Social media Influencers: How to choose the right one for your business?

What do you want to achieve on social media?

Before you start whittling down the influencers who you’d like to endorse your brand, you must decide what you want their advocacy to achieve. Do you want to reach more customers, build trust in your brand or sell a specific product? Perhaps you want to grow your local following, promote an event or increase your number of enquiries? To guarantee a return on investment, you should select an influencer who will help you achieve that aim.

 

Will the influencer help you reach your ideal customers?

Who do you want to reach on social media? It’s vital that those who engage with your influencers’ posts are your ideal customers. At the end of the day, you want the people who discover your brand through the influencer to eventually make a purchase. If the influencers’ followers don’t seem the kind to buy from your business, your efforts could be wasted.

 

A great tip for tracking down the influencers that your audience love is to hang out where they hang out. See which topics your current customers share, explore the hashtags they use and click on the profiles they tag into their posts- they may point out the right influencer for you!

 

Go big or go niche?

Before you assume that the more followers, the better, consider your aim. If you’re a highly local, specialist business who knows their individual customers and trades on the basis of personal relationships with them, a mass following on Instagram is not necessarily what you need. You might find more success from selecting a micro-influencer in your community.

 

Micro-influencers have fewer followers, but their audience is extremely engaged, loyal and supportive. If your customers have a special interest such as vegan food in York or upcycled furniture, they’ll be more likely to trust an influencer who shares and understand that interest. The more a micro-influencer’s audience overlaps with your ideal customers, the higher your chance of engagement.

 

On the other hand, you may be setting your sights on national or even international trade. In that case, it may make sense to choose an influencer with a much larger following, such as a celebrity. That way, you’ll be able to reach more people. If your product has a wider appeal, you’ll benefit from putting it on a larger stage. Just be aware that high-profile influencers usually come with a sizeable price-tag.

 

Does the influencer fit your brand?

Even if they draw an audience that matches your customers’ demographics and interests, you can’t assume that they’ll match your brand. Perhaps you need a serious professional to advocate your B2B brand. An influencer who is known for their playful, joking approach is unlikely to be appropriate, no matter how many of your target audience they are in touch with.

 

Ideally, you want to choose an influencer who would fit right into your team. They’ve got similar values, sense of humour and the voice they use on their social media is akin to yours. Make sure that their post for you will match your tone and brand style. Otherwise, you risk an anomalous post that could alienate your loyal followers.

 

Does the influencer have the technical know-how?

Perhaps an influencer has the perfect audience and you can see they fit your brand. But do they know how to use social media in the way you want them too? Chances are, they’ll be adept at posting if they have a large or highly-engaged following. However, if you’re hoping for an influencer to host a live stream on your channel or produce video content featuring your product, you’ll need to be sure they can deliver.

 

Which actions do you want customers to take after seeing the influencer with your brand?

Your ideal customers have liked the post, and they trust your brand after seeing the influencer endorse it. What next? Will they know how to buy your product or where to find more information about your company? Returning to your objective will help you brief the influencer on how to mention your brand. “You can buy this product on Goodramgate” or “Come and join me at this event in York”.

 

To maximise the impact of the influencer, ask them to tag your own social media profile into their post. Just make your contact information, posts and monitoring are up to speed so you make a good impression when customers click through!

 

If you would like to discuss an influencer campaign for your business or discuss the benefits of a campaign please get in touch with our team here.