Influencers are people having relatively large audience to whom they express their beliefs and view towards a product or service. In consumer world they can make it or break it for a brand. It becomes easy to market your offerings with help of an influencer as they already have great deal of trust amongst your target audience. Influencers can be buyers, journalists, bloggers, industry professional, critic, public figure, etc. Influencers can be ranked on few metrics such as, market reach, independence (that they are not biased), frequency of outreach, expertise, persuasiveness.

Influencers can be a great take to increase your brand awareness, drive engagement, and give a push to conversions. As per a study, almost 40% of twitter users made a purchase after seeing an influencer tweet about the product. Hence Influencer marketer can be a great asset to boost your sales.

As per study Influencer marketing provides 11 x more Return on Investment than any other traditional marketing initiative. According to another study by Tomoson. It is the fastest growing acquisition channel. Two third of marketers plan on increasing their influencer marketing budget. It offers 37% higher retention rate.

Linkedin has more than 53000 profiles for Influencers. As per a Nielsen study, searches for Influencer marketing grew 5 times in 2016. As per Disney, the last step for big dollars to flow into Influencer Marketing is Measurement.

Bonus for Influencer Marketing is that it is immune to ad blockers, and customers are readily in agreement to buy your content or piece of advice. Association with influencers create a ripple effect amongst influencers.

Almost 88% of influencers tell others about the brand that endorses them, giving you some bonus shout outs and mentions with larger audience. Word of mouth has always been a powerful marketing tool, and Influencer marketing is broader perspective of that. The time of celebrity endorsement might have not gone, but facts are on the side of Influencer marketing.

Nielsen found 92% of people trust recommendations from people they know, and 70% of people trust expert opinions they read online.

Here is Roger Federer endorsing Rolex to his social media followers.

Social Media has become a great hub of Influencer marketing for ecommerce. Influencer marketing follows the concept of Trusted Advisor. Before making a purchase and paying few dollar bills for it, every customer would expect a good word about the brand or the offering.

Influencer is the person who fills the gap. If the Influencer is able enough and have skills to communicate the best about the brand, he can even become instrumental in creating brand advocates out of his audience.

Choosing the Influencer – Social Proof

In order to maximize the outputs or ROI, brands need to figure out which Influencer is perfect for them or could generate higher sales and bigger profits.

Social proof comes in handy when to evaluate the outreach of an influencer in a metric driven environment. It can calculated by the amount of likes, followers, comments, shares, retweets, mentions the Influencer has.

But when it comes to Influencer marketing, many argue it is not the popularity but influence that matters, which can be evaluated by engagement, and level of involvement by the audience. If the influencer is able to change the opinion of an individual its the best and he is more than an influencer and also a opinion leader.

Factors influencing Purchase intent

On normal days, your audience might not have urge to buy the offerings you recommend to them. But an effective influencer must have the ability to change that. The factors that influence purchase intent can be, brand awareness, perceived quality, customer loyalty, perceived value, and others. An influencer will work well, if he is able to construct a positive image for a brand in minds of his audience. So the next time he comes about talking about that brand, he pushes the consumers towards a purchase. Perceived value of an offering is the utility of it. Higher perceived value will tend to close to a purchase. Role of Influencer is to map them to the needs of its audience.

Micro Influencers in Big Picture

Influencer marketing on Instagram has grown into a billion dollar industry. It has came into the notice of marketers that Influencers with around 1000 to 10000 followers have engagement (Ratio of likes and comments) at their peak. While the influencers more than 100000 followers have their engagement rates flattened out. The reason being that people don’t tend to interact with celebrities, and connect more to one’s they can closely relate to. The winner here are micro influencers.

Stats that work in favor, about Micro Influencers –

• 60% higher engagement
• Budget Friendly (6.7X more cost-efficient per engagement)
• 22.2% more weekly conversations than the average consumer

How to find Micro Influencers –

• Search in the followers of your business account. People who are already your consumers, or aware about your offerings, will be the best ones to promote it.
• Use Hashtags. People find burning and trending topics by it. You can find your next influencer if they match your psyche.
• Search for Local Influencers – If you cater to a specific geography, this is the best shot to gain more by good publicity from local influencers.
• Automate the search. Manual process of finding influencers can be time consuming. Use tools such as Buzz Sumo, Klear, etc.

To find the right fit, take these into consideration –

• The quality of comments
• Growth in Followers
• Video Views
• Presence on Other Social Media Platforms

Influencer Marketing on Social Media

For ecommerce businesses social media is go getter. 74% of shoppers make buying decisions based out of social media. Influence works very well, as social media is built on personalized experiences. Majority of crowd on social media, are normal people with similar aspirations, and common topics to talk about. Here is a quick take on how to go about Influencer Marketing on Social Media

• Reviews from Social Influencers – Social Influencers are people with large number of followers and are into the business of influencing buying behavior of them. The influence can be organic or paid, whatever the case, it affects purchasing decisions to great extent. Recah to relevant influencers and ask them to try your products, and speak about the experience they had.
• Be Niche oriented – Find a influencer who is subject matter expert or an industry professional, or having followers of your niche. It ensures that your investment doesn’t goes to waste, and you enjoy the maximum conversions.
• Run Contests – They add an element of fun, while consumers tend to retain your brand for much longer;. Use influencers to run these contests and win your product or any custom gift. Influencer will give a boost to audience you might reach.
• Mentions on Social Media – Use Influencers to talk more often about your offerings, so you stay on top of search results in Social Media. Customers nowadays are also actively searching for their next purchase on social media. A mention from reliable source will tend to close them in a deal.
• Creating Discussion among followers – An influencer that gets its followers talking about the offering is the best. It amplifies your brands reach, and leave lasting impact on followers.
• Creation of Unique Marketing Content – It doesn’t has to be rocket science, but a more personalized approach towards promoting a brand can help a lot. Story telling where the offering is connected to influencers real life, will stir the customers to like it more.

Effect of GDPR

With EU coming under the radar of GDPR, the EU market will witness a great shift in marketing strategies adopted by businesses. The direct communication between brands and its consumers will now be subjected to consumers assent. Third party databases for reaching out to potential consumers will cease to exist. In such a scenario, brands will have to figure out other ways to reach their potential consumers. Thanks God, Influencer marketing is there, and it will be on rise as it remains to be best way for reaching out to consumers, creating credibility, and mending the purchase behavior for the interest of organizations. Amidst strict regulations, Influencer marketing will be productive in mass scale campaigns without infringement. WIth GDPR on the table, you can make a bet on Influencer marketing.

Conclusion

Now its your turn, to get started with Influencer that is right for your business. Give your business a chance to create better bonding with your customers and target audience. As already discussed Influencers in action empower your business with trust of your target audience. Time to trust us and go for it.

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