The popularity of influencer marketing keeps increasing now that companies, big and small, are recognizing its potential.
According to some estimates, brands are set to start investing more money in this strategy. To implement this method properly, you have to establish a “healthy”, long-term relationship with the bloggers, vloggers (or more of them) from your niche.
The question is; how to find the perfect person for that job?
Find some pointers below!
Finding Bloggers – What You Should Know
The very first thing you should know is that influencer marketing doesn’t have to include bloggers with their own websites or blogs only. Instead, it is important to ask yourself where would your target audience “hang out” online and collaborate influencers from that social media platform.
Besides bloggers, YouTube vloggers, Snapchat users, people who do podcasts, and others are also suitable for influencer marketing.
Before you choose one or more people to work with, always ask yourself whether his or her followers on a certain social media website (or app) buy the product or service you provide.
Another useful thing you should bear in mind is that focusing on the number of followers isn’t always the most practical thing to do.
While a blogger with 10,000 Instagram followers may seem like a better option than a blogger with 1000 followers the engagement rates may tell otherwise.
For example, the latter may have 30% engagement rate while the Insta blogger with 10k followers can have as little as 2%. Of course, Instagram is just an example here, the same rule applies to other platforms too.
When choosing bloggers, vloggers, or even celebs for influencer marketing purpose, it is always useful to check the way they engage their followers or how successful they are in doing so.
Since influencer marketing, just like any other strategy, requires finances (you can’t do it without spending a dime) there’s a way to keep your costs down after all. To do so, you should engage up-and-coming influencers with a decent number of followers and engagement rate, but haven’t “made it” just yet.
Additionally, you should opt for bloggers or vloggers who aren’t working with major brands and don’t post collaborative content so often. Why? It’s because this shows they’re not flooded with influencer marketing offers and are more likely to accept the lower budget offer or free products.
How To Attract Bloggers, Vloggers, and Others?
Now that you know what to bear in mind when looking for influencers, you’re probably asking yourself how to attract them. Finding perfect influencers for your brand is easier when you know the type of people you have to look for. The first step to take is defining an influencer for your brand:
- Context – there is no “one size fits all” rule when it comes to influencer marketing and just because some other brand works with a blogger or vlogger who’s doing a great job, it doesn’t mean that person is perfect for you. Defining context is paramount and allows you to narrow down your search
- Reach – follower count or other ways they reach a lot of people. But as mentioned above, reach isn’t the only criteria you should consider when choosing a blogger or vlogger
- Engagement – a person’s ability to engage their followers matters a lot. A blogger can have thousands of followers, but if engagement is lacking then you’re better off reaching someone else
- Actionability – a blogger/vlogger’s ability to cause action by their audience
Now that you have defined a type of influencer that would suit your brand perfectly, it’s time to outline the image that person should have:
- Personality type – do you need an activist? Or maybe you need an informer or authority? What kind of person would promote your brand the best way?
- Genre – fashion, health, technology, lifestyle, travel etc.
- Authenticity – a blogger or vlogger should have a great deal of knowledge on that niche. Also, their posts, from photos and captions to blogs should be authentic, not taken from someone else (which happens frequently, so pay attention). This is particularly important for bloggers because influencer marketing is a ProvenSEO strategy to improve search engine results for your website, which means their content has to be genuine
Where to Look For Influencers?
Social media monitoring is the best way to find influencers that fit your criteria, here are some options:
- Research hashtags – identify certain hashtags that target influencers are using and browse. You can also enter your company’s name in “search” on different websites and see whether some vloggers, bloggers, or celebs already mentioned it in any way.
- Google alert – this useful option allows you to set alerts for keywords pertaining to your brand. This way, you’re able to identify people who are actively writing about it or similar topics
Another useful way of looking for influencers is through websites or services that work to help you find ideal bloggers and other people for your brand.
Attracting bloggers, vloggers, and others to want to work with you, also requires the following:
- Never directly ask them to mention positive things only – offer a product or service, and collaboration, ask for mentions but don’t dictate what they should write as they have to be genuine
- Make sure your project and offer have value
- Make it easy for influencers to participate
- Be accessible and understandable
Conclusion
Influencer marketing is a growing trend which is why an increasing number of companies look for bloggers, vloggers, and other individuals with strong online presence.
To attract the influencers to work with you, it’s important to learn how to look for them which is why it’s essential to have a project with value, outline characteristics you want the blogger to have, and take different factors into consideration.
Always make sure the person is close to your niche. A blogger with thousands of followers who posts about makeup and fashion isn’t the right influencer for a business from technology niche.
