How to Build an Influencer Marketing Strategy

According to a Q3 2023 Sprout Pulse Survey, more than 80% of marketers agree that influencers are essential to their overall social media strategy. These strong numbers go to show that influencers are a lot more than just a zeitgeist. 

While influencer marketing may seem simple to you, there is a lot that goes into making influencer marketing work for your brand. This guide can help you understand the intricacies of how to make influencer marketing work for your brand.

30- Second Summary

This guide delves deep into the world of influencer marketing strategy for brands and how you can create one to ensure the success of your brand in the competitive digital realm. We start by discussing the types of influencers and then delve deep into how you can create a promising influencer marketing strategy for your brand. 

To bring it all full circle, this guide also informs the readers why they need an influencer marketing strategy and how it can help them unlock the doors to success.

Types of Influencers

As a business seeking increased outreach, you may think that partnering up with an influencer with millions of followers may be the best approach. However, that is not true in every case.

Your influencer marketing strategy deck does not always rely on the number of followers an influencer has. Some influencers have larger audiences across several demographics, while others may have smaller and more engaged communities. 

Each type of influencer has something different to offer. Let’s look deeper at the different types of influencers for influencer marketing strategy templates and make the best choice.  

Mega Influencers

Mega influencers, also known as celebrity influencers, have over 1 million followers. These followers may include other famous individuals such as public influencers, athletes, musicians, and more.

The celebrity status of these influencers makes them ideal for large-scale brand awareness, allowing them to captivate a large and diverse audience. Jay Nagy, Tiffany Butler, and Kylie Jenner can be ideal mega influencer marketing strategy examples.

While every business may want to partner with mega influencers, collaborating with them can be quite expensive. It is also important to remember that their audience is broad and may not always match your expectations of engagement rates.

Macro Influencers

With followers up to 1 million, macro influencers are well-established in their respective niches. These influencers do not have the leverage of being celebrities or public figures. They gain their recognition through consistency and engagement. Over time, they establish themselves as thought leaders in their niche.

As compared to celebrities, macro influencers offer a more targeted approach because their audience shares common interests. While partnering up with macro influencers may not be as expensive as mega influencers, it may still be relatively expensive. 

Influencer marketing strategy examples with macro influencers may include Jennifer Messina, Andrea Alayon, and Lina Noory. They can be a great match for startups seeking rapid exposure, growth, and credibility.

Micro Influencers

These influencers have up to 100,000 followers and are seeking opportunities to grow themselves. Even being beginners on the influencer marketing path, these influencers often have strong presences on different platforms such as Instagram and TikTok.

You may think that businesses strive to partner up with mega or macro influencers the most, but that is not true. In fact, most marketers love to partner up with micro influencers. It is because these influencers have a passionate audience and genuine interactions.

The best part is that these influencers are a lot more affordable than mega and macro influencers and can lead to significant engagement.

Nano-influencers

Lastly, nano influencers have up to 10,000 followers. While you may think that the number of followers is not significant, you cannot consider nano influencers to be an unreliable option. Even with seemingly small numbers, they may have a strong connection with their audience.

Nano influencers have a strong connection with their audience. Their communities are very close-knit, which means that their content is also very personable. Even with a smaller reach, they can be a great option for markets aiming to target a specific audience.

According to the Influencer Marketing Hub, 44% of brands prefer to partner with nano influencers in 2024, compared to 39% in 2023. Some of the best nano influencers in 2024 are James Thomas, Chloe Styler, and Catherine McKnight.

How to Create an Influencer Marketing Strategy 

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Before creating an influencer marketing strategy template, you must develop a strong strategy that helps you optimize your campaign performance for maximum exposure.

Here is a detailed guide to help you achieve your goals with influencer marketing.

Define Your Marketing Goals

Before you start, you must make up your mind regarding what you want to achieve from your influencer marketing efforts. On this step of the journey, you must also determine your annual budget for this endeavor.

Whether you want to grow brand awareness and identity, enhance your marketing funnel, or increase conversions, understanding your goals before starting can help you ensure your strategy remains consistent throughout your campaign.

As far as budgeting is concerned, you must pay influencers a fixed rate based on factors such as engagement rates, follower count, and number of sponsored posts. Finalizing these details beforehand can give you peace of mind before proceeding ahead.

Select a Type of Campaign 

Once you have finalized your budget and are ready to proceed ahead, the next step is to determine the type of campaign you want to run. This step is crucial because the kind of campaign you choose can determine whether the influencers will want to work with you or not.

Before choosing the right influencers for the type of campaign, you must ensure that their posts align with your brand values. 

Before you finalize influencers for your campaign, you must ensure that the chosen influencer posts content relevant to your industry or brand. You must also consider their engagement ratio and reputation before making a final call.

Some popular types include:

Discount Codes

You can give your influencer a unique discount code to share with their followers through their content and drive sales for your brand. For every sale, the influencers can earn a commission, and you can enjoy a return on your investment. 

Contests

If you have been thinking about growing your following, you can partner with influencers for contests or giveaways. These contests and giveaways can boost your brand identity, leading to success in the long run. 

Sponsored Posts

In order to drive the influencer’s audience to your presence, you can ask the influencers to post about your product for a certain fee. This approach can also be great for driving sales and boosting your brand awareness.

Gifting

You can also ask the influencer to post about your product in exchange for a free product. Their review of your product can excite their audience and make them more interested in finding out what you have to offer.

Collaboration

Collaborating with an influencer is also a great way of tapping into their audience. You can create an influencer marketing strategy template through collaboration in order to introduce your target audience to a new product, service, or content. 

Choose Influencers and Outreach

Finding the perfect influential voice is not as challenging as you may think. Regardless of the perceived difficulty, you can always find the right influencers to establish credibility and influence purchasing decisions for your business.

