Influencer marketing has become the new big thing in digital marketing. While some marketing tactics are merely fads that fade over time, influencer marketing is clearly here to stay.
Brands in all industries are looking for ways to get the most out of influencers. They need a sound strategy that begins with perfecting their pitch. You need to conduct your due diligence and know as much as possible about the influencers that you want to work with.
It is a good idea to reach out to the biggest influencers in your field. However, the most promising influencers may get dozens of pitches a day. Yours won’t stand out if you don’t plan it out carefully.
Poor quality pitches can derail your influencer campaigns
The statistics on influencer marketing don’t lie. The average ROI of influencers is 1,200% as high as traditional online ads. Companies that perfect their influencer strategies can see even better payoffs.
It is hardly surprising that companies are investing more heavily in influencer marketing. Nearly 80% of all brands plan to allocate part of their marketing budget to influencers this year. Next year, they are expected to spend around $8 billion on influencer campaigns on Instagram alone.
Despite the clear interest and promising opportunities of influencer marketing, many brands struggle to see results. One of the biggest problems is that their influencer outreach strategy is flawed.
You need to know how to engage with influencers to bring them on board. You need to establish the right rapport and build a strong relationship from the first point of communication. Here are some guidelines to help you out.
Emphasize how your content will benefit their followers
When it comes to your brand and trying to connect with the right audiences and demographics, it’s important to understand the exact audience of the influencers you might be working with. It’s not just the number of followers they have, it’s also their engagement, language, location, personal interests and much more.
Too many brands think that offering money is the key to winning the heart of an influencer. That simply is not the case. According to experts from Scalefluence, “Influencers don’t just want a quick payday, they want a partnership that will keep returning ROI for them and their partners month after month. The biggest influencers will also only work with partners that have high quality offers, have a product that they would personally use, and is also relevant to their audience’s interests.“
Through the use of online tracking tools and social media analytics platforms, it’s now easier than ever to look of social profiles and see how many times per week they are posting, what their reach and engagement is, and it’s also possible to see what type of results these postings are getting.
Influencers have worked very hard to build their credibility and social capital with their followers. The smart ones that have earned a name for themselves have done so by playing the long game. They realize that spamming their followers with unrelated messages and offers is only going to destroy everything that they built.
Your pitch should keep this in mind. You don’t want to try selling them by dangling money in front of their face. You need to do your research and have a pitch that emphasizes the connection between their followers and your offer.
Something else to consider before sending out a pitch to as many high-profile accounts and influencers as possible, is to put a little more time and research in the actual numbers behind each account. When viewing different social profiles (especially on Instagram), be sure to run a social profile audit so you can see how many of their followers are unique, active, or seen as fake or bots. The last thing you want to do is build a partnership with a big influencer, only to find out that half of their follower account is fake.
Be clear about what you expect from them
Jay Baer, a social media influencer and author at Convince and Convert has talked about influencer pitches that he has received. Baer said that for too many brands that pitch him make things too open-ended. They give him a lot of discretion on how he wants to be involved.
You might think that you are doing an influencer a favor by giving them the license to decide how they want to help you. However, most of them would prefer that you hash out the details first. Your pitch should have a clear structure and expand on the ways that the influencer can assist you.
Personalize every pitch
You should be careful about using templates for sending influencer pictures, as they often get pitched all the time and know an automated message or bot when they see on. Using manual outreach, writing, and research can save you some time, but you need to avoid using them verbatim.
It’s also important to tweak every pitch to include personal elements. You should start with a salutation that addresses the influence her by name.
Let them know that you are going to provide the resources and support to make things easy for them
Many influencers have another full-time job. Others are working 60 hours a week managing their online presence. They simply don’t have time to come up with tons of material on the spot.
You are going to need to be as flexible with them as possible. You should also offer them as much support as you can. It will be a lot more likely to come on board if they see that they will get the support they need.
Make your influencer pitches count!
At the end of the day, successful influencer campaigns are built on excellent pitches, and showing that you have a real interest in what the influencer has to offer, while also providing value to their user base and following.
Lastly, make sure that you know how to pitch your target influencers carefully and entice them to work with you. It will go a long way towards bringing them on board to promote your brand.
