If you’re aiming to scale your brand this year and the coming years, don’t turn a blind eye to influencer marketing. On top of your other digital marketing strategies such as SEO, PPC, email marketing, and more, influencer marketing is a great tandem for any type of online advertising.
According to a BigCommerce survey, 18 percent of marketers are willing to shell out around $100,000 to $500,000 on influencer marketing. In addition to that, 19 percent of marketers also invest around $1,000 to $10,000 per year on influencer marketing. These figures go to show that influencer marketing is for every type of business – big or small.
While other types of digital marketing tactics can work for your brand, influencer marketing can expedite brand awareness and hopefully, increase conversions. And every Digital Marketing Agency can attest to its promising results. If you’re still not sold on influencer marketing, here are ways on how influencer marketing can build your brand.
- Improves credibility
If you’re trying to establish a new brand in your niche, it’s hard to gain your target audience’s affinity. That’s because they haven’t heard of your brand. So why should they buy from you when they can buy from other more prominent and established brands that offer the same products and services?
Without a doubt, credibility is crucial when building your brand. And this element is hard to achieve during the initial stage of your journey. By selecting influencers with a considerable following, you’re putting your brand out there and letting people know that you’re a force to be reckoned with. If you select revered influencers, it’s going to be easy to persuade your audience about how great your brand story is.
- Boosts online presence
Although conventional forms of advertising such as outdoor advertising still work to this day, digital marketing is becoming more popular. Marketers choose online marketing because more than half of the world’s population is online, which means most of your audience is online as well.
Influencer marketing can boost your brand’s online presence, especially when you’re collaborating with your chosen influencers. By creating unique and valuable content, many people will be more interested in your brand. Also, if you’re creating enjoyable content, your content will have the ability to go viral.
- Communicates with your target audience
Marketers can create the most compelling ads to communicate with their target audience. However, influencer marketing can do more personalized communication by posting videos on their social media channels.
Instead of looking at flyers, or banners, influencers can put your products and services in the best light possible through verbal persuasion.
- Increases content ideas
Influencers have tried-and-tested methods to create and publish content that appeal to their followers. And for marketers running out of content ideas, getting the influencers to do the rest can fill the content marketing gap.
Collaborating with influencers means you’re diversifying your content ideas, giving your brand more chances of scaling.
- Builds top-of-mind awareness
The reason why they’re called “influencers” is because they influence through their advocacies, values, and principles. That being said, it’s vital to select influencers that share the same brand values or principles. This will lead to more genuine promotions and projects that impact your audience’s decision making positively.
When you work with influencers, your target audience will likely remember your brand because of the emotional impact the influencers have on them. In turn, this will create top-of-mind awareness that can build your brand.
- Helps with customer loyalty
Ask any marketing professional about how to establish a successful business and, without a doubt, building a network of loyal customers is going to be their top advice. Loyal customers are what sustain a business even through the lean times.
Some companies pay influencers to promote their products. Others offer incentives such as freebies and discounts when they share marketing info on their social media. In some cases, influencers earn commissions for every purchase made through their marketing efforts. Customers who are introduced to the business through influencer marketing think highly of the influencer which then extends to the brand.
- Taps new leads and market
Like it or not, influencers are pro when it comes to establishing networks through shared interests and personal relationships. Fashionistas, for example, have a wide and strong connection with people who are also in the fashion field. They form niche markets as a result.
Tapping just one influencer in the market is enough to open the door for others to know about your business. This will lead to the business reaching more relevant leads and tapping into the untouched markets.
- Improves SEO
SEO is crucial for the success of any business, especially one that operates online. Without it, it would be tough for consumers to find the products and services that they are offering when they search for them online. The core premise of SEO is to get information about the business listed online like name, website, and contact information along with relevant keywords.
Influencer marketing not only spreads information about the brand but because they do it through social media, there is high engagement among their followers. Through their help, the buzz is created about the brand which pulls other people into the conversation as well.
- Better return on investment
Besides promoting brand loyalty, generating new leads, and reaching new markets, influencer marketing also offers a high return on investment. Influencer marketing, being so new, can be financed at low rates through an established digital marketing agency. Furthermore, brands on a tight marketing budget can also seek out potential micro-influencers they can partner with to promote their brand.
Not only that, they can encourage existing customers to share their experience with the brand through reviews or inviting bloggers, or vloggers, to feature their products and services in exchange for a small commission.
Conclusion
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Try to diversify your digital marketing strategies by pairing different online advertising methods. By doing so, this will be more effective to build your brand.
