Influencer marketing has slowly taken over the world in which we live in today. From sponsored posts, account takeovers, to giving away products; it has created an enormous effect on not only growing influencers, but creating engagement between customers and brands, while overall having a large effect on sales of products.
Top 8 Types of Influencer Marketing Campaigns:
- Host giveaways
- Social media takeovers
- Affiliate marketing
- Sponsored social media constant
- Gifts
- Sponsored blog post
- Guest blogging
- Brand ambassador programs
- General Idea
General Idea
There has become a general idea behind influencers, marketing and engaging with influencers through social media to play a large role in exposing brands/products to a large target audience. Influencer marketing campaigns are used to connect with their audience through various methods listed above.
Throughout various marketing strategies, there are also multiple that allow influencers to gain more of a following compared to gaining sales and engagement. Giving away products is a great example of just that. Although people may believe it is a great way to have their products exposed to customers it can cause harm in the long run. It may cause good PR attention at first, however, “It can kill the value of your product”. Killing the value of a product happens when the usage of a product no longer matches the value. This occurs when an overwhelming amount of products are given out, therefore no conversion to sales is happening in return.
It is a very common practice to give away free products. It is a consumer acquisition tactic. You are giving someone a sneak pic of your product, attempting to get them hooked onto paying for it in the future. This method allows for products to be given away for free while having nothing left to offer or upsell after the fact. Therefore, influencers gain a following off of giving away companies products, which they are promoted to do, however, it builds more of a following for the influencer than it does for the company.
Engagement
Engagement created by influencers can overall affect the conversion to sales rate. The number of conversions divided by the total number of visitors affects the overall rates at which customers buy a product.
At the end of the day the final goal is to have an influencer’s video, post, image, or reals from a social media outlet such as: Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, etc. to lead their followers to view a website or store to purchase products.
Marketing Stratagy
Decade-long YouTube creator, Laura Lee and now makeup and clothing entrepreneur, often post multiple PR unboxings throughout the year. Laura Lee is a Mega influencer. Her latest video was directed towards being sent products where she titled it, Let’s open all my PR boxes! (this is wayyy too much). The video is 42 minutes and 24 seconds long. It also states in the description there is a giveaway and there will be 15 winners. This is an example of what influencers do with various PR they were given. In the background of her thumbnail is an enormous stack of PR boxes piled high above her head. This video is an example of not only growing followers but also engagement and conversion to sales.
Throughout the video, she gives thanks to the brands who sent her various products, also expressing which one she loves, hasn’t tried, or is giving away. The community that follows Laura Lee and trusts her as an influencer builds a relationship where her peers can possibly buy what she loves as she talks about it throughout many of her videos. Therefore, also building a relationship between creators and brands. Laura Lee has a tremendous amount of discount codes offered by brands, persuading customers to buy products as they would be saving money.
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Laura Lee’s video description, including discount codes, and her personal disclaimer include the following text:
*** D I S C O U N T – C O D E S ***
* OFRA: use code LAURALEE for 20% off!!
LILLY LASHES: use code: LAURALEE for 10% off
ARTIST COUTURE: use code: LAURALEE for 10% off!
https://www.artistcouture.com/
* JOUER: use code: LAURALEE for 15% off!
https://www.jouercosmetics.com
Disclaimer: All opinions in today’s video are my own! I will always state when a video is sponsored and I’ve partnered with a brand. I do earn a small commission when my code and links are used. Thank you guys for the support!
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Discount codes allow for higher foot traffic, conversions to sales, and benefits the influencer, which is getting a commission.
Another popular form of social media that is used to promote brands is Instagram. Instagram has a new feature that allows influencers to post images tagging where each item is from within their post. This allows the viewer to easily click and press what item they may like from the specific picture, such as a pair of shoes. This is a much simpler and faster way to promote a product. It brings the user straight to the seller’s website where they have the option of buying the product. It creates more visitors and possible sales.
Instagram was full of 2021 updates; another similar one is the new tool customization link sticker for Instagram stories. It allows customized sticker text which usually has strong actions for example “sign up for 15% off” or “shop the sale”. This update no longer allows for just Mega, Macro, Micro, but it now includes Nano.
Influencer Guide
A Guide to Social Media Influencers:
Mega: 1 million + followers
Macro: 100,000 – 1 million followers
Micro: 10,000 – 100,000 followers
Nano: 10,000 followers or less
Mega influencers such as Laura Lee have the most potential to reach the most peers. They also have an abundance of experience working with brands and creating partnerships however they are the most expensive to work with. It can range anywhere from $2000-$50,000.
Macro influencers’ engagement consist of around 800,000 to 900,000. They are also used to working with brands and creating high-quality Conciente such as mega influencers. They are slightly cheaper to work with, but can result in high fees for brand partnerships.
Micro influencers range around 10,000 to 100,000 followers; they do not have as much of a reach due to the smaller audience. However, depending on a specific campaign or company you may want to work with a micro-influencer to get your maximum results. They are lower and cost and Brands have the option of working with several micro-influencers at one time.
Nano influencers often have less than 10,000 followers. However, nano influencers are likely to have the highest engagement out of all of the social media influencers. They are the lowest cost influencer to work with, which is perfect for new start-up businesses with smaller budgets.
Reference Sites
https://www.cloohawk.com/blog/top-8-types-influencer-marketing-campaigns
https://www.optimizely.com/optimization-glossary/conversion-rate/
Teaching Social Media 
I just finished reading “The Age of Influence” by Neal Schaffer for an honors project for one of my marketing classes this past semester, and he mentioned many of the things you cover in your blog post. Influencers are paving the way in marketing, especially digital and social media marketing. Marketers can no longer rely on the old-fashioned billboard or even the bland Facebook post to drive traffic and engagement. Excellent article!
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I loved the article, great information and very intuitive.
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Thank you all so much!
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