers that have reach within the topics that you’re trying to break into. Explore different platforms to understand the themes your desired audience are talking about, where your brand could fit in, and which influencers could make it happen. A cosmetics company might find that conversations around make-up application, a recent red carpet event, and animal welfare would be great to get involved in.

At this point, why not keep your ear to the ground for any suitable influencers that are already speaking about your brand in a positive light, expressing any needs that your product or service could satisfy, or articulating any problems that it could solve?

Once you’ve slimmed down your influencer options by channels and topics, you should scrutinise your prospective influencers’ engagement rates. It’s all well and good having loads of followers, but it counts for nothing if few of them are actually paying attention.

It’s worth noting that what would be recognised as a ‘good’ engagement rate mainly depends on the influencer’s follower count and the platform in question. As a general rule, the more followers an influencer has, the less engagement they receive. And, while Facebook and Twitter aren’t known to deliver an engagement



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rate of more than 0.5% - even among micro and nano influencers - much more is expected from Instagram and YouTube.

Now, let’s say you’ve identified influencers that align with your business objectives, engaging your desired audience within the channels and topics you want to focus on. Brilliant! You’re all set to approach them with a business proposal, right? Well, no actually, not yet. You still need to do your due diligence.

Working with an influencer shouldn't be taken lightly, it’s serious business. In fact, an influencer is essentially a business partner. So just as you would appraise a business to get a good measure of its assets, liabilities and commercial potential, it’s important to undergo a thorough examination of an influencer’s social media presence, what they talk about, and how they interact with their audience.

During this process, it may be that you find everything perfectly agreeable, you may even find that there are more affinities between the influencer and your brand than originally anticipated. But, it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that, on closer inspection, you notice they’re not quite as ideal as you’d hoped...

Before you form a partnership with an influencer, there are some things you should keep an eye out for...

Content Saturation. If you spot an influencer that only publishes heavily sponsored content, alarm bells should ring. You want to be a brand that stands out, rather than ‘just another promo post’. And, even the most popular influencers need to provide value beyond brand promotion alone.

Brand Affiliations. It would be lovely if an influencer worked solely with your brand, but it’s likely they’ll be working with others too. This isn’t necessarily a problem, but you’ll want to find out whether there are any conflicts of interest. They might be allied with a competitor, or working with brands that are at odds with your brand’s values. Problematic Content. You only have to remember the controversies surrounding certain influencers to know that they can mess up, and that not all social media personalities will do your brand justice. So, be on the lookout for inappropriate content or language that doesn't suit your brand image, insensitivity surrounding



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important and emotional topics, and any political opinions that might alienate your target audiences.

Last but not least, Fraud. Watch out for fraudulent influencers that buy followers instead of ‘earning’ them organically over time. They’ve plagued influencer marketing for years, and they’re useless to brands. This is because their audience comprises fake followers or bots that won’t - or couldn’t - be genuinely interested in what your business has to offer. On the surface, it might even look like they’re generating engagement, but only because they’re buying likes and comments too. If you want to uncover phoney influencers, take a closer look at their engagement. If it’s unusually low, they may well have bought fake followers, but haven't bothered with buying fake likes and comments. You should also be suspicious if engagement on their posts is unusually high in comparison to the average engagement rate for the number of followers they have. After all, if it seems too good to be true, it usually is. Extremely consistent engagement across multiple posts of varying quality is another reason to be wary.

You should also scroll through some of the comments they receive. Are they really generic? Are they vague enough that they could be used for pretty much any kind of post, regardless of the content? Have any of them been repeated over and over again? If so, it’s not looking good. Comments that mention specific elements of the post in question are a much more positive indicator of engagement. Finally, visit their followers’ profiles. Do any of them have next to no personal pictures and barely any followers themselves?

Admittedly, there are a lot of boxes to tick when it comes to vetting influencers and checking that everything is what it seems to be. So, don’t cut corners. Be rigorous. It could mean the difference between success and failure.

So, you’ve created your shortlist of influencers. They work the right platforms, they engage the right audience with the right topics, and they’ve held up under scrutiny - they're the real deal. Finally, it’s time to get in touch with them and come to some kind of agreement!

Reach out privately with a personal, tailored message, either through direct message in the platform if they’re a follower of your brand, or through their email address if they’ve disclosed it.



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For the sake of appearances, it’s best not to comment on their content or message them publicly asking to be contacted. In your message, show that you’re familiar with them - comment on their style, reference some of their recent content, and explain why you want to work with them in particular. Think of it kind of like a sales pitch, take time to make your message enticing, spark their interest in your brand and the opportunity at hand.



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Chapter 4: Defining Your Partership

So, we know what it takes to identify and approach the perfect influencer for your campaign, but you’re still not quite ready to turn them loose on social media with your brand message! Before that, you’ll need to negotiate and clearly define your partnership. First of all, let’s talk payment.

The cost of working with an influencer can vary hugely. In fact, they could cost you anything up to a million dollars per post. It all depends on the platform they’ll promote your product on, the number of followers they have, and the average level of engagement they generate.

The average cost of an influencer endorsement is much higher on YouTube and Instagram - which generally hosts more well considered, and engaging content - than the likes of Twitter or Snapchat. A Mega Influencer - boasting more than a million followers - will naturally expect to receive a larger sum than a Micro influencer with a much more limited reach. And, those who are known to create deep interest in a brand are far more valuable than influencers with a low engagement rate.

