Influencer Marketing Archives - Page 2 of 10

In News

How much is that influencer worth? The answer may surprise you

September 21, 2022 No Comments

Standards for measuring the impact of influencer content are not created equal, writes Salesforce’s Martin Kihn.

We’re all under the influence.

Influencer marketing is the fastest-growing paid channel this year, after connected television (CTV), resilient even in the face of recession. As companies plateau their use of social media, 75% of US marketers plan to invest in influencers this year – up from 66% in 2020, according to eMarketer.

And it’s not about products-for-posts anymore – it’s big business. Global marketers spent about $14bn on influencers last year, including media. B-listers such as Joanna Gaines and Addison Rae enjoy multi-figure deals, while real-life stars including footballer Cristiano Ronaldo get an estimated $500,000 per post. And there are thousands of creators in niches from travel to beauty to – of course – cats who are paid an average of $100 per 10,000 followers per meow.

In a world where 50 million people call themselves ‘creators,’ there are a lot of options for brands to partner their way into feeds, tweets and videos. Influencers can provide creative content, access to elusive audiences, higher engagement and compelling social proof.

But there’s a problem. Brands using influencers, surveyed by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) in 2020, admitted their top challenge was measurement. The situation is no better now. How do you know if you’re getting a worthwhile return-on-influencer (ROIn)?

Channels are not created equal

Measuring the impact of an influencer program is notoriously sketchy. It’s an emerging channel without industry standards. Although the Media Rating Council (MRC) has established guidelines for paid social measurement, most of the value of influencers comes from organic engagement – all those likes, shares and comments from followers and friends of friends that turn a snippet of video into cultural cachet.

Challenges with measuring ROIn include:

Data collection: Brands without API access to influencer accounts rely on methods such as emailed screenshots for metrics
Reach: It is difficult (read: impossible) to deduplicate audiences across platforms
Engagement: Different platforms present different options (where TikTok garners likes, Pinterest culls clicks) and define ‘engagement’ in different ways
Consistency: Agency partners often use proprietary roll-up metrics that can be opaque

Earlier this summer, the ANA released the first ‘Influencer Marketing Measurement Guidelines,’ taking a step toward standardizing organic measurement. Developed by the Influencer Marketing Advisory Board – formed in 2020 with reps from brands such as Puma and Target – it was based on meetings with 25 agencies and the eight major platforms (Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube).

Brands that have been there will tell you that working with influencers is special – more like hiring an improv troupe than deploying a bot. Companies like control, but creativity is part of influencers‘ charm. So it makes sense to start by asking them how they measure success. A beauty star such as Huda Kattan might value video engagement, while a photo influencer such as Murad Osmann might care more about shares.

Most brands measure ROIn based on ‘engagement,’ a blunt sum of actions divided by exposures, aggregated across all the platforms in the campaign. But this method assumes every creator aims for the same responses, and it ignores the platforms‘ real inconsistencies.

Many roads to the rainbow

Using basic discipline, the hard-working marketer with an influencer program wants some combination of three KPIs:

Awareness: This is driven by reach and frequency, generally available for each platform in isolation, but not across platforms; video views are usually counted here
Engagements: These are measured interactions with the influencers‘ content, including likes and shares – often expressed as an ‘engagement rate’ (ER) or engagements per reach
Conversions: Often the ultimate goal, this is likely undercounted and based on direct clicks through to the brand’s commerce site or other destination

Now, the ANA performs a public service in teasing out the vagaries of the platforms‘ self-reported metrics. Anyone who’s spent time parsing reports from social networks will appreciate this effort. Key differences among the platforms‘ influencer reporting include:

Facebook and Instagram: For Meta-owned platforms, ER is total engagements divided by impressions, not including video views
TikTok: ER is total engagements divided by video views, excluding replays
YouTube: ER is the same as TikTok; however, TikTok counts any video that’s started as a view, while YouTube only counts a view after 30 seconds or 100% for its short-form ‘Shorts‘
Twitter: Twitter is similar to Meta, but quote-tweet counts aren’t available via the API
LinkedIn: ER does not include video views, which are counted after two seconds with 50% viewable
Snapchat: Interestingly, Snap doesn‘t yet provide organic influencer reporting

Understanding the components of the platforms‘ reports unlocks comparisons. Obviously, an autoplay video view on Twitter isn‘t as meaningful as a video view on YouTube, and a retweet on Twitter is not exactly equivalent to a pin on Pinterest.

For awareness and conversion measurement, reach by platform and direct attribution are useful. They aren‘t perfect, since the former misses duplicates and the latter indirect attribution (ie people saw the content and converted later, or offline). But they‘re reasonable baselines.

The problem comes with the most important influencer metric: engagement rate. How can it be improved?

Worth the weight

The answer is by weighting the different components of engagement. Intuitively, we know that a like isn‘t the same as a share or a comment. It‘s easy to like a post – you just tap the heart, right? But sharing to your network is a kind of endorsement, and a comment – with the right sentiment – indicates more visceral involvement.

A principle I used when measuring the impact of social media for brands was one I took from the self-help guru John Bradshaw: “We give time to those things that we love.” Simple enough. Extending it to social platforms, I‘d argue that actions that take more time and effort should count more toward ROIn.

For example, the marketer can create a consistent weighting factor for different actions based on the time they take to complete. Say it takes a second to commit to and tap a like. Even a short, positive comment takes at least five seconds. And a share with a comment might take longer. Typical viewer patterns should be considered, and they will vary considerably based on the influencer and type of campaign.

The ultimate ROIn plan might include breakouts for awareness and conversion, and an approach to ER that considers weighting actions by their level of effort. (The ANA guidelines don‘t address weighting.) Of course, a detailed formula requires access to the platforms‘ API and permission from the influencer. Art, science and some social engineering are required.

But that’s what puts the ‘sure’ in measurement.

Feature Image Credit: Andre Sebastian

By Martin Kihn

Senior vice-president of strategy, marketing cloud

Sourced from The Drum

In News

Here’s Why Geotargeted Influencer Marketing Changes The Outreach Game

July 29, 2022 No Comments

By Danielle Wiley

In the ever-expanding world of influencer marketing, the sheer number of potential partners and topic niches can seem overwhelming. With one recent report estimating that there are over 200 million creators of various kinds, the main question brands may be wrestling with is who to partner with instead of where.

