Are you wondering how to find the right influencers for your brand or products? If so, then keep reading. You might be familiar with celebrity social media influencers such as the Kardashians, Selena Gomez, and The Rock, but did you know that Jamie Oliver is a top food influencer on Instagram with more than 9 million followers? Have you heard of Benjamin Lowly, Jannid Olsson Delér, and Huda Kattan? They are photography, lifestyle, and beauty influencers on Instagram. And then there is Cristiano Ronaldo, the soccer star and sports influencer with more than half a billion followers.
What is an Influencer?
An influencer is someone who has the power to affect the purchasing decisions, opinions, or behaviors of others through their online presence and credibility across various platforms. Influencers are often trusted by their followers for recommendations, opinions, and authentic connections. They typically share content on social media platforms, blogs, or videos that resonate with a specific audience, and their followers trust their opinions and recommendations.
Influencers can come in various forms, from celebrities with millions of followers to everyday individuals with smaller, more niche audiences. Their influence is built on their ability to engage with their followers and establish a sense of trust, authority, or relatability within a particular industry or interest area, such as fashion, technology, beauty, fitness, travel, or lifestyle.
Influencers vs Creators vs Celebrity
Influencers, creators, and celebrities all play distinct roles in marketing, but their influence varies.
Influencers are individuals who have built a strong connection with a specific audience, often within a niche market, and can sway opinions or purchasing decisions based on their authenticity and engagement.
On the other hand, Creators focus primarily on producing original content, such as videos, blogs, or artwork, and may or may not have the same influence as traditional influencers.
Celebrities are widely recognized public figures who gain influence through their fame, often outside of social media, and have a broad reach but may not always engage directly with their followers. While all three can impact a brand’s reach, influencers tend to have more targeted and personal engagement, creators prioritize content production, and celebrities bring widespread visibility due to their established public status.
Four Types of Influencers on Social Media Platforms
- Nano Influencers: Typically have 1,000 to 10,000 followers. They are known for deep connections with their audience, leading to high engagement rates.
- Micro Influencers: Have 10,000 to 100,000 followers. They are popular for their niche expertise and high engagement levels, making them effective for targeted marketing.
- Macro Influencers: Range from 100,000 to 1 million followers. They offer a broad reach and are helpful for brand awareness and traffic generation.
- Mega Influencers: Have over 1 million followers. Often, celebrities or well-known personalities provide massive reach but may lack the personal touch of smaller influencers.
Source: Visme
How to Find the Right Influencer for Your Brand or Product
Since you're a brand searching for the right social media influencers to market your brand or product, you have already defined your goals and know why you are interested in influencer marketing. And you know your target audience. But what do you need to consider when searching for the right influencer to work with your business? Below are a couple of ways to find influencers for your marketing campaigns.
Relevance To Your Business
There are many types of influencers, but you need someone relevant to your business. They must be able to influence your target audience and have content that aligns with your brand values. What are your brand values, and do the influencers you are interested in have similar values? A Google search will quickly show you which social media platforms they use, what kind of reputation they have, and the quality of their work. This is critical knowledge when making your decision—after all, you are going to give them the freedom to create content on behalf of your brand. That means the influencer needs to speak to your audience with a voice that aligns with your values.
The more generic influencers are active in things like food, travel, fashion and style, lifestyle, design, beauty, sport and fitness, and photography. If, for example, you are looking for a food influencer for your organic grocery brand, and the potential influencer does not promote organic living, then you need to continue to look for influencers who align with your brand.
Use Social Media To Your Advantage
Social media platforms like Instagram are the best places to find relevant influencers for your influencer marketing campaigns. Your goals define how influencer marketing is measured, and this should be your guide when researching candidates on social platforms. General measurement areas include audience reach, impressions, engagement (comments, likes, shares), sentiment, high-quality content, and conversions.
In the influencer world, the highest follower count does not necessarily result in the highest engagement rate. Influencers with fewer followers but a loyal audience often find it easier to build a high engagement rate. An engaged audience is more likely to convert by buying a product or service, viewing a website, or mentioning a brand when sharing. Ensure you cover all the social media channels during your research, even if you don’t intend to use the platform during your campaign. You need to see how the influencer engages on the different platforms.
Use An Influencer Marketing Tool
Fortunately, you don’t have to spend much time on social media to identify the influencers you are looking for. You can also use influencer marketing tools to find, engage with, and deal with influencers in your industry. These tools allow you to filter and find the best ones for your brand based on your preferences, including those who produce content that resonates with your audience. Not only does the software help you find the right candidate, but it can also help you run a more successful influencer campaign. The benefits of using influencer marketing tools are:
- Finding the perfect influencers for your brand by using filters, artificial intelligence (AI) search, and engagement analytics.
- Track trending topics, hashtags, challenges, and more to create viral content with the right influencers.
- Using in-depth analytics to analyze influencer success, track progress, and improve future campaigns.
- Compare your progress with your competitors to design better influencer marketing strategies.
Starting with well-defined business goals will make it easier to select the best influencer marketing tool for your purpose. There are tools for social listening, identification, outreach, management, marketplaces, and agencies.
Check Their Content Quality
Once you have the shortlist of influencers you want to work with, the next step is to review the quality of their social media content to determine whether it reflects the quality standards of your company. Since they will be (potentially!) the face of your brand, you need to learn whether people value the influencers’ opinions and admire them. Good influencers are discreet and demonstrate how a product or service fits effortlessly into their lives. What defines good influencer content?
- Is a different strategy used for every social media platform, and is the influencer engaging with the audience in a manner appropriate to that platform?
- Are product reviews generic and the same across platforms, or is diverse content created that fits the product, brand, and platform?
- Do they engage with industry authorities and subject matter experts where relevant?
- Does the content engage your targeted audience demographic?
Do They Have an Engaged Audience?
As mentioned earlier, the influencer’s follower numbers should not be the determining factor when working with them. Instead, you need to look at how engaged they are with their audience. On the three main social media sites, engagement is reflected in different ways:
- Twitter: Re-tweets and followers
- Facebook: Shares, likes, and followers
- Instagram: Likes and followers
What would engaged followers do?
- Frequently visit the influencer’s social media accounts
- Click, like, comment, and share the influencer’s posts
- Retweet the influencer’s posts
- Reply or swipe up on their Instagram Story
- Watch and share the influencer’s video on any platform
How do you know if an influencer has an engaged audience? The followers click, like, comment, swipe, and share the content. These are the followers who are most interested in their influencer content, so they are more likely to click on a link and make a purchase.
Check If They've Worked With Other Brands
It is convenient when a social media influencer works with other brands, as they understand how the business relationship works and what a brand might be looking for from them. If the brands they've worked with are unfamiliar, find out what industry they represent and if it is a company you are comfortable associating with. The limited brand experience should not prevent you from selecting an influencer who is passionate about your brand—if they have an engaged audience.
Serious influencers spend time building their brand and cultivating their audience. They are protective of their reputation and the people who trust them, as it takes patience, focus, and persistence to become a social media influencer with an engaged audience. If you are happy with the influencers you selected and the brands they worked for, you can start connecting with them to see if they are interested in promoting your brand. Influencer marketing does not necessarily offer quick results, but influencer audiences can be very passionate, resulting in positive outcomes for your brand, service, or product.
Find an Influencer That is Suitable for Your Brand Today
At WSI, we help companies build an online reputation that is positive, engaging, and authoritative and can help you find influencers. Do you want to increase brand awareness with the assistance of social media influencers? We can connect you with your social audience. Contact us today to learn more about how to find the right influencers for your brand.
