Celebrity influencers are so 2016. Here’s how to really influence buyers
2016 was all about leveraging celebrities & large social influencers to market your product or service. But as more and more brands begin to employ influencer tactics – 2017 might be the year you shake-up how your influencer strategy works.
Your audience are your influencers.
Social audiences are savvy – it’s no secret that celebrities get paid to promote products. Social media has become so heavily saturated with promotional posts that audiences know when they are being advertised too and begin to ignore it.
Celebrities have more reach. But who’s got more relevance? Talking from experience here I know I would much rather listen to a friends recommendation than Kylie Jenner’s any day. That’s why brands need to be ditching the Zoella’s of the world and opting for real-life, authentic influence.
How can you push for relevance over reach?
Reviews
Reviews may be a bit of an after-thought for some brands – but they make a huge difference in pushing potential customers further down the funnel. 62 percent of online consumers say they are more likely to do business with a company if they read a positive review. A great example of reviews being used cleverly is on Topshop.com, which includes reviews on clothing products. Customers can rate things like the quality of the fabric, and describe the sizing and fit of clothes.
Reviews can be quite a difficult thing to get right, as they often come from angry or disappointed customers. It’s rare for a satisfied customer to make the choice to leave a review. This is why it’s always useful to prompt happy, satisfied customers to leave reviews, as they probably wouldn’t typically.
The best ways to prompt reviews from your customers:
- Ask them via email
- Provide incentives, such as a discount code for future purchases or for friends
- Make it easy – too many steps or actions will put people off reviewing
User Generated Content
People trust people. People don’t trust brands. Sharing content that real people have created is opening up your brand to be more trusted. If they can see normal, relatable people enjoying your product, they may be more likely to trust that the product is worth purchasing.
Some awesome examples of UGC:
- Calvin Klein:
With over 400,000 images tagged, the #MyCalvins campaign prompted customers to share their own photos on the hashtag
Innocent drinks:
It wouldn’t be a digital marketing article without a mention of innocent drinks. The forward thinking drinks company use honesty and humour when it comes to sharing user generated content.
Listen to Matt, everyone. Matt knows what he’s talking about. https://t.co/kdBBZA1BSk
— innocent drinks (@innocent) February 15, 2017
Micro-influence
Ditch the Zoella’s of this world and opt for a lesser-known influencer to boost your brand. Influencers with less followers are likely to have a larger percentage of followers who actually know them/speak to them – making them a more trusted source by their audience. Huge influencers like Zoella have millions of followers, but they’re not necessarily the most engaged followers.
Millennials and the digital savvy are more clued up about the promotion of products through large influencers online. They’re more likely to trust the relatable and authentic influencers – who often have much less of a following.
Using lesser-known influencers also means the way you work together can be more dynamic & fit the tone of both your brand & match their own personal brand, too.
Micro-influencers content also achieves much higher engagement rates than typical influencers – according to Chris Gonzalez of Gnack, micro-influencers get an average of two to five times more organic engagement than a typical influencer.
Influencing potential buyers online is no longer as black & white as it used to be. As more & more people become savvy to brands working with influencers, the less impact it will have on purchasing decisions. Shaking up the way your work & introducing some of the above tactics can keep your influencer strategy ahead of the game.
By Ruby Lowe
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