Platform to make money and boost your account
in Instagram and TikTok
Platform to make money and boost your account
in Instagram and TikTok
This Influencer Outreach guide contains strategies, tools, & examples to lead you to successful outreach. Learn them to make every outreach into a conversion.
Influence marketing has become a common tool used to promote products or services. Companies seeking promotion with influencers gain a lot. Due influencer outreach allows not only boosting sales yet also enhancing the brand awareness. Besides, influencers can have a great effect on the manufacturer’s image, so social media make a huge difference nowadays when it comes to propelling any business.
An effective promotional campaign relying on influencers will definitely take understanding the basics of influence-marketing. Working with opinion leaders may earn you even more than conventional ads, yet only if employed the right way, with the right influencers and a well-designed and thoroughly thought and carefully structured process.
Launching an effective promo campaign definitely appears something to keep you sweating: find an influencer, discuss and accept all the cooperation terms, set the right KPI, and much more. However, the reality may be not too complicated.
Here we have an influencer outreach guide to help you find influencers for effective promotion and have your brand benefit from it.
Promotion on social media starts with selecting a platform - it should be good for your specific product. Instagram, for instance, is a visual platform, which shows the user a picture that grabs their attention. As for YouTube, then it is good to advertise a product through a video, such as reviews or some native ads. Of course, we will never neglect TikTok. At first it was considered something childish and never taken seriously because most of its users were adolescents. However, as the traffic started growing, numerous influencers rushed here, naturally followed by sponsors and brands.
Once you have chosen a service, you will have to create an account featuring the respective product. This is important yet not mandatory. Actually, nearly every company tries to have an account in every single social media nowadays. They say if your company is not to be found on the Internet, it does not exist at all - everything is online now. One of the benefits of having a company’s page is the brand confidence. Anyway, the influencer will have to leave a link to the service that features your product. The task for the business is to attract the user, have them take interest in the product, and urge them touch the brand, so to say. This is the part where influencers can really play a role. Influencers are opinion leaders who are followed and listened to by people of different generations. A single piece of recommendation offered by an influencer may earn you more loyal flowers and leads than months of targeting and other activities.
Now, here comes the main question: how do I find an influencer? At this stage, the issue is all about the quantity and the quality of creators. Nearly everyone claims to be an influencer today. However, what does this or that particular one have to offer to a sponsor? The thing is that an effective promo campaign depends on the sponsor’s choice of someone who will do the whole job.
Many believe that promotion with influencers is extremely expensive. And yes, this is right, yet only in case you are promoting a renowned brand and have collaboration with top mega-influencers thus seeking to boost your brand awareness. In this case, you will need a promo budget running into millions.
Attracting potential customers and generating sales may also take work with lower-key influencers who have a smaller yet a more focused audience. And in this segment, the cost of ads will vary greatly - from hundreds of dollars to thousands and dozens of thousands, which means you will find an offer up to your specific budget.
You can negotiate with an influencer (with no specific contract signed, though) about some particular time a post or a video will be released featuring your product. However, don’t get too much surprised the post is released not exactly the time you agreed upon, or it may never be released. The influencer, just like many other people around, is not really punctual - he or she can simply forget about the time the ad was have been displayed, or may be procrastinating.
The specific feature about promotion with influencers is that the sponsor cannot always state how the product should be presented. Influencers always have it their own way, in view of their unique style, presentation manner and vision. Actually, this sort of honesty is the point that makes their audience follow them, so be prepared to see some creativity you never expected. Besides, when telling about your product, the influencer may even tell about certain disadvantages. Sometimes, however, this “creativity” gets too awkward and so far beyond limits that it turns the entire promo thing into something with a whole opposite effect.
And yet there is a solution in this case - ask your potential influencer send you the prepared promo for approval before it goes public (but this should be explained in advance, before it is too late).
You must have heard already that the number of followers is not the decisive factor, and yet many still buy it, so saying it once again would never hurt: once you have the entire list of the influencers you want to try, your next stage is the Engagement Rate (ER). This is to be calculated subject to a simple formula ER= (reactions ÷ followers) × 100%, which is to be applied both to the entire blog or to individual posts.
For accounts with 500 followers, a decent factor would be 15%; for influencers with 5,000 followers — 7–5%; with 10K — 3-4%, while in case of someone with one million followers, the rate will be 2–3%.
