What is Influencer Marketing and Why Is It Important?
How you can use influencers to market your product for maximum results online.
Putting it simply, influencer marketing is a type of marketing strategy that involves partnering with social media influencers to promote a brand, product, or service. Think of it as an opportunity to use someone with a large online following, perhaps much larger than your own, to open up your brand to a much wider audience.
In recent years, this type of marketing has become increasingly popular, as more and more businesses recognise the potential benefits of working with influencers.
Let’s take a closer look at influencer marketing and if used correctly, how it can help transform your marketing strategy:
What is Influencer Marketing?
Back to basics: Your business partners with an individual or group of people with a significant social media following and a strong online presence. Influencers can be found on various social media platforms, including Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and more. Brands partner with influencers to promote their products or services through sponsored content, reviews, endorsements, and other types of collaborations.
Why is Influencer Marketing Important?
Influencer marketing can be a powerful tool for businesses, as it allows them to reach new audiences and promote their brand in a more authentic and engaging way. If you partner up with someone who syncs with your brand values and has a target market much like your own, it’ll work even better.
Here are some of the key benefits of influencer marketing:
- Increased Brand Awareness
Partnering with influencers can help businesses reach new audiences and increase brand awareness. A whopping 72% of Gen Z and Millenials follow influencers on social media.
Successful influencers have a loyal following of engaged users who trust their recommendations and opinions, so when they promote a brand or product, their followers are more likely to take notice and consider trying it out themselves.
2. Improved Brand Reputation
Influencers have built a reputation for being authentic and trustworthy, which means that their endorsement of a brand can boost its credibility and reputation. This is why finding the right influencer for your product or business is important to gaining relevant and credible traffic.
3. Higher Engagement Rates
Influencer marketing can also lead to higher engagement rates, as influencers have a highly engaged audience. This means that when an influencer promotes a brand, their followers are more likely to engage with the content and share it with their own followers.
Why should influencer marketing be part of a wider Marketing Strategy?
While influencer marketing can be a powerful tool on its own, it’s important to consider it as part of a wider marketing strategy. Here’s why:
- Diversification
By including influencer marketing as part of a wider marketing strategy, businesses can diversify their marketing efforts and reach new audiences. This can help them mitigate risk and increase their chances of success. New audiences = new opportunities to build brand relationships.
2. Integrated Marketing
Influencer marketing can be integrated with other marketing channels, such as social media, email marketing, and content marketing to sync an entire campaign. If your marketing efforts are more cohesive and synced together, chances are, the whole process will be much more fruitful.
3. Long-Term Relationships
Partnering with influencers can lead to long-term relationships that go beyond a single campaign or purchase.
By building strong relationships with influencers, businesses can create ongoing partnerships that provide ongoing benefits for both parties – that my friend, is called a ‘win-win’.
Influencer marketing can be a powerful tool for businesses looking to reach new audiences and improve their brand reputation but it does come with its own set of complexities that need to be navigated through. By including influencer marketing as part of a comprehensive marketing plan, businesses can diversify their efforts, create integrated campaigns, and build long-term relationships with new and potentially, more qualified audiences.
Like what we’ve got to say, get some more marketing goodness from the rest of our blogs.