While finding the right influencer is obviously a critical element of the influencer marketing process, today’s platform technologies offer targeting capabilities that many brands simply aren’t taking advantage of.

Geotargeting allows brands to be even more successful with their influencer campaigns by making branded content more relevant and personalized to its target audience. Brand outreach that’s been tailored to audience locality and behavior has a better chance of reaching the right people at the right time with the right message.

What Is Geotargeted Influencer Marketing?

In a nutshell, geotargeting is a way for businesses to tailor their advertising to potential customers based on specific geographic locations. Geotargeted influencer marketing incorporates the influencer’s location (and their associated influence within that location) into the campaign as a whole.

For example, let’s say a national fast-casual restaurant chain is opening a new location in a specific town. Geotargeting would allow brands to activate area influencers who can raise awareness and drive sales for the new restaurant, connecting with the brand’s intended audience with localized messaging that resonates.

The same campaign could include regional influencers, adding to local-level outreach with bigger-picture messaging that’s still targeted to specific locales as well as national influencers.

Better Results With A Local Approach

Local influencers are ideal partners for local businesses since it’s likely that many of their followers are also in the same area. Partnering with local creators allows local businesses to connect with target audiences that are close in proximity, sharing brand benefits and differentiators through a local’s lens.

This strategy can also be leveraged to support larger brands: Local influencers can help establish and promote regional or national brands with a local presence. Creators with local ties offer brands a built-in community connection, and they often have the local credibility and influence that can help shape a brand’s message.

A few examples of partnering with local creators:

• National clothing brand partnering with a local Pacific Northwest weather reporter to promote their new line of rainwear.

• Rising college basketball player promoting a local restaurant with a new menu item named after her.

• National beauty store partnering with a local makeup influencer to promote a new retail location in the area.

• Southern restaurant chain partnering with local influencers to promote nearby locations that offer regional favourite foods.

• Member of a local dance team promoting a new sparkling water flavour from a national beverage brand.

• Local nutritionist sharing her excitement over the new opening of a specialty grocery store.

People are more likely to try out a new restaurant or product in their area if someone in their social circle recommends it. Additionally, influencers are often able to share brand messaging in a way that doesn’t feel like a traditional ad or sales gimmick.

Increased Authenticity & Brand Impact

Influencer marketing is a way to tap into the genuine consumer needs and interests of the moment, which offers an effective strategy for dealing with ongoing consumer uncertainty.

By partnering with creators who authentically represent their target audience, brands don’t have to rely on spray-and-pray advertising. Instead, they can share incredibly personalized messaging that’s been shaped by influential local personalities.

Geotargeted influencer marketing can contribute to the larger brand story by including relevant local perspectives. Consider the branding upsides of partnering with genuine people who genuinely care about their locality, are known for their local/regional expertise and/or are strongly associated with the area.

The right kinds of geotargeted campaigns can spark authentic reviews and recommendations that drive specific kinds of consumer action. And they can also add to a brand’s overall presence by encouraging genuine consumer connections and points of engagement.

Geotargeted Brand Spend Boosts ROI

Every influencer marketing campaign will inevitably reach some people who aren’t interested in the promoted brand. However, without careful campaign targeting, brands may be wasting their budget reaching out to consumers who don’t even live where they can buy a brand’s products or services.

With geotargeting, brands can deliver content to potential consumers within a specific location, with messaging that’s shaped by locals and relevant to the area. Whether it’s for a local business or a local franchise from a large national brand, geotargeted influencer marketing can work alone or supplement national outreach efforts.

Not only does the spectrum of influencer marketing include the affordable (and surprisingly effective)nano-influencer, but also influencer campaigns can be stopped, started and adjusted on the fly. This offers an enormous benefit to brands adjusting to Covid-19’s “new normal.” Shifting consumer behaviours can be quickly addressed within the campaign. (For instance, if a new store is opening in an area with rising infection rates, campaign messaging can be quickly changed to promote online shopping instead of in-person.)

The Local Mindset

Brands know how important personalization has become for reaching today’s consumers. Local market strategies are increasingly necessary to drive traffic and sales, as well as to strengthen the overall brand.

Location is an important aspect when it comes to marketing personalization, and technological targeting advancements have changed the game for both creators and audiences. Today’s platform tools offer deep-dive demographic insights that simply weren’t available even a few years ago.

Research shows that consumers’ attitudes and behaviors remain highly localized, even in a global context. Adopting a local mindset through geotargeted influencer marketing can help brands foster the kinds of meaningful audience connections that drive real results.

Feature Image Credit: getty

By Danielle Wiley

Founder and CEO of Sway Group, an agency that specializes in influencer marketing, branded content and digital advertising. Read Danielle Wiley’s full executive profile here.

Sourced from Forbes

In News

Instagram’s Enhanced Creator Tags: Implications for B2B Influencer Marketing

July 28, 2022 No Comments

By Lane Ellis

How can B2B marketers make their content stand out and highlight the talented subject matter experts, creators, and influencers they partner with?

Earlier this year Instagram rolled out new enhanced tagging features that allow digital marketers to do a much better job of indicating and crediting the various influencers and creators involved in the creation of content shared on the platform.

Instagram’s addition of enhanced tagging — which is also available for use in video Reels — offers significant new exposure opportunities for B2B content that has been created by multiple professionals, often precisely the type of content that is either made or co-created by industry influencers.

Let’s take a look at some of the advantages provided by Instagram’s enhanced creator tags, and how B2B marketers can best put them to use.

1 — Straightforward Setup Process

The process of using the enhanced tagging features is fairly straightforward, however there are a few caveats to be aware of as you move to incorporate them into your B2B marketing workflow on Instagram, in order to get the full effect of Instagram’s latest tagging elements.

While Instagram has moved to make more of its features available to desktop users, the enhanced tagging features were initially only available from the mobile app.

Simply having content creators or co-creators tagged goes a long way, and shows a clickable link to learn more about or follow the people involved in the digital assets you find helpful on Instagram. The updated tagging feature can do more, however.

