8 Things To Consider When Hiring An Influencer Marketing Agency

Originally published on LinkedIn.com on August 9, 2016 By Jason Barrett

Word of mouth has always been considered to be one of the most effective marketing tools. (1) Many people thought that the digital age will reduce the effects of this tool, but the fact is that word of mouth is stronger than ever, even though it comes in slightly changed forms today. One of these forms that has been around for years and years, but gets a lot of attention in the marketing mix today is influencer marketing.
Just like traditional word of mouth, influencer marketing is actually quite simple, you get the help from an individual or even a group with influence and good reputation and you link their activities to your brand.
So, the basic goal is to “transfer” some of their credibility to your products or services and affect consumer’s behaviors. There is a wide range of benefits of using influencer marketing and some of these benefits and advantages include increasing brand awareness, affordability, scalability, visibility and excellent ROI. It is not surprising why so many small and big businesses are showing interest in this type of marketing.
Influencer marketing can be practiced through many channels, but experts agree that social media are the best place to find and use the help of influencers.
There are literally millions of active users on the top social media platforms which makes them the ideal place for getting new customers. Of course, these individuals or groups of people don’t accept to work for everyone and they want to do this on their own terms.
In other words, using their help is not easy. First, you need to identify them, after that you need to establish contact and finally, make the deal work. In order to save some time and money, it is the best idea to hire a social media influencer marketing agency. Since not all of these agencies are the same, you must take some things into consideration before you select the right social media influencer marketing agency.
1) A Well-Established Relationship With Influencers
If you want to get the most from your marketing campaign, you must choose the right social media influencers. So, before you make a deal with some of the many agencies that work in this field, you should learn more about their current relationships with popular social media influencers. In other words, they must be close to a group of influencers that can reach a significant amount of people.
2) An Agency That Can Offer Services In Your Niche
You can rarely find an influencer that can affect all categories of people. So, in case we are talking about a social media celebrity focused on animals, you can’t expect spectacular results if you use them for the promotion of your beauty products. The best social media influencer marketing agencies have connections with influencers in different niches, so make sure to ask them whether they can help exactly in your niche or not.
Many can state this of course, but the classic question to really get under the skin is to ask about specific campaigns relating to brands they’ve worked with.
3) Experience
The best marketing agencies in this field have the experience, knowledge, and skills to create targeted, creative marketing campaigns that will make sure that your message is shared with a huge number of people. At the same time, they know how to use your company’s logo, name or specific products or services in these messages. If you believe that you have found the right agency, feel free to ask them about their previous work. You’ll need examples from other successful campaigns.
4) Social Media Knowledge
For many people, Facebook and Twitter are the synonyms of social media. But, did you know that Instagram has more than 400 million users active on a daily basis? LinkedIn has a similar number of active users. This means that each of these platforms has its own influencers and if you want to use their help, you’ll need to find a marketing agency that has experience with different social media platforms. Not to mention Tumblr, Snapchat, YouTube, Vine and Pinterest as additional platforms which can perform incredibly well with the right strategy, approach, amplification, ideas and of course social media influencer.
5) Different Types Of Campaign Activations
Let’s be clear, there are a few different types of social media influencer marketing campaigns and a serious marketing agency should know how to start all these campaigns. In many cases, companies need to use different types of campaigns at once as part of their marketing strategy. Of course, if you don’t have much experience with this type of marketing, the agency should provide some suggestions.
6) Biggest Isn’t Always Best
Another thing that you should take into consideration is the size of the agency. Many people make the same mistake and want to work only with the biggest agencies. This is wrong. Even though this might be a sign that you will work with a good agency, the fact is that the biggest brand names in this industry usually have a few outstanding digital marketers that work with a specific category of clients while the other companies are left to junior digital marketers.
7) Lowest Prices Doesn’t Mean “Best Deal”
You know how the old saying goes – you get what you pay for. Well, this saying is especially true when it comes to social media influencer marketing. Of course, this doesn’t that you must opt for the most expensive option. What is important is to understand the return on investment.
8) Focus On The Things They Do – Rather Than The Things They Say
You might be excited when you hear that your business message will be spread by ten influencers, but the truth is that these influencers might be worth less than one top influencer. So, don’t focus on the words that marketers are saying, look what they will actually do for your business. The agency you’ll choose should provide details reports about their work and explain to you what you will get from their marketers.
Hiring a social media influencer marketing company is one of the best things that you can do for your business today. The influence of social media is growing and with the right people you can get incredible exposure for your brand.
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