Influencer marketing is poised to explode in 2017. Businesses are paying more attention to it than ever before, and are reaping the benefits. According to a poll by Tomoson, businesses are making $6.50 for every $1 spent on influencer marketing.
Influencers are also seeing big returns on their efforts to build meticulous followings of loyal fans. Whether they’re using their influence to promote their own products or others’, they’re also seeing financial gain. A study by MediaKix found Instagram influencer marketing is a $1 billion industry, and projects that number to double by 2019.
As a huge advocate of growing businesses by creating high-value content and sharing it for free, helping others, and consulting businesses on how to increase their influence, it’s only natural that I have a vested interest in influencer marketing. I’m also a networker at heart. I love to hear about other people’s experiences with influencer marketing. That’s why I was honored to be part of the recent #Qchat on How to Become an Influencer in Any Industry, co-hosted by Ulyses Osuna, PR expert and founder of Influencer Press.
Below, I’ve compiled some of the most interesting and best answers based on the questions in our engaging chat. I hope you find them helpful as you navigate your own journey toward becoming an influencer in your industry.
Who is your favorite social media influencer?
There were several answers to this question, but online marketer Neil Patel of Crazy Egg and Hello Bar made the list a few times:
@quuu_co Tweeting from lovely Bristol, UK. My fave #socialmedia influencer is the inspirational @neilpatel! #Qchat
— Matt from Quuu ?? (@MatthewSpurr) May 2, 2017
Wine entrepreneur-turned-online marketer and investor Gary Vaynerchuk of Vaynermedia was also named as a favorite. It’s easy to see his influence online. To date, Vaynerchuk has nearly 1.5 million Twitter followers and is also a best-selling author, podcaster and blogger:
From Pittsburgh, and hands down @garyvee! #Qchat @quuu_co
— Tara McQuaide (@tquaide5) May 2, 2017
Vaynerchuk even made an appearance to say hi when he noticed we were tweeting about his influence online:
@audgepauge93 @quuu_co @Ulyses987 @dknowlton1 I like breaking ties … hi ??
— Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee) May 2, 2017
There’s obviously no right or wrong answer to the question of favorite influencers, but here are some stats on some of the most successful in their industries:
- Influencer Jake Paul of TeamDom amassed over 17 million social media followers on Vine, Instagram, YouTube, Musically and other platforms.
- Virginia Salas Kastilio is an influencer who also has her own firm with the top Snapchat influencers from around the world. She founded Snap and Stream to share her ideas on influence and marketing trends.
- Kristina Bazan, the founder of Kayture, is a fashion blogger and influencer who was one of the first bloggers to break into high-end fashion and help brands like Dior, Dolce & Gabbana and others get more exposure.
In 2017, how do we identify an “influencer”?
Hootsuite defines a social media influencer as someone who carries influence over others, and wields that influence via social media. This simple definition of an influencer may ultimately confuse brands, businesses and influencers themselves on what their role is:
@MatthewSpurr @ludop0lis @quuu_co A1: The word Influencer is somewhat becoming over used but in today’s age if someone has a large social following they’re considered one
— Ulyses Osuna (@Ulyses987) May 2, 2017
People had a lot of different ideas about what makes an influencer. A lot of readers might assume that an expert with a large following is an influencer, but it doesn’t appear to be quite as straightforward as that in many people’s minds:
@quuu_co A1: someone who you naturally feel compelled to check in on regularly, wish to replicate, and are inspired by! #Qchat
— Matt from Quuu ?? (@MatthewSpurr) May 2, 2017
Someone with the ability to connect with an audience on a deeper level than traditional marketing #Qchat #Q1 https://t.co/CIAVuD83vC
— Georgia Burgoyne (@propsforgeorgia) May 2, 2017
Calli Welsch offered a great response about how influencers present actionable ideas:
A1 An influencer is someone who is selectively sharing ideas and actionable items their audience will engage with. #Qchat
— Calli Welsch (@CalliWelsch) May 2, 2017
So while there were varied answers on what exactly an influencer does, the concept is still the same. Influencers are there to flex their muscles and give more exposure to their personal brand, a product or an entire industry. Here’s some of the research on how influencers make an impact:
- 62% of 18- to 24-year-olds would buy a product endorsed on YouTube over one endorsed by a celebrity.
- 92% of people trust word-of-mouth and recommendations from family and friends above all other forms of advertising.
- More than 40% of Twitter users say they made a purchase as a direct result of seeing a tweet from an influencer.
How can becoming an influencer in your industry benefit your brand?
Being seen as an influencer in your industry can bring credibility to your brand, generate more traffic for your site, and ultimately pay you to share your opinion or promote a product.
