Last year, a global pandemic helped shape the way brands and influencers collaborate.
Previously, a content creator with a sizeable number of followers would easily land a new contract based on reach. However, in 2020, several other factors impacted the favoured partnerships for remote content creation.
From being able to produce photos and videos when all studios were forced to shut – reinforcing that influencers are not merely a modern way to distribute marketing messages – to showing more diverse and inclusive casts to represent brands. Influencer Marketing couldn’t have had a better year.
Additionally, in 2020, enter authenticity and timing. These two facts factors, no doubt, helped brands – and consumers – pay closer attention to the conversation in times when, most of us, had plenty of time to spot the genuine companies. We could now identify the companies who truly cared about their supporters, teams, suppliers, and the overall public. Plus, crucially, the ones that didn’t.
We are still in the early stages of a brand-new year. Things can dramatically change over the next 12 months, but we definitely need to consider how, moving forward, to make the most out of creative partnerships.
Here, six professionals with influencer marketing as part of their strategy for this year, share how they intend to successfully collaborate.
Find niche influencers
“We have recently doubled our social traffic by creating collaborative content with tech influencers.
When we work with technology leaders who have previously worked with IBM, Microsoft, etc., we include their quotes in our blogs. They are more likely to share the posts they are featured in with their extended network on social media. The main priority for 2021, with regard to growing our social traffic, is to primarily focus on this strategy.”
Eleanor Bennett – Digital Marketing Specialist at www.logit.io
Create a collaboration program
“Due to customer buying behaviour changes that have occurred since the pandemic, we have shifted a lot of our marketing budget towards influencer marketing on social media. We also plan to continue to adjust our marketing budget as we go. Most of the time, we give the influencers free products in exchange for a video testimonial/usage and recommendation. We also have a collaboration program, where we get access to influencers’ Facebook page/Instagram page to advertise their generated content. Depending on the influencer, we give $100/month base pay for getting access to their FB page. This approach it makes the content more personalized and gives our brand more reach. We also use a platform called Everflow to set up the offers that influencers can push and give them a 5% revenue share of all sales that they generate through their dedicated links.”
Ashwin Sokke – Co-Founder at vegan beauty brand WOW Skin Science www.buywow.com
Don’t ignore newer platforms
“In 2021, we will invest at least 80% of our social media budget into nano- and micro-influencer marketing. We are going to put it at the heart of our social media strategy. Currently, we collaborate with quite a few influencers, but we are planning to increase the number to 100+ collabs/month. We will also grow our presence on TikTok, the platform that we have somehow ignored until now. Hashtag challenges could bring great engagement for our brand.”
Daniel Seeff – CEO at www.footcardigan.com
More User Generated Content, please
“It’s been difficult to yield growth on social media as a small business, especially with the current channels becoming so saturated with content, as well as pay-for-play. To cut through the noise, my social media strategy this year is to invest more in influencer collaborations to capitalize on mutually beneficial partnerships. These partnerships will allow us to share more UGC and expand our reach. More storytelling will play a big part, as we have to learn to connect better with people on social media through it – whether it’s behind-the scenes, long-form captions, more appearances from our CEO, etc.”
Lola George – Digital Marketing Specialist at www.overnightflowers.com
It’s an influencer’s year
“After two years in business, I noticed a big increase in sales with the onset of the first wave of COVID restrictions early in 2020. Many people were panic shopping and basically just buying anything they felt they might need during an extended home lockdown. Although we had a great year in business, once we started our second lockdown, customers were adopting a more conservative approach to purchases. Subsequently, sales dropped as shoppers aren’t impulse buying to the same degree. Our social media engagement is still healthy, but it hasn’t worked as well as before so we are switching a proportion of our budget to influencer marketing. We believe this is the way forward, because people are at home on their phones, and connecting more with big name influencers who were previously less available.”
Corey Pattakos – Branding consultant for Shopify stores and CEO at www.blkdiamond.com
Find influencers passionate about your brand
“We’ve just finished a podcast with influencer Bradley Simmonds (400k Instagram followers), which was a success as he fits our brand image. The days are gone of brands mostly working with influencers with the biggest following. Instead, for an influencer to be effective for your brand, the fit must be perfect. If that means using smaller influencers, then fine. This way, the passion for the brand will come across in the content created by the influencer and your chances of generating sales are greater.”
Miles Branford – Marketing Executive at personal training gym www.intent91.co.uk
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