Influencer marketing is immensely popular among brands today and for good reason. Influencers with a good follower base (ideally between 10 - 100k followers) are great assets for increasing brand exposure and awareness.
Out of all tasks in the end-to-end process, influencer identification seems to be the most challenging one for both smaller and larger brands. We hear it in talks with clients and prospects, we see it when looking at the search traffic to our website, blog-posts consumed, etc. Why is that?
Easy in theory.
Finding suitable influencers is easy in theory, but in practice it is a complex and time-consuming task for most people.
In theory, it seems clear that we only want to work with influencers who have reach and authority within a market segment that is relevant to us (e.g. nutrition). In theory, it is a given that we’re looking for influencers creating and posting content that we consider to be both of high quality and engaging. In theory, it only feels natural that our company is looking for influencers that project a set of values and personality that aligns with our company values. Simple enough, right?
Complex in practice.
But how exactly do you get down to it?
One way is to employ one of the many influencer marketing databases out there, set some initial filters, search for some hashtags, look at results, narrow down, reach out to everyone, negotiate some deals.
The problem for most of the smaller businesses here is that those databases typically come with a hefty price tag (lower 4 digits per month) and minimum contract durations of 6 to 12 months.
While that might not be an issue for larger brands, it still requires significant time and effort to condense down to a short list. We’re not saying that’s an issue or that there’s something wrong in the process.
Successful influencer marketing always did and always will require careful selection and vetting.
We’re just pointing out that there’s a lot of work involved and that it’s more complex than you initially expect it to be.
A companion approach to searching and filtering.
While linkr also allows you to set filters and specify search criteria to identify high-quality influencers to work with, we have recently introduced an additional way - companion approach if you will - to find new cooperation partners: your own, on-site, brand ambassador program.
What does that mean and how does it work?
Imagine an influencer finds the way to your website or your online shop, spends time on the site, really likes your brand and offering, probably even buys from you. And then leaves again.
Opportunity for a cooperation or relationship with an influencer that already is fond of your brand missed. A cooperation with an influencer having a following in a category you probably wouldn’t have thought of. With someone you’d consider “out of your league” when it comes to the number of followers the influencer has.
What typically happens - even if the influencer decides to take the initiative and reach out to you to find out more about your company and whether or not you would be interested in a cooperation - is that these emails from influencers end up in inboxes or end up as tickets in customer services queues, essentially never reaching the person or team responsible or qualified to process them.
The linkr ambassador program allows you to set up a personalized login and sign-up pages, giving clients and influencers who have bought your products, used your services or simply like your brand a convenient way to reach out to you and join your company’s ambassador program.
You can spin up these pages in no time and without any technical skills required.
The pages come with your own, personal subdomains (yourbrand.linkr-network.com) and are customizable in their look and feel, allowing you to present your business just the way you want to.
You can easily link to them from your website, your checkout page, a special sub-page of your website, your website’s footer, your email signature,... or from anywhere else you’re getting exposure.
See here how the linkr brand ambassador program looks installed on the website of the lifestyle and fashion brand SORBET ISLAND:
Every signup through your ambassador program receives a free audience check from linkr and is automatically added to a list for you to review and process.
This way, the linkr ambassador program not only is a great way to identify new cooperation opportunities and relationships but also allows you to structure related requests.
Stop wasting potential.
Start your own ambassador program today.