Ulyses Osuna says that being an influencer has given a major boost to his personal brand:
@quuu_co A2: Being an Influencer can skyrocket your personal brand. I remember people weren’t too interested in me until I was being featured on pubs
— Ulyses Osuna (@Ulyses987) May 2, 2017
Other contributors referenced an influencer’s ability to build trust in a product:
@quuu_co A2 Influencers build trust – easy to believe that the energy they put into influencing, they also pour into their product/service. #Qchat
— Jetset Imperatrix (@jetset_) May 2, 2017
However, Amy Murnan shared an interesting idea: an influencer can put a face to your brand’s name and make the connection more personal. This illustrates that the definition of an influencer isn’t as simple as promoting a product to a loyal audience, and has intangible benefits like brand recognition:
A2 – becoming an influencer can give your brand a friendly face, and can help people connect with it in a more human way. #qchat
— Amy Murnan (@amymurnan) May 2, 2017
Melinda Crow brought up another really good observation:
A2 Becoming an influencer opens doors that you didn’t even know were shut. #Qchat
— Melinda Crow (@melindacrow) May 2, 2017
If you want to build your online influence, which channels should you use?
Trying lots of different social media channels as an influencer may be a good strategy to start out with, but it isn’t necessarily scalable. It may take awhile to learn where your audience hangs out, and how they engage with you. Once you see which channels convert best and offer the most engagement, you can weed out the time-wasters where you’re not seeing traction.
However, there was a little debate over whether you should be everywhere, or just on one or two channels:
@quuu_co A3: Is that like a trick question? I think all of them! Nobody said it would be easy lol. But defo @buffer can help with that! #Qchat
— Matt from Quuu ?? (@MatthewSpurr) May 2, 2017
@MatthewSpurr @quuu_co @buffer disagree, your message could get watered down or fall on deaf ears if you’re everywhere ? #qchat
— Ludo De Angelis ? (@ludop0lis) May 2, 2017
Most of the Twitter chat contributors seemed to agree it’s best to focus on select platforms after you figure out where your audience is:
@quuu_co Q3 where are you people / where is your tribe? #qchat #loveyouseth
— Ludo De Angelis ? (@ludop0lis) May 2, 2017
A3: That really depends on the #industry you’re shooting for. I my experience, #influencers can quickly achieve success on @instagram #qchat
— Audrey Willis (@audgepauge93) May 2, 2017
I did notice that while Twitter seemed like a common answer to this question, other platforms were more challenging for aspiring influencers. Specifically, Instagram came up as a channel that’s difficult to break into:
@Ulyses987 @audgepauge93 @quuu_co @instagram A4: Everyone I speak to loves instagram, but cannot genuinely crack it. Want to go deeper on that platform #Qchat
— Matt from Quuu ?? (@MatthewSpurr) May 2, 2017
@MatthewSpurr @Ulyses987 @audgepauge93 @quuu_co @instagram I feel like it’s hard to break into the IG world as a company unless you have a physical product. #QChat
— Eileen Guan (@__GUAN) May 2, 2017
What type of content should you be sharing in order to grow and engage a following?
Flexing influence can come in so many different forms, it’s hard to know what type of content to focus on sharing. It ultimately boils down to your industry, offering and talent. Gary Vaynerchuk grew a large following as a vlogger and on Twitter. Other influencers like Neil Patel thrive on creating in-depth blog posts and then sharing and engaging on multiple platforms.
Most of the contributors agreed that the content you’re sharing should be high-value and actionable. Here are some of their responses:
A4 – usable strategies and techniques that get results. Builds credibility and increases likelihood of new purchase. #qchat
— Matthew Fitzgerald (@M_K_Fitzgerald) May 2, 2017
@quuu_co Q4 high-qual, relevant and value-adding live VIDEO BABY! ?#QChat +gifs
— Ludo De Angelis ? (@ludop0lis) May 2, 2017
Matthew Fitzgerald brings up an excellent point that sharing content as an influencer may involve a variety of mediums. After all, not everyone enjoys videos or likes reading lengthy posts. Or, you may find your industry resonates more with particular types of content:
A4 – I think delivering the content in multiple formats is also a bonus, some people don’t a watch lives or don’t like reading #qchat
— Matthew Fitzgerald (@M_K_Fitzgerald) May 2, 2017
What’s the biggest mistake you can make when trying to become an influencer in your industry?
There’s no one way to become an influencer and achieve success. Some take to Snapchat and quickly build a following and find their voice. Others see success sharing their personal insights and content on Facebook. But while there are different ways to achieve influence, there are still some mistakes to avoid.
