5 Must-Have Elements for Influencer Marketing Sales Success

Influencer marketing has become the “it” strategy for marketers with brands looking for ways to tap into consumer insights and recommendations on social platforms. With the all-important holiday shopping season just around the corner, brands will increasingly seek out ways to include influencers into their integrated marketing mix.

So why has influencer marketing emerged as such a hot topic among brands and retailers? Consumers today have grown weary of brand messages and instead want to hear the authentic insights and firsthand experiences of trusted online influencers when they consider making a purchase.

In fact, the recent Influence Central research study on recommendations and online reviews revealed that 91% of women consumers look beyond in-person family and friends to tap social networks when they need a recommendation, and 88% say they are discerning when it comes to the credibility of online reviewers.

While influencer marketing will become a core component of many marketing strategies during this holiday season and into 2017, much more goes into crafting an effective, results-oriented program than simply incorporating influencers. Here are five must-have elements to include when launching a successful influencer marketing program.

1. Identify KPIs and decide how ROI will be measured
To ensure the success of your influencer efforts, first identify KPIs and ROI so you can make sure the campaign will map to and deliver the desired bottom-line goals, which could include the following:
• Proving increased sales
• Driving sales to particular stores or an online destination
• Acquiring new customers
• Expanding into a new customer segment or demographic
• Retaining existing customers
• Sharing powerful content

In addition, once core business goals have been identified, make sure the strategy and program also closely map to the business outcomes. For example, what platforms or mediums will prove most important to the brand goals at hand? Does your brand need powerful visual influencers to reach audiences via shared photos on sites such as Pinterest, Instagram or Snapchat? Or do you need to find influencers comfortable with video for a Facebook Live activation? Do you need to move a coupon? Do you need to engage in shopper marketing?

2. Find influencers passionate about your brand and who resonate with your customers
You’ll also need to identify which influencers you’ll want to target for your campaign, and you can begin the process by going online to analyze which influencers are familiar with your product or service. Many times influencers write about their favorite brands without being part of a campaign.

Then, identify influencers who reach your core target consumer and whose content resonates with your brand—remembering to focus on key traits specific to your audience and map influencers to these factors. In fact, the recent survey asked women consumers which attributes were most important when it comes to evaluating opinions or recommendations of others before buying or trying. Their Top two responses? “Experience with the products/service/place” and “similarity to me in life-stage and lifestyle.”

Finally, the most crucial step in working with influencers proves to be the vetting stage. To eliminate high-stakes surprises, it’s important to be familiar with your influencers—to know their writing style, as well as their ability to craft personal, authentic posts that move beyond a review and share storytelling with their audiences. In this area, there’s no substitute for real longitudinal experience and hand vetting of each influencer.

3. Analyze the give/get
A key part of any influencer campaign proves to be the “alchemy of the give-get.” This means what the brand and influencer will “give and get” as part of the campaign that works both for that particular brand and for the level of influencers with which they’ll engage.

For the “give”—what do you need to offer influencers to set them in motion? This includes the opportunity to get involved in a campaign and the ability to gain additional exposure to your brand. Influencers also get products to keep and review, as well as other forms of compensation for their time.

On the “get” side—what do you specifically need influencers to do? For best results, your brand team needs to be detailed about what they want from an influencer, including the specific social media platforms on which they want engagement. In addition, brands need to be open about the quality and type of content they want from an influencer, as well as the timing parameters.