2 — Switch On A Business Or Creator Account

One aspect of the enhanced tagging system takes on even more value, and that’s when the people tagged have gone through the simple process of setting up their Instagram profile as either a creator or business account.

Tagging people with a creator or business account adds a second line of helpful information below the person’s username, containing a category they’ve selected, such as a few B2B-related examples listed here:

Video creator
Digital creator
Writer
Author
Advertising Agency
Marketing Agency
Market Research Consultant
Advertising/Marketing
Internet Marketing Service

To ensure that anytime your brand or the influencers you work with are mentioned using an enhanced tag that also shows category information, it’s easy to switch your Instagram account from personal to professional — there is no waiting period or fee involved — simply access your account settings and select the option to switch to a professional account.

From there you can choose between a creator or business account, described by Instagram as:

Creator accounts are best for public figures, content producers, artists and influencers
Business accounts are best for retailers, local businesses, brands, organizations and service providers

After choosing your account type, you’re given the option to select a category that best fits how you use Instagram, and this will be the category that shows below your username when others include you using enhanced tagging — however keep in mind that you must also tick the “show category on profile box” option.

Instagram uses a search box for finding the most relevant category for creator and business accounts, such as those we listed above, and it can be worthwhile to experiment with the available categories, as new ones may be added over time that better describe your own B2B marketing niche.

3 — Ripe For Implementation By B2B Brands

In the B2B arena, the new Instagram enhanced tagging is ripe for implementation by brands and marketers looking to distinguish their content from the competition, and to highlight the subject matter experts and influencers they partner with.

It’s still early days for implementation of the enhanced tagging, and those brands and B2B marketers willing to put them to use will be among the first to stand out as multiple contributors are highlighted in co-created content.

“The new Instagram enhanced tagging is ripe for implementation by B2B brands and marketers looking to distinguish their content from the competition, and to highlight the influencers they partner with.” — Lane R. Ellis @lanerellis Click To Tweet

4 — From One Influencer To Many Others

When Instagram’s enhanced tagging becomes more regularly utilized, it will represent a powerful way not only for influencers to have the digital work they’ve helped create gain greater exposure, but it will also be a helpful way to find new industry experts who are tagged alongside an influencer you may already be aware of.

These days top performing digital content can involve a slew of talented creative professionals, from marketers and writers to video, audio, and social media specialists, and Instagram’s new enhanced tags make it easy to shine a light on everyone who had a hand in building a successful digital asset.

5 — Tagging Gives Voice To Underrepresented Talent

While not unique to Instagram, the new enhanced tagging features can play a helpful role in giving a greater voice to traditionally underrepresented talent.

Instagram’s augmented tagging features were brought to life through the help of three women in technology, who were each profiled in the Snobette interview, “Meet The Women In Tech Behind The Instagram-Enhanced Tagging Feature.”

“In a world where online visibility directly leads to brand sponsorships and other types of monetary opportunities, crediting is more important than ever,” Alexandra Zaoui, music data analyst at Instagram-parent firm Meta, observed.

“In a world where online visibility directly leads to brand sponsorships and other types of monetary opportunities, crediting is more important than ever.” — Alexandra Zaoui @ZaouiAlexandra Click To Tweet

“One of the biggest challenges about being a woman and particularly a Black woman in tech is not seeing nor working with others like you,” Cameryn Boyd, software engineer at Meta, noted. “I’m passionate about bringing other Black women and underrepresented people into tech because that is how and when some of the best and most equitable innovation happens,” Boyd added.

Just as in the B2C marketing world, B2B influencer marketing can help amplify underrepresented voices, and features such as Instagram’s new enhanced tagging help expand such efforts.

Our CEO Lee Odden featured efforts that give voice to talent as one of the top methods for elevating B2B marketing in 2022, in “Three of the Biggest Opportunities to Elevate B2B Marketing in 2022.”

“B2B marketers are in a unique position to make choices about how they represent their customers in content, who they partner with in content collaborations and the influencers they engage.” — Lee Odden @LeeOdden Click To Tweet

Instagram Enhanced Tagging For B2B Marketing Success

By fully embracing Instagram’s new enhanced tagging capabilities, savvy B2B marketers can lead the way and set a good example for the influencers, digital creators, and industry experts they work with, in a process that’s beneficial for both brands and influencers alike — not to mention both existing and potential customers.

Instagram is just one of the digital menagerie of social media platforms that top B2B brands use to engage audiences, however as an increasing number of B2B firms find success on platforms including TikTok and others, having a solid cross-platform tagging strategy in place will give you an edge over those who don’t.

Creating award-winning B2B marketing that elevates, gives voice to talent, and humanizes with authenticity takes considerable time and effort, which is why an increasing number of firms are choosing to work with a top digital marketing agency such as TopRank Marketing. Contact us to learn how we can help, as we’ve done for over 20 years for businesses ranging from LinkedIn, Dell and 3M to Adobe, Oracle, monday.com and others.

By Lane Ellis

Lane R. Ellis (@lanerellis), TopRank Marketing Social Media and Content Marketing Manager, has over 38 years’ experience working with and writing about the Internet. Lane spent more than a decade as Lead Editor for prestigious conference firm Pubcon. When he’s not writing, Lane enjoys distance running (11 marathons including two ultras so far), genealogical research, cross-country skate skiing, vegetarian cooking, and spending time with his wonderful wife Julie Ahasay and their cat Kukla in beautiful Duluth, Minnesota.

Sourced from TopRank Marketing

In News

Forget everything you know about influencer marketing and start from scratch

June 8, 2022 No Comments

By Crystal Duncan

Influencer marketing has evolved and so must your approach. Here’s what you need to do to make this powerful approach work as part of your full-funnel marketing strategy.

Like most nascent marketing channels, influencer marketing began as something of a Wild West. Metrics were thorny, processes were clouded, and many brands got burned working with influencer platforms or individual creators who produced scant measurable results.

The upshot is that, even now that influencer marketing has matured into a more structured discipline, some brands remain skeptical of the entire medium.

We are at the point where brands who have struggled to produce and prove value from working with influencers in the past, must consider starting from scratch. That doesn’t don’t mean scrapping your Influencer program, but effectively taking a beat to re-evaluate your approach and reset it.

