Successful influencer marketing is all about credibility and trust. So it’s ironic that the category is suffering its own integrity issues.
The promise of influencer marketing—especially in the era of social media—is its ability to scale the kind of authentic influence people experience offline. These are the trusted conversations and recommendations that occur between people. You know, word-of-mouth. That’s why a decade ago, Mark Zuckerberg, describing the potential of Facebook, called a trusted referral “the holy grail of advertising.”
Today, influencer marketing is a paid reach vehicle. It’s seen as a way to get celebrities and other tastemakers to endorse a product on their various social feeds. Done transparently—something that doesn’t always occur—that’s a solid strategy for building awareness. But it misses out on impacting both consideration and intent (the other key parts of the purchase funnel). And it’s not really the way influencer marketing should work.
Everyone knows this, but what many marketers might not know is how this change happened. And that there’s still time to fix it.
The influence conundrum
I had a front-row seat into this new mindset, having worked at Facebook during the Instagram acquisition in 2012 and then later joining Pinterest in 2013. These two channels—along with Snapchat—changed the face of social interactions, bringing visuals front and center. Plus, they all initially eschewed paid advertising in order to preserve the user experience. In other words, they didn’t sell ads.
But that didn’t stop marketers from wanting to reach the truly huge audiences of these three apps. The way to break through on a platform that didn’t offer paid advertising was to focus on identifying people who might be already advocating for a given brand. That turned influence into a paid vehicle. Everyone noticed this, including the FTC, which made the well-publicized declaration that much of influencer marketing is simply paid advertising.
It’s time for the industry to address this and stop pretending that paying someone to hawk products is influencer marketing. It’s time to get back to the harder—but infinitely more rewarding—work of gaining fans through building great products, cultivating genuine relationships and telling authentic, inspiring stories.
Who are your advocates?
Let’s start by identifying our biggest advocates—the people who love our products and the lifestyle they make possible. These are types of influencers I call “experts,” the ones who are super-passionate about a topic. They often have years of experience and a depth of knowledge that make them trusted sources. These are the kinds of people who just ooze excitement when they talk about their passions, and that excitement inspires consumers everywhere.
Then let’s use these trusted influencers to focus on the parts of the purchase funnel that drive sales and build long-term loyalty. Simple endorsements drive awareness. They introduce your brand to new potential consumers and provide an opportunity for consumers to learn more. Trusted advice, on the other hand, drives intent. It puts your products into the right hands: The people who already use and care about them and who will share their experiences with others.
Influence in action
How does that look in the real world? Let’s take a look at an influencer campaign Experticity recently ran for Reebok.
Looking to up its game in the performance running segment, Reebok recently launched its Floatride Run, a lightweight $150 shoe that features an incredible new cushioning platform. It’s been engineered to provide comfort, responsiveness, support and flexibility—the kinds of things serious runners really value.
Rather than focus on splashy ads, Reebok came to Experticity to invest in credibility. The brand wasn’t seen as a leader in performance running, so it couldn’t just say it had done its research and created a great shoe. It needed influencers to try it and spread the word.
So we got the shoe in the hands of over 1,000 running experts on our platform. These people are serious runners. They’re track coaches, marathoners and ultra-marathoners. Their posts and content have credibility in the running community. They have the ability to not only drive awareness of the shoe, but to give others the impetus to try the product and consider a purchase. That’s powerful influence.
For brand marketers, it’s time to go beyond follower counts and look to the people who actually influence others to purchase your products. Experticity partnered with research group Engagement Labs in an attempt to quantify that influence and they discovered that these authentic influencers have 15 times the buying conversations of everyday people. These are the people whose influence comes from their expertise and knowledge, the kinds of things that foster real trust. It’s not always easy to identify these people, but it’s worth the effort. They’re the authentic influencers whose opinions are valued by consumers and brands alike. Let’s give them the status they deserve.
