Influencers VS Celebrities

People do buy a coffee machine because George Clooney says he loves it in an advertisement. Unbelievably, people recognize celebrities and subconsciously see them as trustworthy. Their fame and name act as an argument, a reliable proof that the product or service they support is truly great. Hiring celebrities is a very common marketing technique. It works for pretty much anything you would think about.

On the Internet, things are a bit different. People are aware and less sensitive to outbound marketing strategies. These include paid banners and ads. Depending on sources, around 30% to 40% of users use ad blockers. And the trend is to grow even faster now that web browsers have built-in ad blockers (like the most popular Google Chrome). Inbound marketing, focused on content creation, is thus the most effective marketing technique. What work best are content marketing (especially videos) and social media. What can be even more valuable are influencers, as they use both.

Unlike celebrities, influencers are followed for their content and commitment towards their community. They are not just recognized, they are trusted by their audience in a much deeper way. Each of them is special, so are their audience. Perfect when you know the targets you are aiming at.

Influencer marketing relies on a cooperation between a brand and a person that can be anyone. This cooperation requires patience and communication. Influencers are not actors or actresses you can hire to play a role.

What makes a good influencer-company cooperation?

Influencer marketing is a combination of content marketing and social marketing. These are the two biggest marketing techniques online. Social networks provide interaction and communication and content provides value. An influencer combines social links with quality content that matters to their community.

An influencer is not just somebody followed by many users on social networks. It is somebody that built an image and a community of its own. Asking one to drink your new soda in one of their videos won’t necessarily work as intended. It all depends on who you are dealing with and what they are willing to do. You can’t hire an influencer. Their own reputation is at stake. Providing they are not only interested in money, an alluring paycheck won’t be a strong enough argument.

A great influencer marketing strategy doesn’t rely on advertising tricks. Such as hypocritical stars stating “this is the best coffee maker I’ve ever seen” while they didn’t even try the product once. Good influencers think about their community beforehand and are authentic. Will this be interesting to them? Is it related to what I do in my usual content? Can I recommend buying this if I know it’s not that great? All sorts of questions you should answer in place of themselves before even contacting them.

To make sure your cooperation with an influencer will be fruitful, you must go through some steps:

• Identify your targets and how they act online, what they like and who they follow.
• Select the potential influencers that are compatible with your offer and way of thinking.
• Build relationships with the suitable ones, agree on partnerships if possible.
• Monitor the results and the reception of the audience.

The effectiveness of influencers

Finding the best influencers and dealing with them requires a lot of time and money. According to the following stats, the efforts are well worth doing:

• 94% of marketers think influencer marketing is effective.
• Influencer marketing can generate 11 times the ROI of traditional ads.
• 90% of consumers trust peer recommendations while only 33% trust ads.
• 30% of people would buy after a recommendation from an influencer while only 3% would if the recommendation is from a celebrity.
• 60% of people consult blogs and social networks before buying.

Influencer marketing is great to reach young generations. Indeed, they are mostly online and not attracted by traditional marketing techniques anymore. The best thing that can happen for a brand is having users engaged. Word-of-mouth is effective more than ever before and there is no better way to make individuals talk about your brand than online, in a community.

Celebrities are followed by indistinct masses. In contrast, you can target a specific audience with influencers. This marketing technique also helps circumvent ad blockers or any typical avoidance of ads by bored users. Influencers are also a lot less expensive than most celebrities. They could even do it for free or in exchange for samples if they think you are worth being more known. Lastly, influencer marketing boosts SEO.

Source: Musefind

Who is the best influencer?

The answer depends mostly on one factor: the budget. With a large budget, you can target major influencers, who have millions of followers. With a small one, minor influencers who have thousands.

Both techniques are totally viable for different scenarios. For instance, a major influencer may accept being an influencer for a short time. This would give your business a temporary popularity and engagement spike. Instead, minor influencers will probably endorse you in the long run and for more personal reasons. Because they are convinced that you are worth supporting or that they want a partnership.

In short, think about the targets you want to reach:

• Major influencers are busy and most likely doing partnerships for profitability. They are looked for by dozens of brands. Therefore, harder to reach and interest.
• Minor ones care a lot more about the message they send to their rather small community. They are easier to deal with and their public is easier to define.

Above all, your offer must be relevant to the influencer. You should choose wisely, regarding the audience and their typical judgment. If the public turns out not being receptive to your offer or even bear a grudge against you, a cooperation is pointless. Afterwards, you want to check the average engagement an influencer is provoking. As well as how frequent you will receive positive results from them.

Lastly, authenticity is key. Nowadays, influencers promoting brands obviously or sneakily are spotted immediately. The promotion must be natural and trustworthy. Followers need to feel and believe that the recommendations are sincere. The motivations of the influencers should appear clearly: they want to share great tips and finds, not just earn money with a referral code.

Gather everything into a video

The Internet now is all about video content. If that sounds new, you better catch up! On the Internet, the best and most effective marketing and content format is video. Videos catch viewers’ attention, increase engagement, are often shared, are memorable, et cetera. They are obviously the way to go if you want to be noticed and remembered.

Videos are uploaded for either content marketing and on social networks. As said earlier, those are exactly what influencers are doing. There is a seamless synergy between the typical influencer content and your own. It’s thereby totally logical for your influencer marketing strategy to include videos there. Promotions and recommendations are always better said and shown than simply written.

In practice: 5 examples of great influencer marketing videos

1. PewDiePie and movie “As Above, So Below”: the most famous YouTuber (scoring almost 64 million subscribers) created a series of videos in Paris Catacombs. It was to promote a horror movie. Million views and visibly for both sides: win-win.
2. Subaru’s MeetAnOwnerCampain: three huge influencers specialized in videos content helped promoting Subaru cars. They used extreme sports and adventurous themes videos to appeal to their communities.
3. The Walking Dead Mobile Game: a group of popular YouTubers worked on publishing a video to promote the App to their millions of followers.
4. Lyft Undercover campaign: Lyft videos featured renown YouTubers. The goal was to increase the visibility of Lyft service in a highly competitive market.
5. Goodwill: partnering with 6 ambassadors was a great way for this engaged brand to gain popularity and bring their ideas to life.

Final thoughts:

There are many other examples that could be quoted to show how influencers and videos are a good match for any marketing strategy. Especially now that social networks are unmissable and that video content is everywhere online. Influencer marketing has made a good start towards becoming one of the main strategies for marketers.