A single promo is no longer enough: experts believe that to arrive at a stable outcome, you will need to get in touch with the audience 6–8 times. Long-term cooperation will allow having the audience develop a stable and clear association between the product and the influencer.
Brands want long-term collaboration because they see it as a guarantee for trust to be established with the influencer’s audience. Brands often share their dissatisfaction with the was they had their products advertised: One day he promotes my beauty salon, and then, a week later, you see him singing praises to another one. What would the audience feel then? Probably nothing exciting, right?
Analyze promotion and select the influencers whose promo campaign was a success. Then sign long-term agreements for various types of ads - posts, videos, stories, etc. Never be shy to experiment - try both branded and conventional content (no brand mentioned will only make it appear natural).
Here a few rules can be defined, which may help you lay the basis for long-term cooperation with influencers.
Flexible yet persistent
You may fail to immediately build rapport with an influencer - they may never like your concept of positioning the product, specifically if we are talking about some famous influencer whose name and image do matter. However, if you were professional enough interacting with the influencer and their manager, as well as you stayed loyal and careful, then chances are you will collaborate in the future.
As honest as possible
Brands often believe that micro-influencers are not to be paid and all they need is some barter terms. Never write something like “We would like to offer you a gift and you, in return, offer us a story with a tag” - this is lack respect. Certain brands go even further - they just do not say anything, while sending their product “by way of gift”, and then ask for a post.
You cannot feel insulted in case you get a NO as a response. This may never mean that your product or communication style are not good enough. Influencers do have a right to consider their audiences something that deserves being paid for, their content does have a price. Simply ask them to show the price tag.
Brands also may suggest influencers release a few posts on barter terms, thus trying to see if there is any response from users. This may be good for the influencer, too: first, it offers them a chance to get to know their followers, and, second, if this collaboration turns good, it may become paid.
With major influencers and celebrities it is all much easier - they give you the price immediately. Luxury brands may offer them some of their products in exchange for a promo release, yet nobody accepts these terms. Unfortunately, people still fail to realize that influencers with an audience in the millions are part of a business where nothing is done for free basis.
Send offers that fall within the major topic and the target audience of a particular blog
It would be at least strange to ask a lady promote some product while sitting at the wheel, in case everyone knows she always takes a taxi and does even have have a driver’s license. Follow what is happening in the influencer’s life and stay updated. If you know he or she is planning a trip to the seaside, while you are running a beauty brand, then having this influencer advertising a line of sunscreens you offer would be a great idea.
Provide a clear brief
Agreements are important. The influencer should read your brief first and ask questions. Actually, we are talking about a document, which is the basis for everything to go on further. If you know the influencer send you the papers for approval, then indicate this, along with the deadlines.
Advertising with popular influencers is a perfect tool for promotion. However, the question is How to find the right opinion leader so that your money is not wasted?
Working with influencers is harder than it may seem, so we have collected here 4 tools you can use within your personal influencer outreach guide.
There are 2 options: manual and through a service. Manual means that you will try to find an opinion leader in social media via search, hashtags, keywords, etc. This is a reliable way yet a time-consuming one.
In case you have no time, you can opt for special services, and here is a review of the most popular ones.
trendHERO
Used for finding and checking influencers on Instagram.
Search based on the country, city, or the gender of the audience that likes the influencer. This service will also check how the audience is growing to detect any cheating with followers. It will also check if your audience’s interest match that of the influencer.
You can find an influencer by keywords in the bio, by location, by language, the number of followers, likes and comments. You can also base your search on the time the last post was published thus trying to sort out those who are not active. The service will also let you see who a particular influencer has advertised before and what was the outcome of the campaign.
The base has over 45 mln accounts as well as more than 90 metrics for checking them.
To start working on the platform, you will have to get registered and select a plan:
Blogger, $ 9.99 / mo. Good in case you know who you would like to work with. Allows getting 10 reports per month as well as roll the balance to the next month if you have not used up the entire share of the reports allowed.
Business, $ 29.99 / mo. Offers more than the previous plan: 50 reports / mo and exporting to Excel.
Agency, $ 99.99 / mo. THis plan is the right choice for those looking for influencers on a daily basis. You can upload contacts, have 200 reports / mo and enjoy access to unlimited (and regularly updated) lists of influencers.
