When Gigi Hadid launched her own Tommy Hilfiger collection, Caro Daur launched her first MAC-lipstick and Farina Opoku promoted her own NA-KD-Collection all their followers went wild. Partnering with Influencers to launch personalised product lines or collections seems to be the new trend. And it works!
Cooperation’s like these have customers running to stores, product selling out within hours of being put on the shelves and social media exploding with consumers posting their newly acquired items.
Why do these cooperations work so well?
It starts with the very principle influencer marketing is based on. To be called an Influencer means you have an audience which looks up to you, values your opinion and in many cases will take that opinion into account for their own purchases. This comes from the fact that influencers are individuals, meaning they have their own style and way of communicating which makes them very relatable as opposed to the rather un personal “entities” which brands represent.
It is this personal connection that drives the amazing results some brands get by partnering with influencers. All of a sudden the brand is positioned and seen from a completely different perspective, because if the influencer I follow likes it, then it must be something good, right?
One-off cooperations are great but we have realised we can get far more value out of a lont-term cooperation with the Influencer. (DESIDERIUS)
By partnering with the influencer to co-design a product line the brand gets incredibly valuable feedback on what will work for their audience (which is in the end their target customer).
In addition, there is nothing more personal for the influencer than to be able to promote their own products to their audience. By designing their own product or collection the influencer’s style and brand’s target are 100% aligned, meaning the influencer will be able to fully commit to promoting the product over longer periods of time.
Examples
https://www.instagram.com/p/BiC_u1in6Vb/
How to do it?
The first order of business would be to setup a campaign to identify the ideal influencer partner. It is great if you already have the ideal candidate in mind, but if not you can run a campaign on linkr to see who is interested in your brand and gives you the best offer.
Once you have selected 1 (or more) influencers it makes sense to invite them to your office for a meet and greet. During this meet you can discuss the cooperation targets, how the products will be designed and produced and any other details that might be relevant.
The secret to maximising the success of this type of cooperation lies in creating excitement already before the product launches. By allowing the influencer to announce the cooperation, giving “sneak-previews” and asking for feedback from their audience you are sure to have a lot of customers queuing up for the launch of the product.