It’s worth mentioning that you may not necessarily have to pay anything. Some influencers with a small reach may be willing to work with you in exchange for other incentives, like products, discounts or experiences provided by your brand. In the past, some brands have even tried to frame exposure and close association with the brand as payment in itself, but... if you take this path, proceed with caution. Influencers have been known to campaign against brands that ask for free content, considering it to be exploitative or offensive.

Along with deciding on payment, you’ll also need to iron out the details in the contract you have with your influencer. First of all, intellectual property. Who will have ownership of the content? When can it be used again and in what circumstances? The content could be used outside of your agreement, or it could trigger an unforeseen negative response, so it’s wise to reserve the right to remove it.

Secondly, consider termination details. If your influencer were to ‘fall from grace’, or act in a way that wasn’t complementary to your brand’s image or values, you’d want to ensure that you’re able to cease your partnership when it’s justified and appropriate.



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Another important part of the process is establishing the data they’ll provide you with so that you can properly track your return on investment, or ROI. Only some of this is publicly available, and you’ll get richer, more valuable data from the analytics sections within your influencer’s account. Naturally, influencers may not be comfortable giving away access to their accounts for privacy and security reasons, so you’ll need to agree on how else they could provide you with the data you require - perhaps through screenshots of their own dashboards.

It should be mentioned that this data exchange can work both ways. The influencer might ask you to share the results you achieve from your campaign with them. That way, they can prove their effectiveness to other businesses when looking for more work in the future. In this scenario, only share what you feel comfortable with being in the public domain, and always ensure that you’re handling this data in a secure and compliant way.

While we’re on the topic of compliance, let’s take a look at the legal stuff...

Initially, because the popularity and prevalence of influencer marketing surged so rapidly, legal compliance couldn't keep pace, and both influencers and brands failed to meet the guidelines set by official authorities like the Advertising Standards Authority and Federal Trade Commission. But now, these organisations, and the social media platforms themselves, have begun to crack down on unruly influencer marketing, so don't get complacent.

To create a compliant campaign you need to ensure that your commercial intent and purpose is made perfectly clear. People should always be able to tell when they’re being advertised to, and hashtags like #ad, #gift, #sponsored, #collab, and #partnership are all used to ensure this kind of transparency.

You’ll also need to make sure your influencers are entirely honest, and don't make any false claims about what your product or service can do, otherwise there will be repercussions.

There have been many examples of this in recent years, and you won’t struggle to find out more for yourself.

In cases like this, penalties range from a warning letter to fines and even imprisonment if regulations continue to be breached. So, it’s vital that you read up on



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the laws that govern your ability to work with an influencer not just in your own market, but in any regions that you intend to run your influencer marketing campaigns.

Now you know what goes into an influencer marketing strategy, found the right influencers to pull it off, and agreed on the terms of your partnership, you’re finally ready to kick off your campaign, but the work isn't over just yet! You’ll still need to closely monitor how it’s all going...

When it comes to measuring the success of an influencer campaign, be sure to remember that influencers have access to sophisticated analytics data through their own account. And, it's very possible that they’ll have valuable experience in interpreting it, so don't neglect to request that they share it with you, and offer any insight they’ve gained.

To help you gauge success on broad terms, observe your traffic and engagement before, during and after the campaign. You should also use results from similar campaigns you’ve launched in the past as benchmarks for success, and your influencer’s previous campaign results could be equally valuable.

Instead of relying purely on impressions and engagement, you could also integrate UTM tags, promotional codes or affiliate links into your campaign. They’ll help you to pinpoint exactly where users are following calls to action and converting into followers - or even customers - so they’re great if you want to know which elements of your campaign are doing well, and which need more work.

Another way to optimise your influencer marketing is through A/B testing. If you want to figure out if a certain element of your campaign is working well - whether it’s the specific copy, platform, or price points you’re using, you could run two variations of the same kind of content - similar in every way other than the element you’re experimenting with - and see which does best. If you wanted to optimise your pricing, for example, you might ask your influencer to do two Facebook live events one week after another, one with a discount slightly higher than the previous week.

Crucially, you shouldn't just measure your influencer campaign’s success once it’s finished. Be clear with your influencers about the frequency for reporting results throughout the process, and agree on ways in which you’ll adapt if you’re not seeing the results you want. Be sure to keep a watchful eye on your influencers too... Are



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they posting the correct type and volume of content at the right times, in accordance with your original agreement?

It’s important to recognise that, as of yet, there’s no particular industry standard for measuring the success of an influencer campaign. Social media is constantly evolving. This makes it pretty difficult to pin down metrics that can be relied on for comparison over time. But, as long as you’re mindful of this and remain sensitive to changes in this area, you won’t go too far wrong.

It’s nearly time to wrap things up for this lesson. But before we do, it’s worth bringing to your attention that there are loads of platforms and tools that exist to help you with influencer marketing. They can dramatically reduce the amount of hours you’ll spend doing research for suitable influencers, and they often provide additional management solutions, assisting you with making initial contact, agreeing on pricing and legalities, as well as tracking influencer performance and supplying measures of success.

The drawback of these services is that you may not have a direct relationship with the influencer, and this could limit the strength of connection they feel with your brand, and restrict your ability to nurture your partnership for future campaigns.

So, that’s it. Hopefully, you now have a good grasp of influencer marketing, and how you might use it to meet your objectives. You should know who influencers are and where they can be found, how to select the right one for your business needs and incorporate them into your wider strategy; how to negotiate the terms of your partnership, and how you can measure and optimise their performance. Now, it’s time to give it a go yourself.

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Influencer Marketing Part 2 Download Script