15 years ago, the term social influencers wasn’t even on most people’s marketing radar. Social media was just a baby in 2003. The only sites worth mentioning were Myspace and LinkedIn until they were joined by Facebook in 2004.
How things have changed.
The number of social media users worldwide is expected to reach 2.77 billion in 2019. But the really interesting stuff shows up once you start digging into influencer marketing research.
Like this golden nugget:
Social influencers provide a return on investment of $6.50 for every $1 spent by businesses. Not only that, influencer marketing generates 11X higher ROI than traditional forms of advertising each year!
So, who are social influencers, and how can you incorporate them into your marketing strategies?
Who Are Social Influencers?
According to Influencer Marketing Hub, there are two characteristics of social influencers:
- “An influencer is an individual who has the power to affect purchase decisions of others because of his/her authority, knowledge, position or relationship with his/her audience.”
- “An individual who has a following in a particular niche, which they actively engage with. The size of the following depends on the size of the niche.”
The most important takeaway of these two characteristics is that an influencer “has the power to affect [the] purchase decisions of others.” That means influencer marketing has the potential to increase revenue which is always a welcome addition to any marketing strategy.
Social influencers are divided into 3 groups:
1. Micro-influencers: This is the smallest bracket of influencers who typically have between 5,000-100,000 followers.
2. Macro-influencers: These influencers are often industry experts, thought leaders, and professional content creators with follower counts ranging from 100,000-1 million.
3. Mega-influencers: These are the big players who have more than 1 million followers and often include mainstream celebrities.
The Influencer Breakdown:
- Micro-influencers make up the largest pool of social influencers and have the strongest engagement levels of all three types, averaging between 25%-50% engagement per post.
- Macro-influencers average 5%-25% engagement for each post and can reach 10X more people than other influencers.
- Mega-influencers typically generate 2%-5% engagement per post and have the largest audience of followers.
The Power of Social Influence
Social influence goes a long way towards building trust because people view influence as a form of social proof.
That’s why peer reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations are trusted more than every other form of advertising.
In other words, a recommendation from a friend or family member is more powerful than research, professional advice, or brand persuasion. According to Experticity, “92% of consumers trust recommendations from personal connections, while only 33% trust ads.” Fortunately, influencer marketing—when executed properly—appears more authentic and trustworthy to social audiences, which means they don’t generally associate influencer recommendations with traditional advertising stigmas.
To assert the power of social influence with your brand, consider partnering with an influencer that reaches your target audience. They’ve already done the work to establish an engaged following that values their recommendations and trusts their views.
Aligning your business with trusted personalities can provide a substantial boost to the success of your marketing campaigns.
How Influencer Marketing Can Benefit Your Brand
Influencer marketing comes in many different forms, many of which can be extremely profitable. Influencer ads can look like an average social media post without professional editing, or it can look like a straight-up ad, with models, Photoshop elements, and obvious product placement.
Here are 6 ways brands commonly work with influencers:
- Sponsored posts
- Product reviews
- Guest blogging
- Collaborating on events or campaigns
- Sending free products
- Making them an affiliate
Social influencers do not work for free. Mentioning your brand on their latest blog post comes at a price. The way you work with influencers is often determined by your budget. Can you afford to pay a mega-influencer $5,000-$1 million for one sponsored social media post? Or will it be more effective to pay 5 micro-influencers to each write 5 guest blog posts for $100 per blog post?
Here are 5 tips for determining the value of collaborating with an influencer:
- Choose the goal for partnering with the influencer (brand awareness, sales, etc.)
- Choose an influencer that shares an audience with your brand
- Determine the cost of paying for one sponsored post, and then determine how much it would cost your team to create the same message and achieve similar exposure
- Choose an authentic influencer that will represent your brand well and share content that resonates with the audience
- Consider how many other sponsored posts the influencer publishes to make sure your content won’t lose its effect in a mass of ads
Weigh all the options to decide if the ROI of partnering with an influencer is worth your time.
Social Influencer Marketing Ads (A.K.A. Promoted Posts)
Let’s use our earlier examples of micro, macro, and mega-influencer accounts to look at a couple examples of social influencer ads.
Starting with @george_and_troja, we see a beautiful photo featuring the lovable Troja. But there’s one other thing that’s hard to miss in the image: a strategically placed watch that is slightly out of focus. Reading the caption, we see this is a sponsored post and the watchmaker’s account has been tagged. It’s tasteful and the focus of the image remains on Troja, which is what their followers really care about.
Moving on…