#Qchat participants overwhelmingly said faking influence is the biggest mistake you can make:
@quuu_co Ooooooh love this question. The “market” will decide when you are an Influencer. Don’t fake this
— Ulyses Osuna (@Ulyses987) May 2, 2017
Claro Consulting backs up this idea, and warned against buying followers:
@quuu_co @MatthewSpurr Buying followers! You need patience to build a loyal following. #Qchat
— Claro Consulting Ltd (@claroconsultltd) May 2, 2017
As an influencer, you need to be passionate about what you’re promoting. Satya cautions against the idea of spamming people by pushing something you know nothing about:
@quuu_co A5 Promoting something you have no idea about. Spamming,spamming is cancer to the influencing power of an influencer!
— Satya ???♻ (@POETICandFUNNY) May 2, 2017
There’s something that I think is important to bring up here that wasn’t addressed in the Twitter chat, and that is: it’s also a mistake for influencers not to disclose when they are being paid to promote a brand. Heed a warning from the Fyre Festival, where some celebrity influencers didn’t disclose that they were being paid to share sponsored tweets, posts and other social media shares – and now the lawsuits are piling up.
How can you collaborate with other brands or individuals to strengthen your influence?
Collaborating with brands and other influencers can work to strengthen your own influence in your industry. But how do you do that, especially if you’re an emerging influencer?
My advice is always to give incredible value, help others without expecting anything in return, and network, network, network. At the end of the day, there are no shortcuts to building genuine and authentic relationships. But that’s really what it takes to become – and remain – an influencer.
Several contributors, like Matthew Fitzgerald and Ludo De Angelis, agreed:
A6 – find someone your skills COMPLIMENT and ask if you can add value to their audience. Unrelated stuff kills business. #Qchat
— Matthew Fitzgerald (@M_K_Fitzgerald) May 2, 2017
@quuu_co interviews! letsplays! providing value in some way for free! That’s the best part – the meeting people part!! #QChat
— Ludo De Angelis ? (@ludop0lis) May 2, 2017
Other people in the chat said that following up and persistence are key to mastering collaboration:
@Ulyses987 @jetset_ @quuu_co Follow up, follow up, follow up!
— Audrey Willis (@audgepauge93) May 2, 2017
#Qchat participants understand that there’s no secret to collaboration. They recognize that it takes concentrated time to build their influence. Here are some other tips to take with you.
- Look at building influence and networking as lifelong relationship-building tools. I frequently host dinners to build my network, and offer to help others without expecting anything in return. I do the same thing when participating in online communities. That genuine and authentic approach builds relationships quickly, and as a great side effect, also ends up helping my businesses grow.
- Continuously repurpose your content. The more ways you can share and grow your content, the more opportunities you have to get in front of brands and influencers and get them to take notice of what you’re doing.
- Be exhaustively persistent. There are no secret shortcuts to growth. While a viral piece of content or recognition from an influencer can give you a boost, you still have to put in the hard work to get that initial traction.
What’s the best way to get featured in a major publication?
There’s endless advice online about leveraging social media and blogging to gain influence. But getting featured in major publications is also a way to quickly scale influence and get taken seriously in your industry.
Getting featured isn’t necessarily an intuitive process. With social media and blogging, you can self-publish and reach out to brands and influencers to build relationships and get noticed. But editors and publishers hold the key to getting featured in their publications. There seems to be some confusion over how to do this, but contributors came up with some great ideas:
@quuu_co A7: Get in the conversation & let the publication know that you are there. Share their content, add comments, and add value! #Qchat
— Shane Barker (@shane_barker) May 2, 2017
@quuu_co A7. Make it EASY for them to feature you. You have to remember that it’s a lot of work for the writer to write about you.
— Ulyses Osuna (@Ulyses987) May 2, 2017
A7 – find what that publication is missing in terms of content and fill in that gap in a way that the audience enjoys. #Qchat
— Matthew Fitzgerald (@M_K_Fitzgerald) May 2, 2017
Some of the #Qchat participants seemed to struggle in the area of gaining influence by getting featured in publications. If you’re in the same boat, there are a few things you can work on to improve your results:
- Depending on where you live, ask for LinkedIn introductions to editors and publishers and take them out for coffee to talk about the type of content they’re looking for.
- Look for MeetUps in your area hosted by, or heavily attended by, area publications.
- Leverage social media to follow and engage regularly with the dream publications you want to be featured in.
- Sign up for HARO (Help a Reporter Out) to connect with writers and publications looking for experts (like you) to interview for their outlets.
Now it’s your turn. What are your best tips for becoming an influencer in any industry? Even if you missed the #Qchat, I want to hear from you. Leave me a note in the comments below with your own responses to our questions.
Image: Twitter.com/Quuu_co