Social Media Influenced

Influencer marketing can be beneficial to brands due to the topic-focused audiences influencers have. This has made influencer marketing significant. Brands are able to find creative, innovative and authentic ways to connect with people by using influencers to advocate for their products or services. Influencer marketing is a way to effectively reach a target audience for either awareness, consideration, or conversions. This article will explain what an influencer is, dive into the different types of influencers and briefly explain what influencer marketing is.

What is an influencer?

The term “influencer” refers to someone with a strong social media presence with the ability to ‘influencer’ their followers’ subconscious behaviours. These people have access to a huge audience and can convince others to act based on their recommendations. Brands often use social media influencers to reach targeted audiences. This is possible due to the trust social media users have in the opinions of their peers as compared to brands.

There are five categories of influencers – mega, macro, mid-tier, micro and nano influencers. Understanding what makes them different can mean the difference between a successful collaboration or a heavy marketing bill with the lowest return on investment(ROI).

Mega-influencers

This type of influencer is referred to as the “celebrity of influencers”. Typically, these influencers will have a minimum of 1 million followers and up. Brands usually use these influencers for their large audience amongst a lot of different people. This is usually beneficial for brands that are running brand awareness campaigns. Brand awareness campaigns that are focused on the same conversation topics as your influencer could introduce a new wave of customers to your business. In most cases, these types of influencers have a large following not because of influence but rather because of their popularity. For instance, these could be a musician or an actor.

Macro-influencers

Macro influencers are typically known for the niche they cater to. Usually, this type of influencer will have between 500 000 – 1 million followers. They engage more with their audience than mega influencers. The main difference I would like to highlight is that macro-influencers usually rise to fame through the internet, whereas celebrities are what make up mega influencers. These influencers are made up of vloggers, YouTubers, podcasters, social media stars, and influential bloggers. Brands use this type of influencer because they want exposure on a social media platform. Brands will further use this type of influencer for a fraction of the cost as compared to the mega influencer. Greater visibility for a brand is what a macro influencer provides to a brand. When you want to dive a little deeper into your audience based on a certain topic, but your brand is still in the awareness stage of your campaign this is the influencer you are looking for.

Mid-tier influencers

Mid-tier influencers will typically have between 50 000 – 500 000 followers. They are powerful even though they do not necessarily have the “celebrity status”. This group is powerful because these influencers offer a wide reach and more engagement than the influencers mentioned above. They provide polished content but still have a sense of authenticity. They have credible experience in content creation and connecting with their audience.

Micro-influencers

This group of influencers is effective with regard to trust as well as engagement with followers. This type of influencer will typically have between 10 000 – 50 000 followers. Micro-influencers connect with their followers and are focused on their niche. The following influencers rely on interacting with their audience to build trust and encourage consistent engagements. Their content may not be as polished as the other influencer groups mentioned above but their followers are likely to purchase a product or service they recommend. Brands prefer working with this type of influencer because their audience is dedicated and interested in their content.

Nano-influencers

Authenticity is what makes this type of influencer useful to a brand. This type of influencer will typically have between 1 000 – 10 000 followers. We can refer to these types of influencers as “regular, everyday people”. A nano influencer’s reach is lower compared to the other influencers mentioned above, however, the engagement level with their followers is high. Yes, they do not have a large following but their followers trust them and enjoy hearing from them. You can think of this type of influencer as the popular friend in your area. Influencers with a large following are mostly just about promoting a brand, product or service. Followers are looking for content that is genuine and not promotional. Using this type of influencer is very cost-effective, beneficial to brands with smaller budgets. There are a couple of nano influencers that are focused on partnerships with brands and building their following, they don’t even charge brands at all.

Influencer marketing briefly explained

Influencer marketing is using influencers or content creators to advocate and engage with your brand’s message. As part of this, the influencers present their content to their audience, generating brand awareness for your brand and speeding up the customers through the sales funnels according to your marketing objective. The process that takes place is that brands or marketing agencies connect with influencers, influencers then create interesting content about the brand, the influencer’s audience then discovers the brand or interest about the brand is created and lastly, the influencer’s audience thereafter becomes the brand’s customers.

Final thoughts

In conclusion, different types of influencers have different offerings to brands. Brands have to decide the type of influencer they would like to align their brand with and the outcome they are looking for from influencers. Influencer marketing remains effective for brands because of the accessibility influencers provide to their followers. A lot of people will engage with your brand because of influencer marketing.