Influencer marketing is on everyone’s lips. Brands are competing to grab them, social networks are teeming with influencers and aspiring ones, communication agencies are increasingly inserting one or more influencer marketing campaigns into their strategies.
Sectors such as fashion and beauty draws on influencer to conquer new audiences, to publicize their products and increase sales.
People follow influencers for advice or recommendations on products and services, because they recognize their authority and consider them trustworthy, even a role model to follow.
The influencer, in turn, create a sincere, honest relationship with your followers, a relationship similar to that created between friends. To succeed, they must show themselves without filters, “give” a glimpse of their lives to followers, be perceived as “close” and not “distant”, as the classic advertising testimonial can be.
Given the popularity and success of influencer marketing, and normal that many people want to take this path. However, and a winding road full of obstacles, which requires a lot of dedication and patience to create a community of devoted followers and all ‘ other than simple.
If however you have an iron will, clear ideas, patience and have a strong passion, here are 8 tips to apply immediately to begin your journey as influencers.
Table of Contents
A little theory: the definition of influencer marketing
This is a recent form of marketing, which is growing exponentially, practically it is about people, who are able to have a strong influence on potential buyers. It is a technique, which developed almost by chance, thanks to multiple practices, uses, and habits.
Influencer marketing is not focused on any target market and potential consumers, but on a target well defined, or specific individuals.
More and more companies decide to adopt this new type of marketing, because they manage to have a very high return on investment.
What is an Influencer?
Basically an Influencer is a person who over time has acquired a lot of notoriety on the web, and consequently is followed by a large number of people, who are part of a certain niche.
Generally it is an expert figure in a specific sector, which can be, for example, that of fashion, technology and travel.
The Influencer’s ability lies in capturing people’s attention and trust. For his followers he is just a reference figure. This is why it is very precious for companies, who hire him to enhance their brand, since he is able to influence the purchasing decisions of the people who follow him.
Of course, the higher the number of followers, the more the brand’s advertising will acquire a certain value, leading to an eventual increase in sales and revenues.
The figure of the influencer
Initially, an influencer was represented by professionals such as journalists, analysts, sales agents, industry experts, etc., who were able to give great visibility to a specific product or service, also determining its success or failure.
Today, the concept has remained unchanged, but with the rise of the internet and social media, the influencer has taken on a completely different role. Now he is practically a user, who does not cover any profession, and does not have any specific skills. Solo, which has thousands of followers, present on various social networks.
For example, it can be a YouTuber, who publishes videos on various contents, or manages a site, or more commonly a blog on which he writes articles that he then shares. Or he is simply a social star, who publishes photos, videos, and posts on major social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. Often different people from the show business, the so-called VIPs, also play this role.
Whenever the influencer shares any content, they get great feedback, in terms of views, thanks to the trust of their fans.
Influencers have been divided into 3 types, based on the number of their followers, which are:
Micro-influencers : the number of followers ranges from 50 to 25,000.
Mid-level influencer : the number of followers ranges from 25,001 to 100,000.
Macro-influencer : the number of followers exceeds 100,001.
Today the Influencer is considered a real profession, just think that the eCampus University has arranged the first degree path to become an Influencer. It is a real course of study where they teach how to gain popularity on social media and earn from brand sponsorship.
8 tips for becoming an influencer
Do you like talking and writing on topics of general interest such as fashion, lifestyle, travel, music and so on? And, moreover, are you very loved and followed on social networks ? Well… you can try to start a new career and make money by becoming a successful influencer.
But in reality what is this new professional figure? And what does “ influencer marketing ” mean ?
Let’s go and see immediately, specifically, what this constantly growing phenomenon consists of, also with regard to our country.
How do you become an influencer?
Meanwhile: there are no magic formulas, like in marketing in general. You need ideas and strategy, but above all you need to have credibility and empathy: an influencer who does not come into contact with their followers, who does not create a true bond, a deep relationship, is simply anything but an influencer.
However, I can give you some tips that may come in handy if you want to embark on this fascinating journey, obviously focusing on Instagram.
Tip # 1: take care of your social profiles
If you want to become an influencer, you have to take care of your social profiles. There are no loopholes! An influencer with a messy, confused and botched social account simply doesn’t exist.
Meanwhile, an influencer must have a business profile, so as to have the insight of the native platform and analyze the post data, stories, Reels and IGTV. The bio should contain a catchy description of themselves, their skills, of the and contacts. In 150 words it can be done!
The feed must be orderly, have visual coherence, centered on one’s passions and on the field of which one is expert: in short, an influencer must carefully take care of his own visual brand identity.
Tip # 2: identify your niche
You have created a state-of-the-art, professional social account with a strong brand identity. Well: you have taken the first, decisive step. Now you need to identify a niche in which to move.
First of all, consider in which area you could perform best. Are you an ace with video games? The gaming sector could be for you. Do you have cooking skills? Food is a sector that is always alive.
You can also combine multiple niches, but beware: you must present yourself as an expert or trusted expert of one or more niches, not of all human knowledge. If you are strong with beauty, you could also make forays into the health and wellness sector: they are neighboring areas, there can be.
The thing that counts and your voice, your spirit, values that drive you, your uniqueness, in short. Everything you do has to communicate your personality, your passion for the niche you’ve chosen.