Build an influencer marketing strategy from the ground up with the same scrutiny you would apply to any other strategy. That means a rigorous brand analysis and quantitative vetting process should drive discovery of potential influencers. While the process of engaging and partnering with or deploying an influencer should be as automated as possible. And, last, measurement should focus on influencers’ ability to drive sales. Influencers who can move the bottom line are the ones brands should redeploy to optimize over time.

Gone are the days when influencer marketing was purely a brand awareness play. In the right hands, influencer is now a full-funnel, full-service discipline, meaning it covers awareness and bottom-of-funnel activations, discovery upfront, and measurement on the back end. Here are three cores to building an influencer marketing strategy from scratch and turning it into a proven revenue generator.

Understand who you are and what you need to accomplish

Brands need to set clear specifications to select the right creators. Brands should ask themselves: What are your values? Which audiences are you trying to reach? What backgrounds would you like your creators to represent? What messages do you need to send to your audience?

Next comes the quantitative decision-making process that has historically eluded the discipline. What are your key performance indicators? What calls to action will you bake into your influencer campaigns? How will you measure success? Beyond numbers of followers (the conventional metric), what engagement rates do you expect influencers to command, and how do those rates line up with sales goals?

Once brands have figured this out, they can select influencers who meet their criteria. Brands should also implement a repeatable process for creating content briefs to set influencers up for success. These, too, can be optimized over time, allowing advertisers to eliminate ambiguities. Now is when cutting-edge influencer practices come in, transforming the discipline into a full-funnel strategy.

Maximize distribution, measure influencer success and optimize

The fatal flaw in most content marketing strategies is that brands focus all their attention on creating great content, and after they have created it, they simply slap it into a blog or repost it to a couple of social channels. The same failure has historically applied to influencer marketing.

But sophisticated practitioners can turn distribution into a source of value. For example, a video created for Instagram might be amplified by paid social, an OTT campaign, digital out-of-home billboards, or programmatic display.

After brands have transformed what could have been a simple influencer Instagram video into an omnichannel campaign, they can leverage cross-channel data to quantify sales driven collaboration. This is a far cry from the old influencer measurement framework in which advertisers would report on the number of eyeballs a campaign reached or how many comments it spurred.

Once brands understand how much revenue individual influencers are driving, they can optimize campaigns, staffing a bench of key collaborators. Over time, by following this model, they can build an “army” of Influencers who deeply understand the brand and can convert their audience, ultimately making things more efficient and seamless. This process of distribution, measurement, and optimization should ultimately equip brands with a well-oiled machine of creators proven to be worth the investment – and then some.

Raise the bar for influencer marketing

It is understandable that many advertisers are wary of influencer marketing. But forward-thinking brands should not let past failures dictate future strategy for a channel that has evolved.

Influencer marketing should be part of a full-funnel strategy. It builds awareness and trust through powerful, authentic content that resonates with consumers on an emotional level. It also drives sales and lends itself to granular measurement, which allows for optimization so that influencer becomes not only more lucrative but also more efficient over time.

The only thing standing between many brands and a revenue-generating Influencer Marketing strategy is outdated assumptions about the channel. By challenging past wisdom and applying the same structure that governs other performance marketing channels to influencers, brands can unlock fresh revenue-generating opportunities.

By Crystal Duncan

Crystal Duncan is senior vice president, head of partnership marketing, Tinuiti

Sourced from The Drum

In News

Choosing Between an Influencer Marketing Agency and an Influencer Marketing Platform

February 22, 2022 No Comments

Sourced from Easy Reader

People believe in social media influencers as they have a connect with them. Word-of-mouth works today like never before because people prefer to listen to the subject matter experts rather than just actors. Now, considering the brand’s side; working with influencers is not easy because factors like choosing relevant influencers, segmenting the right target audience and executing the strategy. Hence, many companies trust influencer marketing agencies to yield optimized results, while some brands use powerful influencer marketing platforms to achieve success. So, now you would be wondering that is there a difference between an agency or a platform? And what would be your strategy to whether invest in a platform or trust an agency! We will answer all these questions here. Let’s get started!

What is right for you? Influencer Marketing Agency OR Influencer Marketing Platform

This contest is between human-led agencies and technology-driven platforms!

Yes you heard it right! The basic difference between these two is that an influencer marketing agency rely on manual selection of influencers with respect to their niche and target audience and then executing the campaign through them whereas an influencer marketing platform selects the influencers through a software application based on profiling and segmenting and then ultimately market the brands’ product/service.

Simply tying up with an influencer no more works. There needs to be more going into your influencer marketing strategy to make your brand trustworthy.

Brands are now today taking a step forward and employ in-house teams, tie-ups with influencer platforms to manage influencers and collaborators, however, the better option is to hand over the entire job to a trustworthy influencer marketing agency which is better and great at their job. The bottom line, either way, is to gain customer trust and enhance sales & revenues.

An agency offers end-to-end functionality, starting from ensuring in choosing right influencers till execution. An influencer platform, on the other hand, is a new-age tool or a software system. It is designed to assist marketers during the influencer marketing process. The systems can help shortlist the right influencers, help with influencer relationship management, and provide data for measuring Return on Investment.

Influence Marketing Agency versus Influencer Marketing Platform

The primary difference but of course, is about the former being human-based and the latter being software-based. Knowing what can be derived from either entity helps the brand decide to pick one or the other, and at times, both.

Now that your brand is in the final stages of deciding which way to go – agency, platform, or both – we are here to tell you things to assess and factors to consider before taking the final call.

It is time to evaluate the following for the final time:

What are your overall objectives and goals for the influencer marketing campaign?
Do you already have an in-house team specializing in managing influencer programs? Or, are you planning to hire a team with the necessary expertise?
Do you have the money to invest in sound influencer marketing tools to empower your internal team?
What is your business scale, and what are your ROI budgets from influencer marketing campaigns? In other words, you could be making a huge investment in influencer marketing and accordingly expecting huge returns. Or, yours could be a new business, and you wish to scale up the influencer marketing spectrum gradually.
Are your budgets constrained, yet you want to have a full-fledged streamlined influencer marketing campaign?