At registration, 1 reports can be obtained free, yet there are also demo-reports available.
Youscan
Helps finding and analyzing influencers, their activities, as well as check a certain brand mentions and even the days when the audience was the most engaged into the promo campaign.
Besides, this service will help you track trends and find new platforms to be used for promotion. Once you get an insight into what users like, what platforms they prefer and what influencers they trust, you are ready to launch a promo campaign.
EpicStars
EpicStars is an influencer marketing platform, which can be used to find and involve an influencer into one (or more) of your projects. The platform offers you ways to request promo on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
To start working with influencers, you will have to submit a task by selecting a platform, the type and the format of your preferred ad, as well as the payment method. Once moderation is completed successfully and the task is accepted, you can start searching for an influencer.
Sorting influencers is to be done manually based on the following factors:
social media;
country/place;
sex and age (13 to 65+ y.o.);
category of platform (38 topics);
top or small influencers;
number of followers;
user engagement analysis;
profile rating in user discussions.
However, no top influencers’ accounts are to be found on the platform.
All you can see in case you use free search is the number of followers, the engagement rate, the approval and discussion ratings, the content with the number of likes and comments, and some details concerning advertising, and feedback.
PostMarket
Features a simple algorithm to create a promo campaign; also offers a list of influencers with some analytical data and stats on each of them. Has both manual and “smart” selection of influencers, where the latter of the modes relies on the system. Besides, it has the PRO mode, where the PostMarket will help you create content and a plot for your ads, as well as they will analyze the respective influencer’s audience to see if it does include your target audience.
You can offer a description of what you would like advertised, what you want the influencer to say, and in what fashion the information is to be presented. Another advantage is that you can have a link placed in the influencer’s profile.
As you pass to payment, you will see influencers matching your request and ready to promote your product. In case you do not like a certain influencer for certain reasons, you can delete them and the system will offer you another one.
The service also offers promotion based on CPA- and CPF-models, i.e. you will have to pay for the result only.
If you want to have some guaranteed result, then opt for the CPA-model - you will pay, in this case, not only for the influencer’s coverage yet for a specific action their followers perform, namely, registration purchase, app download, etc.
CPF-model is good for those seeking to promote their page in social media. Should you prefer this model, you will set a payment for each user coming to follow you. Besides, this model excludes and boosting of followers because each of them will checked carefully by a special algorithm.
Now, what are you going to do if you would like to improve the entire process, stay assured your promo will be a success, and get lots of requests?
Use the automated PostMarket service.
Internet users have ads all around, s no wonder they are sick and tired of it all, so try to avoid it at any cost. Business, in turn, needs promotion, and promotion with influencers comes to be the first choice.
If we try to have a concise check-list for your influencer outreach guide, then this is what we would suggest:
Always check thoroughly the influencer’s page prior to starting any collaboration: followers, likes, comments, brands/persons being promoted, the way of delivering promotion, number of promos released per day.
Always discuss all the smallest details and have everything approved before it is released.
Follow the results and keep your own stats after the placement. Analyze it all to see what was goof and what never worked - this will help you improve your planning for further placements.
Be careful when it comes to payment, do not forget that this field is full of those who may disappear as soon as paid.
Working with automated services may help you avoid numerous issues, save your time and nerves, at the same ensuring your result is above average.
Influencers registered in the system are checked thoroughly to exclude cheating or any other questionable promotion methods.
Promotion with influencers will never suffer from banner blindness or ad blockers that have already been installed on 763 mln devices all over the world. An ad integrated properly into an influencer’s content will never be too obtrusive to let the audience realize it was, actually, an ad.
Besides, promotion with opinion leaders will help you gather lots of info about the product coming through feedback offered by the audience in their comments, likes and reposts.
And another - just a bit of statistics:
Businesses get $ 5.2 on each dollar invested;
63% of marketers are going to increase the next year’s budget allocated to running promotion with influencers;
40% of Twitter users claim they did purchase products following an influencer’s recommendation;
91% of millennials trust online-feedback just the way they trust their family members or friends.
Promotion with influencers in social media is an effective tool to propel the business yet it will take checking creators, having a sufficient initial budget and an account or a website that is well prepared for promotion. To avoid wasting your promo budget, trust it to professionals. Visit the PostMarket website and learn more about how to launch a promo campaign.