By Tamar Weinberg - March 18th, 2015
Say goodbye to traditional advertising. Today, brands are getting access to audiences in new and innovative ways. One of the most powerful ways to connect with these audiences is by leveraging influencers in specific niches.
(For more insight promoting your brand among influencers, check out the upcoming Incite Summit: West, May 18th and 19th in downtown San Francisco.)
Word of mouth marketing has become so powerful on social media that now it’s easy for brands both big and small to find well-aligned advocates and influencers that will share their branded content. What’s more, they come with highly engaged and passionate audiences. Here are just a few ways big brands are killing it with influencer marketing.
The Skype Passion Project
1000heads created a unique storytelling format with influencers to showcase how rich Skype’s social interaction really is. While Skype is inherently a social communications tool, interactions are not available to the public. 1000heads created the Skype Passion Project and sought out ten hyper-connected bloggers in different niches to demonstrate how easy Skype is to use on mobile. They wanted to incorporate Skype’s mantra of ‘bringing people together whenever apart’, so they connected two influencers at a time to share their city and their passion—in two different cities around the world. Within one month, more than 140,000 people visited the campaign hub and over 5,000 people shared the campaign. More than 10% of those visitors went on to download and activate Skype on mobile.
Got Chocolate Milk?
Other brands look to influencers to alter perceptions. PR agency Weber Shandwick was tasked with finding influencers to change the perception that chocolate milk is not just a kid’s drink,but also an amazing adult’s performance beverage. They worked through credible influencers such as athletes and fitness bloggers to help reshape perceptions around the beverage. Through influencers and brand advocates they were able to educate people on the science behind chocolate milk. Working with people such as Hines Ward of the Pittsburgh Steelers, they were also able to leverage ‘athlete-to-athlete’ influence.
#CoachFromAbove Campaign
Tapping into influencers pays off for fashion brands, because they understand the impact of visual content—especially on social media platforms. Instagram has become an extremely powerful source for fashion influencers, and is only growing in popularity. Luxury brand, Coach used Instagram to reach millions of users through 17 influencers across 10 countries. They were enlisted to share photos and videos, encouraging their followers to post their own #CoachFromAbove Instagrams for a chance to win $500. This campaign reached millions of Instagram users, generated over 250 user-submitted photos and the 68 sponsored images created by the 17 influencers generated over 220,000 interactions.
The Sophisticated Marketer’s Guide to LinkedIn
Influencer marketing isn’t just reserved for B2C companies. B2B companies are also finding success by co-creating content with industry leaders and subject matter experts. When creating the eBook, The Sophisticated Marketer’s Guide to LinkedIn, LinkedIn identified and engaged with influencers and B2B marketing experts to share their best tips for marketing on LinkedIn. When the eBook was released, those influencers shared the news with their followers. As a result, the eBook was shared thousands of times, generating millions in new business.
In many ways, influencer marketing is no different than any other form of marketing. Campaigns still need to be created, relationships need to be built, and results need to be monitored. But as the digital marketing landscape changes, so do our tactics. There is one fundamental difference that separates an influencer marketing campaign from the rest and it can have exponential results: a highly engaged and passionate audience.
Tamar Weinberg is the VP of Customer Success at influencer marketing platform, The Shelf, which lets you find the most targeted and relevant influencers for any outreach campaigns through its proprietary patent-pending brand and ecommerce indicators.
(For more insight promoting your brand among influencers, check out the upcoming Incite Summit: West, May 18th and 19th in downtown San Francisco.)