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When considering different angles for your digital marketing strategy, you may discover the world of influencer marketing. Since social media is so relevant in the modern world, influencer marketing can be an effective tool for boosting business and raising positive brand awareness.
Looking to micro-influencers for partnerships can be a great starting point—or long-term strategy—for your digital marketing campaigns. While macro-influencers have a larger audience, their fees can be expensive, and they may not have access to the specific audience you want to market to.
This isn’t to say you shouldn’t partner with macro- or mega-influencers; sometimes, they’re exactly what your brand needs. However, micro-influencers can often be more affordable and highly effective in increasing a niche audience’s engagement with your brand.
It is crucial to understand how to find micro-influencers that best represent you and successfully promote your products and services. Here are some of the best ways to find the right micro-influencers for your brand, leading to a successful influencer campaign that will get people buzzing about your business.
Look at Instagram Hashtags
Instagram is one of the best places to find micro-influencers for your brand, as it’s easy to find creators with the help of hashtags, and you can quickly review their previous content. You can find Instagram influencers by searching through hashtags that are relevant to your brand or your geographic location.
As you conduct your hashtag search, try to notice any users with multiple posts in the hashtag. Check the follower count of content creators whose posts seem similar to the message or image you are trying to present. Micro-influencers typically have 1,000 to 100,000 followers, so their engagement should be high enough for you to discover them through hashtags effectively.
Have Goals for Your Influencer Campaign
If you don’t have goals for how you want to promote your products through social media platforms, it will be much harder for you to find micro-influencers on Instagram or other apps that fit the needs of your campaign. So before you start looking for micro-influencers, ask yourself what the goal of your campaign is.
For example, you should know what kind of influencer to look for partially based on whose followers consist of your target audience. Furthermore, you should know exactly what you want from the influencer and how you expect them to contribute to your marketing efforts on a regular basis.
You must define the role that a micro-influencer will play in advertising your brand before you approach them. If you have a solid plan and lay everything out to your potential partners upfront, it will be easier to deduce who will fit well within your micro-influencer strategy.
Have Different Influencers in Mind
When you start your influencer search, you may get attached to a potential micro-influencer right away. Because you see someone who fits your brand, your instinct may be to reach out to them and choose them as the perfect influencer to promote your products.
However, it is wise to compile a list of different influencers who could be a potential fit. This gives you various options, which is vital because not every content creator will accept the offer to collaborate with you. Even if their content is ideal for increasing your brand awareness, they may not have the passion or audience composition you are looking for.
Keep a list of influencers that you notice, making sure that you take note of their email address or Instagram handle. Once you have compiled your list, start reaching out to a few influencers you think would be the best match for your brand or a particular campaign.
Look at Your Followers
Users who follow your account already are a great starting point when looking for micro-influencers. Because these users already follow you, you know they are passionate about your brand and your products or services. For your influencer campaign to be as genuine and powerful as possible, the influencer representing your brand must have a true, genuine passion for what you offer.
While not all of your followers will be on the level of a micro-influencer, it is more than likely that at least some of them are. Right under your nose!
Look at Your Potential Influencer’s Following List
Aside from looking at your brand’s followers as potential influencers, it would help if you looked at the prospective influencer’s following list. When you select an influencer who you think could be a possible fit for your brand, you should see who they are following and who follows them.
By looking at the people your prospective influencer is following, you can get an idea of their position in their particular niche, their connections with other brands and influencers, and more. Analyzing their subscriber list is also essential, as it will give you insight into their audience and, thus, your potential audience.
Have a Schedule to Reach Out
Though you may be tempted to reach out to all your prospective influencers at once, following a schedule is a good idea. Having a schedule of when and who you reach out to keeps you from getting overwhelmed and helps you avoid message limits that you are likely to run into on platforms like Instagram.
Compile all of the emails and social media handles you have, and schedule them by importance, first reaching out to the most promising micro-influencers.
Have a Pitch
It is important to pitch your brand to influencers in a way that will make them want to promote your products. This is particularly true for influencers who are unaware of your brand but who have a similar audience as you. Having a solid pitch prepared ensures that your brand’s message and goal will come across clearly and succinctly.
To create a compelling pitch, prepare the necessary pieces of your message, starting with an introduction to your brand. With this introduction, you should be giving a short overview of your brand and values and asking the influencer if they would be interested in promoting your brand.
If an influencer expresses interest in your brand, you should lay out all of the prepared expectations you would have for them in a professional partnership. Make sure that you include every detail—if you suddenly expect something from them in the future that you did not initially state, you could face conflict down the road.
Final Words
Micro-influencers hold vast amounts of untapped potential for your brand, and using them for digital marketing campaigns could result in a sharp increase in your brand’s popularity.
Markerly can be a great help for those getting started with digital campaigns. Our goal is to ensure your brand is connected with the most fitting influencers in the industry and that your influencer marketing campaigns are a success.
