Until recently, fame was something restricted to a much smaller number of people. Through traditional media, we saw our favorite artists participate in advertisements, recommending brands and products.
With the rise of social networks, smartphones, and people’s increasing access to the internet, the online environment has become an environment where new talents emerge every day: influencers. These people are independent producers of content from the most varied niches, who have naturally managed to gather a group of fans who frequently follow their work on the internet. From then on, mixing the already-known traditional marketing strategies with the possibilities of modernity, Influencer Marketing emerged.
But what exactly is this? How important is Influencer Marketing, and how to create an effective strategy for your business? The time has come to learn more about the subject. Keep reading!
First of all… What are influencers?
Influencers are people who have acquired a certain fame and reputation within a certain niche. From their own content, they began to be considered experts on the subject, attracting followers who approve and trust their opinions.
For example, let’s imagine a hypothetical scenario: Ana is passionate about makeup. Because of this, she decides to study the subject and develop knowledge of products, brands, skin tones, and different makeup styles. Wanting to share this knowledge with other people, Ana starts writing articles on a personal blog. Over time, she started making videos on YouTube and posting photos of her best looks on Instagram.
As the number of people who frequently follow Ana’s work on social media grows, the more power of influence she will acquire over this group of fans who are part of her circle. It is from similar cases that most influencers emerge. In other words, they are ordinary people who use the internet to communicate in a way that attracts others. And most importantly: organically.
With this in mind, brands observed opportunities for partnerships with these influencers, implementing Influencer Marketing strategies in their actions.
What is Influencer Marketing?
Influencer Marketing is a strategy used by brands that wish to take advantage of the popularity and reputation of a certain influencer as a way of promoting a product or service. This is because influencers have a great impact on the customer’s purchasing journey, especially at the moment of decision.
Just like User-Generated Content (UGC), digital influencers share experiences they have had with brands, products, and services with their followers. This type of content conveys greater authenticity and frankness, which ends up influencing people’s purchasing decisions. Unlike UGC content, however, in Influencer Marketing, the brand can define with the influencer which products or services it wants to promote and how this should be done, in addition to other specifications, such as publication days and times, formats of the content, and hashtags to be used.
Despite being a strategy in which it is possible to have more planning and control over how and when the content should happen, the participation of influencers in promoting the brand generates authenticity and gives confidence to potential customers.
After all, what helps to convince more? Seeing a celebrity promote a brand or product that we know they were paid to promote, and that, in many cases, they don’t even use in their daily lives? Or see Ana (from our hypothetical example) recommending a brand while using it in a tutorial video?
Truth be told, with prices increasingly exorbitant, consumers need to be more and more sure of the purchases they are making. And having the opinion and evaluation of other people who use the brand helps them make the decision.
How important is Influencer Marketing?
Considering that social networks are where most digital influencers are found, it is no surprise that Influencer Marketing is a strategy that focuses on these environments. It is no surprise that social commerce, which is a type of e-commerce that occurs within social networks, such as Instagram and Facebook, has been gaining more and more strength, as it is much easier to reach consumers on the platforms where they are present for much of the day. And where there is content and people, there is digital marketing too.
Below are the main reasons why Influencer Marketing is important for company strategies:
Improves content strategies
Although Content Marketing is quite versatile, a large part of its strategies are focused on social networks, as these are environments that favor something that is essential for this type of marketing: creativity. If your brand already invests in Content Marketing for social media, seeking partnerships with influencers is one of the natural steps that will help improve and complement your content creation strategies there.
Increases brand awareness
Investing in Influencer Marketing is also investing in Brand Awareness, as influencers have a large number of followers, and a single publication can impact this group at once. In the same way as Guest Posts, partnering with influencers has the power to impact audiences of both yours and that of the influencer in question. Therefore, this is a strategy that benefits both sides in terms of generating brand awareness among people.
Gives credibility to the brand
As we have already mentioned, consumers tend to believe more in a brand, product, or service when they see that others recommend them, whether through videos, photos, or reviews. In the case of digital influencers, this becomes even more valid if we consider that they have already gained the trust of their audience, who, therefore, respect and value their opinions.
So… are you now interested in this kind of marketing?