Many such related queries need to come out and be discussed for the last time before a call is taken. These questions and their answers are crucial. The outcomes will be – identifying gaps, understanding the pros and cons of each method, identifying the strengths vis-a-vis weaknesses of the existing marketing team, etc.

When to Choose a Top Influencer Marketing Platform?

Your in-house team has the necessary experience in influencer marketing. The team can then reliably use best influencer marketing platform in India that help them plan, execute, manage and measure campaigns.
When your campaign is small, time-limited, or one-off.
When it is a simple, easy-to-execute campaign without the need to align with any strict rules and regulations.
The final objective is not about user engagement but more about reaching out to the masses.

When to Choose an Influencer Marketing Agency?

If the campaign needs time, it is best to hire an expert.
When the campaign is long-drawn and involves intricate work, it has complicated steps and must comply with regulations.
When multiple steps need to be executed precisely, knowledge and experience are very important.
When finance is not a hurdle
The campaign expectations need to be measured time and again for frequent tweaking.

Most start-ups and small businesses use platforms, while bigger organizations hire agencies. But, there is no fixed rule, and variations can be there. What matters is which entity can give the required thrust to your influencer marketing campaign? And accordingly, take a call!

Choose The Best Influencer Marketing Agency in India

Although there is no dearth of influencer marketing agencies in India, only a few have carved a niche in this highly competitive space. Grynow is by far one of the leading influencer marketing agencies in the country today, with 5+ years of experience. The top management and the team are well-versed in this niche, having worked with brands from diversified industries.

One of its strengths is the versatile and huge influencer network of 1,50,000+ creators. The company ensures fair practices are adopted to create a win-win situation for brands and influencers. The agency has worked with brands and influencers based on the ‘Explore, Engage and Expand’ strategy. Having worked with premium publishers and content creators, the company has developed an exhaustive database of influencers across India, including local and regional ones. Today, it is involved in helping improve the digital footprint of brands that they work with.

The Best Influencer Marketing Platform in India

Grynow has also successfully emerged as one of India’s most impressive, impactful, and results-oriented influencer marketing platforms. With thousands of influencers associated with this platform, it has a rich database of YouTubers, celebrities, bloggers, Insta influencers, and even campus influencers. The platform facilitates brands to invite influencers to become a part of their campaigns, thereby shortening the distance between brands and collaborators. Backed with a rich network of content creators, this platform enables potential influencers to showcase their skills and work effectively with brands. Every content is well-curated and designed to strike a chord with the target audience. The result of such content has been exemplary, helping the brands enjoy a unique connect with their audience. This platform is in great demand for its amazing market knowledge and what’ works.’

Conclusion

The choice is finally yours whether you wish to use a powerful platform or hire a top agency!

Sourced from Easy Reader

In News

8 Ways to Market Your Business on TikTok

January 19, 2022 No Comments

By Faith Walls

From Dunkin’ Donuts to the NBA, countless brands have hitched a ride on TikTok, the latest social media bandwagon. Since its launch in 2018, the user-generated, video-based app quickly grew from its China origin to an international sensation. With nods to its predecessor, Vine (RIP), TikTok turns nearly every content creator into a top-tier video editor and storyteller. The platform delights millions of users with its endless stream of FYP (For You Page) content, that is specifically geared towards your searches, interests, and frequently viewed subject matter.

This firehose of varietal media serves as sort of a time vortex. New users should be warned, your innocent “five-minute scroll” before bedtime can quickly turn into a three-hour content binge before you can say “lights out.” The average user spends at least 45 minutes on the app each day. Naturally, this rapid-fire of content consumption makes TikTok an alluring marketing tool for brands. If you can get your business name simply in the feed stream, you’re doing okay. But with a little creativity, you can take it a step further and generate content geared towards keeping viewers engaged.

8 Best Ways to Market Your Business on TikTok

1. Don’t Aim For Perfection

Contrary to the polished and pristine standards of Instagram, TikTok won’t need you to be editing out blemishes or cropping out that mess on the floor. The app thrives on seemingly authentic content. You will likely find the most engagement when your content is true to your brand personality and intentionally crafted.

2. Paid Ads

If the user-friendly algorithm isn’t enough, the platform is also delving into the realm of paid ads. If you have experience using Facebook Business Suite, you are already prepared to tackle TikTok ad campaigns. Curiously, the platform’s paid ads are designed quite similar to Facebook or Google.

You essentially have two options when it comes to TikTok ads: interest targeting and behavioural targeting. Interest targeting works the most equivalently to Facebook Ads. Through this method, you can structure your ad placement to target a specific audience.

Behavioural targeting works a bit differently, allowing you to generate your ads based on user behaviour on the app within the past seven or fifteen days. This unique method ensures your content is geared towards individuals who are active on the platform.

3. Use Hashtags Liberally

While hashtags may be considered a bit archaic on Instagram, the metadata geo tracker is receiving a much-needed reboot on TikTok. As you plug your videos into the platform, be sure to use niche hashtags and plenty of them. This is an optimal method to grow your page organically.

Joining or creating a hashtag challenge is another way you can add your content to the Discover page. This starts with creating a catchy video often with a specific sound and adding a corresponding hashtag. These campaigns easily go viral as the engaging trend of choice catches on.

4. Join In On Trends

Much like the hashtag challenge, following other trends on TikTok is an ideal way to stay up to date with popular content on the platform. Users enjoy seeing different brands take part in funny and engaging content, as popular dances, challenges, songs, and video effects surge in viewership.

5. Be Bold With Your Original Content

The platform allows users to create 15 to 60 second videos using numerous filters, voiceovers, and virtually any song snippet. This limited-time window means you have less than a minute to optimize the “elevator pitch” of your brand. Keep in mind that TikTok is built on consumer engagement; the more user-friendly your content is, the higher views and comments you can expect. Keep your videos concise and attention-grabbing. Always prioritize quality over quantity.

6. Utilize Influencer Marketing

Influencers are an optimal way to gain viewers and to expand your reach to a brand new audience. Though one normally associates influencer content with the visual aesthetics of Instagram, influencers are taking to TikTok in order to gain new sponsorships. The process works similarly to Instagram, where there is an exchange of incentives – either monetary or product – for the promotion of your business. Influencers already have a loyal following, so placing your brand in front of a wider audience is an effective way to increase awareness.