Tip # 3: study your audience
After you have identified your niche, you have to study the people who attend it, analyze your audience for good, just like a brand. Influencers, by definition, create strong bonds with people, or rather: with people who share the same passions as you.
So, armed with good will and tries to deeply know people who share your same passions.
Use native insights and analytics platforms to understand the demographics, interests, and motivations that drive your audience. Read the comments, engage people with surveys and questions, meet any criticism and thanks for the compliments: every action on your profile, and a mine of information and an opportunity to strengthen the relationship with your followers.
Thus, you will be able to create content that is appreciated by your niche.
Tip # 4: Study and plan a content strategy
You have created an Instagram profile with attention to every detail, with a unique personality. Then you chose the niche in which to operate, studied your audience, tried to understand in depth what moves them. Now you can begin to think about your content strategy.
Yes, even an influencer needs a content strategy: understanding what to publish, how and when, but without losing naturalness. If a post works, if a catch history of the attention, if a board or a review helps someone to make a decision, engagement will go up and followers will increase.
The strategy can change from influencer to influencer. Some influencers choose to never post their private life posts in the feed, staying focused on their business and target niche. Others, on the other hand, choose to give glimpses of their life together with other contents. Whatever your choice, make sure you have a content strategy broad, forward-looking and deep, but especially remember an influencer and this cause close to the people, who trust him as a friend. Plan, but don’t get stuck on an editorial level: keep your voice, be available, take care of relationships.
Tip # 5: be relevant!
This advice and tied hand in glove with the previous one: instead of focusing on what you post (or rather not the only thing matters), but as you post, the relevance of your posts, of your stories, your Reels and your videos.
Remember to post frequently – Instagram’s algorithm will appreciate. But not trade quality with quantity: rather than publish a post sloppy, do not post.
Look at the insights to understand what those who follow you like, propose content that gives them something of value, always in line with your personality.
Posting relevant content is perhaps the only way you can keep your followers engaged.
Tip # 6: Engage your followers
Ok, publishing relevant posts is essential. But equally important, and engage people. As already mentioned, you have to push your followers to comment on your posts, ask questions, answer your stories. Of course, be prepared to answer their curiosities and any objections they may have, honestly. The interactions between you and your followers helps to build strong relationships and strengthen your figure of influencer.
Knowing how to create a community of devoted followers also goes through contests, contests and AMAs (Ask Me Anything, the “ask me something” that we often see in stories). Not only, through contests and contests, you can reach many people and increase the number of followers, but also involve them and make them feel part of a community.
Tip # 7: Open to collaborations
Once you’ve built a good follower community, you can – nay, you have to! – give your availability to work with brands, professionals and other influencers like you, of your own niche or niches related in some way (for example, travel and food).
You can write it in your bio, indicating how to contact you (in DM, by email, etc.): you can tag brands and other professionals in posts and stories; the important thing is that brands and influencers send clear what value you can give with your content.
Tip # 8: “Study” influencers
Once you have carefully studied your audience, you are ready to find the ideal influencer, the one who can put the turbo on your Instagram marketing strategy. But be careful, do not rush to the first one that seems suitable: evaluate it carefully, before choosing it.
Try to understand if it is right for you: to succeed, check the number of followers, engagement, the audience’s sentiment towards him (for example, if he is considered really authentic), if his personality suits that of your brand.
However, do not be fooled by the number of followers alone: sometimes it is more effective to choose a nano influencer, but perfectly aligned with your niche, rather than a macro influencer with dizzying numbers but that has little to do with your brand identity.
How much does an Influencer make?
More and more companies are adopting Influencer Marketing as a marketing strategy, given the strong effectiveness for their business.
In recent years, therefore, there has been a sharp increase in investments in influencer marketing.
As a result, Influencers have seen their profits soar. However, it is not easy to establish a precise amount.
Their earnings vary according to the number of followers, from the engagement that the Influencer manages to generate and also according to the online channel where he promotes his content, which can be for example YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
A promotional post published by an Influencer on Instagram, with more than 7 million followers could cost around 150 thousand dollars, but these are constantly updated figures.
Popular Influencers can earn several million dollars a month.
The phenomenon of influencer marketing is spreading more and more among companies.
According to what reported by Linqia’s State of Influencer Marketing 2018, 81% of professionals said they launched influencer campaigns in 2017, a figure that is constantly growing compared to past years.
Confirming this trend, 92% of respondents claim that influencer marketing is an effective activity for a company’s business and 39% expect an increase in investments in this channel for 2018, while only 5 % plan to reduce them.
On average, marketers invest a lot of money in influencer marketing. 30% of respondents spent between $ 25K and $ 50K in 2017 alone.
24% spent between 50 and 100K and 22% between 10 and 25K.
90% of them measure influencer success on the basis of the engagement metric, however 76% of them say that the main challenge for influencer marketing in 2018 is to be able to accurately determine the ROI of this activity.
As we have seen, the phenomenon is increasingly widespread, in particular, due to the new “online behaviors” of millennials, who are no longer inclined to benefit from traditional advertising, but who follow and are passionate about the “stories” of brands.
Are you ready to become an influencer?
We’ve seen 8 tips on how to go the long way to becoming a successful influencer. The key is to find one item that stands out from the background noise which, by nature, tend to generate social. Armed with patience, good will and determination; above all, lovingly take care of relationships with those who follow you, the springboard for your success.
