You’ll see sponsored material or users advocating a product from a brand you’ve never heard of all over social media. Influencers are those who are thought to have some online authority and can affect the thoughts and tastes of their dedicated followers.
A vlogger, a celebrity, or an industry expert can all be considered influencers. There is no set number of followers required to be considered an influencer. There are macro-influencers who have a large following and micro-influencers who have a smaller following.
Influencer Marketing
A company has a variety of ways to advertise itself and reach its target market. Google Ads is a popular advertising platform. Short but related advertising displays alongside organic search results when you search for specific terms on Google. Influencer marketing has grown in popularity in recent years as a result of the emergence of social media and has swiftly become another popular marketing approach among marketers. Businesses take advantage of an influencer’s reach to raise brand recognition.
What sets influencer marketing apart from other modes of marketing is its highly personal tone. Followers treat influencers like friends they trust who will be honest with them. Hence, if influencers recommend a particular product or service that they have recently tried, their followers trust that it’s something worth having.
Partnerships with influencers can take form in various ways. The most common is for the influencer to spread the word about the brand by posting content leading their followers to its website or social media pages. An influencer can also serve as a spokesperson or ambassador for a brand. They could even write news and feature stories about products, services, and special promos on behalf of the brand.
Ways to Find Influencers
Start with Hashtags
Hashtags are a convenient way of accessing and searching for content on social media. Hashtags are often clickable. When you click one, you will get redirected to a page with all posts that carry that hashtag. Use hashtags relevant to your brand to look for influencers. Most influencers with a substantial following rarely use #influencer or #sponsored, so you have to be more specific in your search.
If you find a post you like, check the creator’s profile. Collaborate with this influencer if their content aligns with your brand’s image and aesthetic.
Go on Google
Google is a helpful tool to search for almost anything. However, you must be specific in your choice of keywords; otherwise, you’ll have to comb through the overwhelming number of search results. Prepare a list related to your brand’s niche and line of business.
A practical tip is by adding site: with the URL of the social media platform where you intend to look for influencers. For example, type site: Instagram.com on Google Search. Apart from keywords, you can also add a location to your search query. This is especially helpful if you want to collaborate with local influencers and coordinate in-person events and photoshoots.
Scan Competitor’s Mentions and Tags
Brands must always be aware of what their competitors are doing, according to sound business judgment. Influencer marketing follows the same technique. Some of your competitors may already be collaborating with influencers.
Influencers, for example, are tagging brands left and right on sponsored Instagram posts. You can reach out to these influencers and collaborate if they don’t have an exclusive deal with one business. As a result, your items or services will have the same audience as your competitors.
Search Keywords on YouTube
Most content creators have now migrated to producing vlogs for YouTube. One good thing about collaborating with a vlogger is that they also have a following outside YouTube. On their other social media accounts, they promote their channel, so the brand gets the added advantage of being promoted across different platforms.
There are a lot of genres of vlogs on YouTube. You should be familiar with the ones that are relevant and applicable to your brand. For example, if you’re a restaurant owner, you might want to search for the keywords mukbang, food review, and even ASMR. You can reach out to the channel owner and send samples of your products for them to feature on their next vlog.
Check Followers on Personal and Competitor Accounts
Influencers in the same niche typically follow similar accounts. Check your competitor’s social media pages or brands in the same niche, and sift through their followers. This is a tedious process, but you might find an influencer who aligns well with your brand strategy and image there. If you’re already collaborating with several influencers, you can also check their followers.
Search on LinkedIn
LinkedIn may be the last place you would check if you’re looking for influencers since it’s like the social media equivalent of a resume. But it’s easy to find the right people here because it has users from a vast array of industries. LinkedIn also allows you to refine your search by title.
You can look up users who indicate that they are bloggers or content creators in their profiles. Also, reaching out to influencers via LinkedIn instead of Instagram gives your company a sense of professionalism, or as the kids would say it: your company looks legit.
Recruit through Your Brand’s Website
Sometimes, it’s the influencers themselves who reach out to brands and not the other way around. Ensure that your website has your contact details if influencers want to collaborate on a project. Dedicate a landing page specifically for partnerships. You can present basic information about your business and the kind of content you are looking to produce on the page.
Influencers who genuinely love your brand often send proposals on the type of content they can produce for you. This saves you time from actively pursuing influencers because those who contacted you are already engaged with the business.
Tips on Finding Influencers
Understand Your Target Audience
The target market of your business must also be the target audience of the influencer you partner with. Remember that influencers are brands themselves, and they cater to a particular type of followers. You have to ensure that these followers are your brand’s ideal customers; otherwise, you would have invested for nothing.
Suppose that you’re a clothing company that started with the dropshipping model. Now you want to create your line of products. You decide to collaborate with a fashion vlogger. Will anyone do? No, since not every fashion vlogger has the same kind of audience. Some may be into vintage fashion, while others prefer a minimalistic style. Still, some may be looking for practical fashion tips instead of style inspirations. Choose a vlogger whose audiences are the same as yours.
Vet Your Influencer
If you’ve finally found the influencer who shares the same target market as your brand, it’s time to check if they can deliver sales. You can do this by checking the influencer’s reach and engagement rates. Reach pertains to the number of followers of an influencer, while engagement is indicative of how interested their followers are in the content they put out. There are also other intangible things that you should look into, like the influencer’s personality and authenticity.