7. Partner With Other Creators

TikTok is famous for its “duet” feature, where users can record videos that build upon another video. This popularized trend has resulted in a vast expanse of creative efforts – from barbershop quartet ditties to personal story prompts. Partnering with like-minded creators and utilizing TikTok live videos opens up the conversation with the audience and helps your brand feel personable.

8. Track Your Analytics Data

As you launch your promotional content and experiment with different trends, be sure to track your engagement through TikTok Analytics. These statistics provide valuable insights regarding your audience demographics and viewership. Don’t be afraid to try out different approaches as you go.

By Faith Walls

Sourced from HEYSocal

In News

7 Easy Ways to Improve Your B2B Marketing Strategies

January 14, 2022 No Comments

By Debraj Chatterjee

B2B is an acronym for business to business. Therefore, b2b marketing is where you focus on marketing your product to other businesses rather than individuals. Take the example of a company that sells office chairs on wholesale.

Although such a company can sell to individuals, their primary customers will be other companies seeking office chairs. Therefore, when the office chair company reaches out to the other company about their chairs, we call b2b marketing.

Why is B2B Marketing Important?

You might not have decided about whether to consider b2b marketing. While it is essential to stick to what you know for marketing, any business reluctant to embrace change will probably not last that long.

That alone won’t convince most people to give b2b marketing a chance. Here’s what will.

It Will Help Market Complex Products

There’s no better way to market complex products than b2b marketing. Most b2b products are usually complex and will therefore require different marketing strategies rather than the usual. That’s where b2b marketing comes in.

It is a Way to Adjust to New Marketing Strategies

B2b marketing is a different type of marketing when compared to the usual marketing. Therefore, it will enable you to adjust to the changing demands in the market and thus boost sales.

It Will Reach a Wider Audience

B2b marketing uses different marketing techniques to introduce the product to the market. Content creation and social media as some of those techniques. That ensures a business reaches a broader audience.
Easy Ways to Improve Your B2B Marketing Strategy

1. Consider Using Live Videos

According to Livestream, only 20% of people would prefer to read about a product via blogs or other written text. The rest would prefer if they could see the videos instead. If you know anything about marketing trends is that you need to follow the majority.

That isn’t surprising since videos are excellent at conveying emotions than written text. Don’t get us wrong; many people prefer to read social media posts on their phones. But information from videos will be better received by your audience.
So, you’ll want videos and especially live videos to be part of your b2b marketing strategy.

2. Grow Buyer Personas

This is an essential step for any marketing strategy and not just a b2b strategy. It is wise to look into your buyer’s personalities and know what product will appeal to them. The best way to grow buyer personas is to thoroughly research the customers’ needs to understand them so you can offer better solutions.

Buyer personas will enable you to connect with them more personally since you will know them better. Therefore, buyer personas will be an excellent way for you to improve your b2b marketing strategies.

3. Consider Content Marketing

Content marketing is an excellent way to tell potential customers about your products. But it has a catch. It would help if you focused more on speaking about your products and how they will solve people’s problems than about yourself.

Blogging is a powerful marketing tool if you adopt it. A potential customer could only be a Google search away. But that will only be possible if you’re willing to improve your b2b marketing strategy with content marketing.

That’s why it could be critical to you building a successful business, thanks to excellent marketing.

4. Collect Feedback

not having a way to get customer feedback is akin to pulling yourself down. You will be going in blind as far as your client’s needs are concerned. Collecting feedback will enable you to create a better relationship with existing customers.

Most relationship experts will tell you that good communication is vital if you want to create meaningful relationships. But what can you use to collect feedback from your customers?

You could start by having a feedback form on your website for buyers to fill in after getting their product or service. Qualaroo is a tool that will enable you to carry out surveys on your website and get their feedback.

5. Create a Brand Story

Ultimately, human beings will often associate more with brands that can trigger their emotions. Customers need to know that they can trust your brand to deliver. Gaining customer trust is easier said than done for businesses. However, creating a brand story will enable you to tug on people’s heartstrings and allow them to relate better to you.

A brand story will enable you to connect with people in b2b businesses on a personal level and thus drive sales for you. A brand story allows people to see the human face behind your products and relate easily to your company.

If your market is predominantly millennial or modern generations, you will need a brand story more than you think. Millennial’s and later generations have seen so many different marketing strategies and yearn for something fresh
A brand story will be perfect in sparking their interest.

6. Influencer Marketing

Ever considered influencers in your marketing strategy? If not, then you need to reconsider that. Influencers are online personalities with a large following. They can convince their many followers to follow or buy a certain product,
Even if you are selling to businesses, you will need to show that most people prefer your products. So, influencers are one way to improve your strategy and have your marketing reach a wider audience.

7. Customer Testimonials

Research shows that people are more likely to purchase something when they hear other people speak positively about it. Although a b2b business aims to make its products more visible to other companies, you first need to connect with the people running those businesses.

Therefore, having customer testimonials on your website will enable you to convert potential clients into loyal customers. It’s that simple. People want to associate with things that delight and impress other people.

Final Thoughts

A competent b2b marketing strategy could be the difference between growing to be among the richest Indian companies or a lowly player in the financial market. The amount of business you do will significantly depend on your marketing strategy, and these tips we have shared will help you massively improve it.

By Debraj Chatterjee

Debraj is a Founder of Cryptonidea, Coinvouge, CryptonBinary blog Services and oversees strategic, operational, and invest Peng aspects of the company’s wide-ranging digital content & digital revenue activities.

