Talk Digi To Me 101 Collaborating with Influencers

Let’s talk about collaborating with influencers on social media! In order to grow their online community and awareness, many brands choose to include influencers in their social media strategy. 

Collaborating with influencers is great way to build trust and grow your platform. You also get great content for your own channels. So if you aren’t already including influencer marketing in your social media strategy, let’s get you started.
I’ll be honest – choosing the right influencer can be the hardest part. When you work with influencers you’re developing a partnership with an opinion leader who can represent your brand to their audience time and again. 

Think of it like building a relationship. There are dozens of amazing content creators carving out a space for themselves online. But which ones are right for YOU?
Here’s what you should ask: 

First, are they in the same category as you? Do they post about sports, health and fitness? Parenting? Fashion, or feteing? Would your product fit into their profile grid seamlessly?

Second, does the demographic of their followers match your target audience? Check age, gender and interests.

Third, check their engagement numbers and total number of followers. High engagement rates are a positive sign – it’s more likely that their followers listen to them, trust them and want to interact. Engagement is more important to you than number of followers alone. 

Fourth, assess your risk. Is this content creator’s opinion respected, or do they become controversial or profane? Ensure that their content always lines up with your brand values.
It’s best if you give her the actual product to try out and interact with, but you also need to be clear on how you want your product or brand represented. The best way to collaborate with an influencer is to give them the product and a few points of banter. This would include the product’s important benefits that need to be highlighted, in their own words. 

You’d also want to set a few expectations to maximise your visibility, for example:

Ask the influencer to add you as a collaborator.

Ask the influencer to tag you in the photo or reel.

Ask the influencer to tag you in the caption in the first line, so it appears above the fold.

Ask the influencer to include your hashtags in the post.

Remember, you chose them because they make a great representative of your brand, so it’s best if you allow them their creative freedom, but do ensure you provide adequate details and set your expectations.

Now, to explain how you can track the success of your influencer collaborations, here’s Alec Begg, copywriter and social media manager with Robinson Creative.

 I’m Alec.

If you do decide to use influencers, it’s important to track how many clients they’re generating for your business.

I’d recommend promotion or promo codes. These are unique codes you can give an influencer that they can share with their audience. These codes are typically a small discount, to incentivise prospective clients in using them.

Whenever someone uses this code, you know that this is a new customer coming directly from the influencer.

Not only does this encourage more people to engage with your business (who doesn’t like a good deal?) but it allows you to numerically track how successful your collaboration is and becomes especially useful if you work with multiple influencers as you can give each influencer their own specific code. This lets you see which audience is more receptive to your brand and which influencer is creating more business for you, allowing you to better choose who you collaborate with.
Thanks Alec! So in closing, I want to take this back to what I said at the start. One of the important factors in your social media management is … building your

Transcript

ALL INTROS: 20 seconds

VOX: Entrepreneurs, business owners, marketing gurus! Welcome to "Talk Digi To Me: 101" the series that introduces tools, trends and tactics from the fast paced world of digital marketing. 

Presented by Carlie Robinson from Robinson Creative. 

INFLUENCER MARKETING

I’m Carlie, your host of Talk Digi To Me 101.

Let’s talk about collaborating with influencers on social media! In order to grow their online community and awareness, many brands choose to include influencers in their social media strategy. 

Collaborating with influencers is great way to build trust and grow your platform. You also get great content for your own channels. So if you aren’t already including influencer marketing in your social media strategy, let’s get you started.

VOX: Choosing influencers

VOX: I have never collaborated with an influencer before. I wouldn’t know who is popular, or how to choose.

I’ll be honest – choosing the right influencer can be the hardest part. When you work with influencers you’re developing a partnership with an opinion leader who can represent your brand to their audience time and again. 

Think of it like building a relationship. There are dozens of amazing content creators carving out a space for themselves online. But which ones are right for YOU?

[french romance music like lady and the tramp]

Here’s what you should ask:

First, are they in the same category as you? Do they post about sports, health and fitness? Parenting? Fashion, or feteing? Would your product fit into their profile grid seamlessly?

Second, does the demographic of their followers match your target audience? Check age, gender and interests.

Third, check their engagement numbers and total number of followers. High engagement rates are a positive sign – it’s more likely that their followers listen to them, trust them and want to interact. Engagement is more important to you than number of followers alone. 

Fourth, assess your risk. Is this content creator’s opinion respected, or do they become controversial or profane? Ensure that their content always lines up with your brand values.

VOX: Collaborating with an influencer 

VOX: I followed your 4 steps and found a fitness influencer I’d like to work with. Do I just give her a photo of my product to post?

Not at all. It’s best if you give her the actual product to try out and interact with, but you also need to be clear on how you want your product or brand represented. The best way to collaborate with an influencer is to give them the product and a few points of banter. This would include the product’s important benefits that need to be highlighted, in their own words. 

You’d also want to set a few expectations to maximise your visibility, for example:

Ask the influencer to add you as a collaborator.

Ask the influencer to tag you in the photo or reel.

Ask the influencer to tag you in the caption in the first line, so it appears above the fold.

Ask the influencer to include your hashtags in the post.

Remember, you chose them because they make a great representative of your brand, so it’s best if you allow them their creative freedom, but do ensure you provide adequate details and set your expectations. 

Now, to explain how you can track the success of your influencer collaborations, here’s Alec Begg, copywriter and social media manager with Robinson Creative.

VOX: Promotion codes

I’m Alec.

If you do decide to use influencers, it’s important to track how many clients they’re generating for your business.

I’d recommend promotion or promo codes. These are unique codes you can give an influencer that they can share with their audience. These codes are typically a small discount, to incentivise prospective clients in using them.

Whenever someone uses this code, you know that this is a new customer coming directly from the influencer.

Not only does this encourage more people to engage with your business (who doesn’t like a good deal?) but it allows you to numerically track how successful your collaboration is and becomes especially useful if you work with multiple influencers as you can give each influencer their own specific code. This lets you see which audience is more receptive to your brand and which influencer is creating more business for you, allowing you to better choose who you collaborate with.

[Outro Music Fades In]

Thanks Alec! So in closing, I want to take this back to what I said at the start. One of the important factors in your social media management is … building your online community. This means connecting with your followers, connecting with content creators, collaborating with those influencers who will share your brand with the people who trust them.

At its most basic level, if you’d like to achieve growth on your social media profiles, I’d also like to suggest that you can take the influencer model, and apply that to your strategy for  simple networking. For example, identify who are the thought leaders in your industry, and collaborate with them as your peers. 

I’m your host Carlie Robinson from Robinson Creative, and that’s a wrap on Talk Digi To Me 101: Collaborating with Influencers

ALL OUTROS: 15 seconds

VOX: Do you have questions about your digital marketing toolkit? 

Contact Carlie directly via whatsapp at 266 4847, on instagram at carlietalksdigital or send your email to carlie@myrobinsoncreative.com [spell out carlie]