Televisions, billboards, and even radio shows used to be one of the main avenues where businesses of all sizes and kinds advertise their products and services. They usually hire and employ the biggest celebrities or rising stars to help their businesses be known by more people. But with the dawn of the internet, those avenues are not as popular and highly regarded as they used to. While it would still be a mistake to disregard their importance and potential impact, businesses of today - especially start-up companies tend to maximize the power and influence of the online platforms made by today's technological advancements. This is where brand influencers come in. Learn more about what brand influencers are, what they can do for your business, and how to find influencers for your brand.
What is a Brand Influencer?
Brand influencers are like any other influencers - people with enough credibility, popularity, and charm to affect people’s perspectives, opinions, and decisions. The difference is that when you find influencers for your brand (or you learn how to be a brand influencer yourself), their credibility, popularity, and charm are shared with your business and brand. The unique thing about brand influencers is that they can be different kinds of influencers and people, too, and they are not limited to specific brands as well, unlike most celebrities bound by contracts and rules. Because that’s just it, they are not celebrities - or at least not all of them are. They can be just a regular person (or even a kid) who has mastered the art of social media. They have more followers and social media interactions than an average user.
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Now, this is where the fun part comes in for both influencers and businesses like yours. For small-time businesses with little budget (nor the need) to hire the biggest celebrities, partnering with brand influencers is the key to leveling up their marketing game. While gifts, discounts, and the likes are highly appreciated (and are even all that is asked by a few brand influencers), you still have to set a certain budget depending on the quality of your product, price, your influencers’ opinions, the rapport you have established, and the amount of work they would have to put into marketing your products. Nevertheless, you can guarantee that the agreed-upon costs would be affordable even for start-up businesses. On the other hand, many people dream of being and try to learn how to be a brand influencer because it certainly has many benefits as well. Not only do they receive gifts and products to try (some even before they come up to the public), today’s age of social media has allowed them to be ensured enough compensation for all their efforts and hard work. A good relationship between a brand influencer and a business like yours can go a long way if maintained well.
How to Find Influencers for Your Brand?
Finding brand influencers may seem easy because of the technology we have access to today. However, you must remember that with influencer marketing, the relationship between the brand influencer and business plays the most significant role in making this marketing endeavor successful. Thus, it is imperative that you take this process seriously and with a lot of thought, consideration, and effort. Here are some of the most basic yet crucial steps you need to take to avoid making a mistake when finding influencers for your brand.
1. Know Your Business and Brand
There are three things that you have to consider when you start to look for brand influencers: what your business goals are, what your key performance indicators are, and what your budget is. These three factors will not only help you find influencers for your brand, but they will also help ensure that you find the ones that are right for you and help your business grow and succeed. Let’s talk a bit in detail about each of these factors.
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Firstly, your business goals. Like any other successful business, a mission and vision statement is a vital elements. A wise man in a recent Marvel movie said, “If you aim at nothing, you hit nothing.” This is the very essence of having goals. More specifically, when you find influencers for your brand without specific targets in mind, you might end up going in circles and having pointless meetings. This is also something that your brand influencers would want to know about and consider before they partner with your business. So do not waste your time and decide what you want to achieve with this influencer marketing strategy. Do you aim to increase sales? Broaden brand awareness? Heighten brand engagement? Generating leads? These decisions must be made with the knowledge and understanding of the nature of your business and with connection to the mission and vision statement you have already established for your business.
Image taken from Strikingly User’s Product
Secondly, analyze your key performance indicators. Key performance indicators (KPIs) refer to the measurement tools that look at and measure the performance of a business about its predefined goals and objectives. That’s why setting goals is the first step when trying to find influencers for your brand. Because it is with these goals that we can more easily identify what our KPIs are. These indicators would also greatly help you identify the characteristics you are looking for in your brand influencers. By knowing your KPIs, you can also identify what aspects of your business to look at. Knowing and understanding your business analytics and statistics about your sales, leads, engagement, etc. is vital in recognizing the best courses of action.
Lastly, know your budget. Now that you have set your goals and identified what you need to do and measure, it’s time to crunch the numbers, as they say. Although it is often said that hiring a brand influencer is much cheaper and convenient, it will still require costs that you have to settle. Thus, it is only right and professional that before you contact and pitch to brand influencers, you already have a number you can present and negotiate with them. This will help you to be more credible and reliable in their eyes. It can also narrow your search to find influencers for your brand since you will get an idea about how exactly you would go about with this influencer marketing strategy and how many brand influencers you can afford.