Sourced from readwrite

In News

B2B Marketing News: Influencer Marketing Climbs 42%, B2B Purchase Study, LinkedIn’s Group Identity for B2B, & Record Ad Expansion On Tap

December 23, 2021 No Comments

By Lane Ellis

B2B Buyers Reward Brands That Focus On Six Ingredients, Study Finds
67 percent of B2B buyers have said that it is increasingly important to work with brands offering both positive social and business value, according to newly-released survey data. The report also showed that in 2021 the number of B2B buyers who find that it takes too long to purchase has increased by 28 percent over 2020 figures, to 44 percent. MediaPost

LinkedIn Shares 2022 Predictions on B-to-B Marketing, Sales Intent
Signals of buyer intent will form a new form of currency even — or perhaps especially — in uncertain times, and the importance of zero-party data has increased — two of several insights contained in recently-released B2B marketing prediction data from LinkedIn (client) of interest to digital marketers. Adweek

Budgeting for 2022: Marketers’ Email Spend Plans
Some 37 percent of marketing professionals expect to spend more in 2022 for email marketing efforts, with seven percent planning to boost spending by more than 15 percent next year — two of several statistics of interest to online marketers contained in recently-released survey data. MarketingProfs

How to remove bias from AI models [Forrester Report]
Knowing where and when to rely on artificial intelligence and recognizing when the technology isn’t appropriate are more important and nuanced judgements than ever, according to newly-released Forrester report data examining bias in AI. Tech Republic

“When we look at the kinds of problems we try to solve with AI, the closer a problem is to a problem human intelligence excels at, the more challenging the problem will be for AI.” — Christopher Penn @cspenn Click To TweetReddit adds real-time conversation features, live upvote counts, and more
Social news aggregator and discussion platform Reddit has rolled out an array of new changes, including real-time post metrics that will show how many users are actively reading a message on the platform — features aimed at updating live engagement statistics, Reddit recently announced. Ars Technica

Advertising spending looks to rebound in 2021, driven by digital media
Influencer marketing and social media advertising have been among the primary drivers of ad growth in 2021, contributing to a 7.2 percent rise in global marketing spending in 2021, expected to reach $1.3 trillion by the end of the year, according to recently-released report data of interest to digital marketers. eMarketer

LinkedIn Announces New, Privacy-Friendly Approaches to Data Collection and Ad Targeting
Microsoft-owned LinkedIn has launched new advertising targeting options with the release of its Group Identity for B2B features, which include a wider array of first-party data, among other new data collection features, LinkedIn (client) recently announced. Social Media Today

Email Production Times Seem to Be Getting Longer
58 percent of marketers have said that they are taking two weeks or longer for email campaign creation in 2021, an increase of five percent from 2020 figures, while over 80 percent said that the global health crisis had changed their email strategy, according to newly-released survey data. MarketingCharts

Ad market’s growth exceeds broader economic recovery, fuelled by digital
For the first time digital advertising channels will account for more than 60 percent of global ad spending, according to recently-released 2022 forecast data, also showing that overall spending will rise 22 percent next year, reaching a record $710 billion. Marketing Dive

Influencer Marketing Surges 42% To $13.8B In 2021
2021 saw influencer marketing spending grow by 42 percent from 2020 levels, topping the $13.8 billion mark, with the greatest concentration of brand spending found in North America — two of several statistics of interest to digital marketing contained in newly-released report data. MediaPost

ON THE LIGHTER SIDE:

A lighthearted look at the “decision paralysis” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist

#BestOfTweets: Twitter unveils the most popular brand tweet of 2021 — PRWeek

TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:

Lee Odden — 100+ Content Marketing Trends and Predictions for Success in 2022 — Content Marketing Institute
Lane R. Ellis — Close More Deals with These 10 Email Marketing and Sales Tips — Small Business Trends
Dell Technologies — Space Is Bigger Than He Thought: 20 Years Later, Dell’s Dude Is Back — MediaPost

Have you found your own top B2B marketing news for the week? Please drop us a line in the comments below.

Thanks for joining us for the TopRank Marketing B2B marketing news, and we hope that you’ll return next Friday for more of the most relevant B2B and digital marketing industry news. In the meantime, you can follow us on our LinkedIn page, or at @toprank on Twitter for even more timely daily news.

By Lane Ellis

Lane R. Ellis (@lanerellis), TopRank Marketing Social Media and Content Marketing Manager, has over 37 years’ experience working with and writing about the Internet. Lane spent more than a decade as Lead Editor for prestigious conference firm Pubcon. When he’s not writing, Lane enjoys distance running (11 marathons including two ultras so far), genealogical research, cross-country skate skiing, vegetarian cooking, and spending time with his wonderful wife Julie Ahasay and their three cats in beautiful Duluth, Minnesota.

Sourced from TopRank Marketing

In News

Getting Brand Communities Right and How to Build One

October 13, 2021 No Comments

By Toby Britton

Every marketer knows that the holy grail of marketing is the all-important word-of-mouth recommendation. In search of this, brand advertising has, in recent years, leaned heavily on influencer marketing, to both gain reach and approximate the word-of-mouth recommendation as closely as possible. In reality, influencer marketing is no match for direct brand advocacy from the customers themselves.

With only 4% of customers trusting paid influencers (according to a UM Wave study), the importance of authentic people-centric marketing is something that brands simply can’t afford to ignore. So, while there’s a strong case for paying for reach and awareness via sponsored influencer tricks, brands who are not leveraging earned media from their most vocal existing advocates could be missing a trick.

Many brands have been tapping into the power of user-generated content for a while now. However, the savviest are going one step further, and building brand communities.

What is a brand community?

A community is a group of individuals with similar values and interests, who are bonded by their difference from outsiders, their traditions, and their sense of obligation to each other. When a community forms around a brand, it taps into people’s fundamental emotional and social needs, creating strong bonds between the people in it and the brand they love. When they express passion for a brand in a brand community, it resonates strongly and is reflected back through relationships with other community members. In a successful brand community, like-minded individuals are able to bond over not only a shared love of a brand but over the possession of particular skills and interest in similar experiences. Naturally, when this happens, a stream of authentic earned media is developed, with community members sharing content with little encouragement.

By allowing brand communities to self-support and flourish with minimal input, brands have the chance to form profound personal connections with customers for a fraction of the cost of a traditional marketing campaign. With the rise of brand community marketing, the new generation of marketers will need patience, plus a new skill set and a knowledge of specific systems and principles to develop and manage effectively. However, once mastered, community marketing will richly reward brands with dedicated and enthusiastic customers, leading to word-of-mouth growth, increased customer-made content, and outstanding return on investment.

What do members of a brand community look like?

