If you’re looking for an excellent tried-and-tested marketing technique for your small business, it’s important not to overlook just how helpful influencer marketing can be. Time and time again, businesses have seen great success in using social media influencers to promote and grow their business.
There are many tactics when it comes to influencer marketing that could work well for your small business. Be it working alongside micro-influencers, co-creating content, influencer takeovers, affiliate marketing, or even influencer-hosted events and contests, this article will tell you all you need to know about each of these tactics, so you can utilize them effectively and start seeing your business grow!
1. Micro-Influencers
When it comes to influencers, your mind may quickly default to some of the most famous ones – Kylie Jenner, Jeffree Star, or even Joe Wickes, but you don’t need top celebrities promoting your brand to see great results. That’s where Micro-influencers come in.
Micro-influencers typically have a follower count of anywhere between 10,000 and 100,000 followers. They run the gamut from B2C-niche influencers in spaces like fashion and consumer goods. They also include B2B experts like small business coaches and accountants.
So why should you work with one?
Advantages
There are some great advantages to working with micro-influencers. Due to their smaller follower count than other influencers, they’re typically more likely to respond to follower comments. Since their followers know this, they generally get much higher rates of engagement – including a great click-through rate for your brand!
Another great advantage to partnering with a micro-influencer is the cost. They don’t charge as much as those with hundreds of thousands of followers, making it a cost-effective marketing strategy for those running a small business.
Tips for working with micro-influencers
As with influencers of any size, you’ll want to identify micro-influencers working within the specific niche you’re looking to promote. Obviously, it goes without saying that you don’t want a fitness influencer promoting makeup or fast food. They won’t have the same target audience you’re aiming for, and therefore their followers won’t be interested in your product.
Instead, you’ll want to develop long-term relationships with those with the target audience you intend to market to. Long-term relationships mean they’ll be advertising for you more regularly, demonstrating to their followers that you’re a brand that can be trusted.
2. Co-Creation of Content
Working alongside influencers to create content together is a fantastic way of building a good reputation amongst your target demographic. Let’s take a look at the benefits of co-creating content and some of the ways you can implement it for your business.
Benefits
Creating content together with a third party (in this case, an influencer) enables you to build authenticity and trust with their audience. If their followers trust you, then they’re more likely to buy what you’re selling (literally!)
Producing content together not only capitalizes on the engagement of the influencer but allows you to increase your reach and fosters more engagement with your own content.
Examples
Coming up with ways of co-creating content isn’t too difficult. Perhaps you run a tech podcast, in this case, you could get a popular influencer to appear as a guest for an episode and explain how to unlock your iPhone if you lose access. Working together on youtube video projects, or creating guest blog posts for one another is an excellent way of creating engagement for both the influencer and yourself. Your customers can become theirs, and vice versa!
3. Influencer Takeovers
An influencer takeover is a unique method, one which isn’t hugely popular, but still successful nonetheless. For this one, you’ll want to consider working more closely with larger influencers, with plenty of fans who follow them in all that they do.
Overview
An influencer takeover does exactly what it says on the tin! To put it simply, this is where an influencer manages a brand’s social media account for a temporary period. This allows them to let viewers in on behind-the-scenes content.
Advantages
There are a huge number of advantages to this method, many of which are all too often overlooked. This helps build the brand’s reputation immensely, as they’re shown to be working closely with an influencer whose audience trusts them.
Another advantage of this method is that it increases audience engagement, via influencer followers checking out your social media accounts, and provides a fresh perspective and new insight into a brand that they may otherwise only encounter in passing.
4. Affiliate Marketing and Discount Codes
Affiliate Marketing and discount codes are an excellent way of getting extra engagement, advertising, and even purchases!
How It Works?
Whilst it may sound complicated, affiliate marketing and providing an audience with discount codes is actually a pretty simple marketing tactic that is easy to carry out. It involves influencers promoting products with unique discount codes. Their followers use these discount codes when making a purchase, and then the influencer earns a commission for each sale made.
Benefits
One of the great things about this method is that it utilizes performance-based compensations. It’s one of the most risk-free marketing strategies, as you won’t pay out unless you see results. This results in trackable ROI, so you can better understand and develop your growth strategy, and is a great choice for anyone with a small business who may not want to start making lump-sum payments, only to see results months down the line.
Tips for Success
In order for this strategy to be a successful one you’ll need to pay attention to how you go about it. Be sure to select relevant influencers to advertise your products (as we discussed before, make sure they have the same target audience as you). You’ll also want to make sure that the incentives you offer are attractive – a big enough discount or deal to consumers, and also enough compensation to the influencers doing the advertising for you.
This may result in a smaller profit margin for you but makes for an excellent way of growing your business as a trusted and reliable brand.
5. Influencer-hosted Events and Contests
Influencer-hosted events and contests are always a fun way of driving engagement! You may even have participated in some of these before yourself, perhaps without even realizing it!
Overview
For this method, influencers host virtual or in-person events or contests, in order to encourage user-generated content. This can include giveaways, meet-ups, fan-signing events, and other events which can push engagement for both your brand and the influencer themselves.
Advantages
With these kinds of events and contests, you can gain increased brand exposure and build your reputation as a reliable and trustworthy brand. This method also increases the engagement you’ll have with your target audience and can make them feel a sense of loyalty to your brand – an important thing if you’re looking to attract repeat customers.
Conclusion
So there you have it, some of the best influencer marketing strategies out there for you to use in the year 2023! The best tactic, however, is to use multiple of these at the same time, in order to see excellent growth within your brand.
Combine micro-influencers with the co-creation of content, or influencer-hosted events and contests with affiliate marketing and discount codes, and your brand is almost guaranteed to see its reputation soar! All of these tactics can help emphasize your authenticity and relevance as a brand, and build relationships with both influencers and customers which can last a lifetime!