If you are new to the influencer marketing strategy deck, you can also consider hiring an agency to help you get in touch with the right influencers for your campaign. 

After finalizing the influencers for your project, you can contact micro and nano influencers through direct messages. For macro and mega influencers, it is often necessary to reach out through email or their websites.

Manage your Campaigns

Now that you have chosen the influencers you want to work with and have the influencer marketing strategy example, you can let the influencers handle most of the work. However, that does not mean that your work is done. You will still need to manage the campaign details.

You can guide your influencers by yourself or let your marketing team handle the task. This can largely depend on your campaign budget.

Whether you choose to lead and manage your own campaign or hire an agency, a smooth onboarding process must be ensured. Further, you can discuss the process with your influencers to ensure their comfort in partnering up with you.

When it comes to creative control, make sure that your influencers have the most of it so that your content comes across as natural to their followers.

Monitor and Refine Your Strategy 

Once your influencer marketing campaign has started, you must regularly monitor the efforts to evaluate if it is going in the right direction or if any changes are needed. This can be done easily by defining KPIs to help you measure success.

Some common KPIs may include PR mentions, social followers, likes and comments, or overall ROI. Tracking these KPIs can tell you what worked and what did not. With this information, you can optimize your future campaigns.

• Track and Measure

After launching your campaign, track its progress using the KPI that matters the most to your business. Make sure you choose the right metrics and keep track of the important details to optimize your influencer marketing strategy for brands in the future.

• Know What Works Well

Analyzing your campaigns will teach you what works well and what does not. You can keep dedicating your energy and resources to the approaches that work well and eradicate the ones that do more harm than good.

• Test Your Options

You must not hold back from testing, especially if you have just started your influencer marketing efforts. If you have innovative and unique ideas, test them to see whether they work for your unique business needs.

• Think Long-Term

Lastly, you must remember to think long-term with every step you take for influencer marketing to extend the success of your campaigns. When you build lasting relationships, these partnerships will help you propel forward. 

Why You Need an Influencer Marketing Strategy 

Working on an influencer marketing strategy deck can be challenging. At some point, you may wonder whether all of this hard work is really worth it. If your doubts are not cleared, you may not be able to invest your time and energy in your influencer marketing campaign.

If you are not sure whether influencer marketing is right for you, here are some reasons to consider.

Amplify Brand Awareness

Influencers have a massive reach, giving them the power to increase your brand’s exposure significantly. When they endorse a brand or service, their followers take notice. Since their followers are likely to be your target audience, this naturally leads to increased engagement.

Since these recommendations come from the influencers the audience trusts, they will feel more inclined to look into what you have to offer. Hence, you will likely see increased traffic on your website and other platforms.

Target Precisely

Precise targeting can be a long and painstaking process that every marketer dreads at some point. However, being a crucial step, identifying and targeting the right audience is a step that cannot be overlooked.

With influencer marketing, you will not have to worry about dealing with this step. When an influencer is relevant to your niche, they will be able to target your audience precisely. Since the audience already trusts the influencer they follow, they will believe what the influencers have to say.

Enhance Credibility

Businesses all over the world trust influencers because of the trust of their followers. When an influencer shares honest feedback about a product or a service, their audience sees that as a testimony. This means that your product or service will be seen as a credible provider.

That is how influencers can strengthen your brand’s reputation and build credibility. In the long term, influencer marketing will help you gather loyal brand advocates who will increase your brand awareness and, ultimately, its credibility.

Increase Audience Engagement

Businesses often struggle with increasing engagement on their social media channels. You need engagement to make your presence credible and authoritative. Influencers can help you in this endeavor.

You can collaborate with influencers to make your content more attractive to the target audience. Afterward, when they share your content with your audience, their audience will also engage with your content naturally.

Improve Search Engine Rankings

If you are thinking that your influencer marketing does not affect your search engine rankings, think again. In fact, collaborating with influencers can boost another form of digital marketing that you may be using for your business. 

Since influencer marketing increases brand awareness, you will likely see more traffic on your website. In addition, your website will also become likelier to earn high-quality and authentic backlinks, leading to increased search engine rankings.

Increase Conversions

Influencer marketing can also help you if you are struggling with conversions. They can increase your brand awareness and drive more people to trust your products and services. It happens because people trust the influencers they follow.

Well-known and credible influencers can influence a potential customer’s purchasing decision. In fact, many buyers agree that their decisions have been influenced by their favorite influencers, making it another good reason for you to trust influencers. 

FAQs

Here are answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about influencer marketing strategy for brands.

1: What do Social Media Influencers Do?

Social media influencers partner up with brands to promote products or services to their audiences. They can do so through several ways, such as product reviews, sponsored content, collaborations, and more. Their efforts can influence the buyer’s purchasing decision.

2: How Much Does an Influencer Campaign Cost?

The cost of a campaign can vary depending on the type of campaign and the influencers you work with. It is important to factor in the budget when creating your content marketing strategy to avoid issues later on during the campaign.

3: How Do I Reach Out To Influencers For My Campaign? 

You can try reaching out to influencers through direct messages or emails. You can find out who their manager is and discuss the possibility of partnering up with them. Some influencers may also have collaboration forms on their website that you can apply for.

4: Does the Audience Perceive Sponsored Influencer Content Well? 

If your content is of high quality and resonates with the influencer’s audience, it will be well-received. Since many customers rely on reviews, having your products or services endorsed by trusted influencers will positively impact your brand image.

5: How Are The Results Of An Influencer Campaign Measured? 

The success of your influencer marketing campaign depends on the numbers. You can use key performance indicators (KPIs) such as engagements, pieces of content, and total media value to assess which parts of your strategy are working and identify any obstacles to your success.