Brand communities are as diverse as the brands that work with them. A community could be composed of regular enthusiastic customers, or brands can recruit a subset of creative customers to collaborate with. What tends to be the most important criteria and one of the biggest differences between community marketing and influencer marketing, is brand love; an authentic love for the brand that exists regardless of any community membership, where such super fans genuinely want to help that brand succeed.

One of the biggest sources of community power for brands is the Creator Economy. This is an economy created around over 50 million passionate and highly skilled individuals around the world who have built businesses and communities around their own personal brands online. They can range from musicians to hairstylists, to business experts, and more. They tend to be present on the main social media platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, and adept at utilizing their talents to create well-presented, top-quality content. In a brand community, individuals from the Creator Economy, regular customers, and those who fall somewhere in between have the chance to interact with a brand in a fresh way.

How to use technology to grow a brand community

Building a brand community might sound tricky and time-consuming at first, and while it’s possible to sustain brand communities using existing social media, specially built digital community management platforms will do much of the heavy lifting for you. Through social listening using hashtags and @mentions, such a platform will identify the super fans and creators that would be the best fit for your brand community.

Brands can then easily recruit these potential brand advocates to their brand community using such a platform, and provide them with an exclusive digital space in which to connect with fellow community members.

Inside this digital space, brands can brief super fans on projects and collaborate with them on campaigns. You’ll be able to provide them with the tools they need to get started, and, in exchange, they’ll bring both their creativity and customer knowledge to the table. You can also use the community space to get feedback on new products and reward super fans ethically in a number of ways, which could include providing them with a platform for their work, workshops, courses, or charitable donations. Often, being able to play a meaningful role in your business is reward enough.

UGC generated by super fans can then be carefully curated and licensed through community management platforms, and published directly to brand channels such as websites and social media, or exported for use in other marketing campaigns.

Examples of great brand communities

Lego Ideas is a community website where anyone can submit new builds using existing Lego bricks, new designs are lightly moderated, showcased, and put up to a community vote, and the winning designs have a chance of being turned into a commercially available Lego set and earning 1% of royalties. Since 2014, this open-to-all marketing model continues to successfully the growth of a thriving community of Lego fans, as well as ethically rewarding the most creative and dedicated amongst them.

Dove’s ground-breaking marketing campaign #ShowUs is a fine example of community marketing in the social justice space. Facilitated by community technology, Dove collaborated with regular consumers who had extraordinary stories to share, in the Dove community to generate a photo library that truly reflects the diversity of beauty around the world, with the aim of improving the representation of beauty in advertising.

Although it can be tricky for brands to champion social causes without seeming superficial, Dove’s existing brand authenticity and willingness to celebrate its shared values with brand fans proved to be a recipe for community marketing success. The challenge set to creators resonated incredibly well, resulting in the world’s largest photo library of women and non-binary individuals, and winning the campaign multiple awards in the process.

Conclusion

As we’ve seen, the key to a thriving brand community is to tap into existing creator talent and enthusiasm, by taking the time to develop a new marketing skillset alongside taking advantage of the best in cutting edge community management technology. Get the balance right and you can nurture a sharing culture; one that can thrive and deliver endless earned media with little intervention and no financial transactions.

Feature Image Credit: John Cameron

By Toby Britton

Sourced from Brandingmag

In News

5 Ways to Make More Money as a Content Creator in 2021

September 21, 2021 No Comments

By Tanveer Zafar

Are you a content writer? here are 5 ways to earn more!

Being a content creator is currently one of the most sought-after job descriptions, because who wouldn’t want to make a living by being themselves online?

With influencer marketing on the rise, there are now millions of brands willing to pay premiums to place their products in front of the right audience. To stay ahead of the curve, I spoke with Shahrzad Rafati, CEO of BBTV and one of the world’s largest creator solution providers, on her tips for turning your content into a career.

Be discoverable

In 2020, over 3.6 billion people were using social media, which is projected to increase to 4.41 billion in 2025. With numbers like these, there’s no reason you can’t achieve massive reach. To hit that next level it’s all about optimization. Details such as keywords, descriptions and titles may seem small and irrelevant compared to the content itself but they can actually be equally important.

You can’t simply press post and expect to receive millions of views without optimizing the content itself. This is where tools such as BBTV’s VISO Catalyst can be indispensable. This software automatically finds the optimal keywords and metadata to maximize your content’s performance.

Brand safety

Many tools are available to constantly monitor your brand, not only protecting it but elevating its reach. Nowadays creators can calculate an overall “Brand Safety Score”, based on the metadata of your content: the title, the description, the tags, the video and image detection.

A multi-platform approach

Growing an audience in today’s world is about using all of the platforms you can. Once you cultivate a significant following on one platform, e.g. TikTok, your followers will literally follow you from platform-to-platform and that’s when you can begin to diversify and increase your content. Follow the three E’s: expandable (does the post encourage continuous discussion?), evergreen (is the post going to remain relevant and topical?), and engaging (does the post fit your target audience or does it alienate them?).

Use analytics

Knowing your audience is one of the most valuable tools you can have. Any social media account can give you your analytics, it’s usually just a simple move from a personal account to a business or pro account. Comparing and contrasting how your reel, video or post performs is a great way to understand the bigger picture of what your really wants.

However, to reach the next level, it’s important to have a little bit of help. For example, a video comparison tool. With built-in key metrics for comparison and defaulted to comparing the first 48 hours of video data, this tool levels the playing field between videos to offer you the best insights for your content strategy. Through their in-depth knowledge of trends and data, it can help you figure out your follower activity, other videos your followers have watched, how long they stay on your page etc. in order to increase your brand visibility, follower count and ultimately your pay check.

Protect your pockets

Thanks to innovation in the influencer market there are more ways than ever to make money. Have you ever found stolen content reposted without your permission? Now there are tools to help creators reclaim this lost revenue. The Plus solutions toolkit ensures that earnings from your content go right to your pocket, and no one else’s. Plus solutions have already helped reclaim billions of views that would have otherwise been completely lost.

Ultimately a combination of engaging content and a savvy toolkit will take any creator to the next level. The key is finding the right combination that works best for your audience, content and career.

By Tanveer Zafar

Sourced from Entrepreneur Europe