In a previous article, we discussed the benefits of sourcing user generated content (UGC) from influencers. There’s no question that influencer content is useful in producing brand awareness and stimulating engagement. The average person trusts influencers more than his friends when it comes to product recommendations and reviews. But the more important effect of UGC from influencers is it reaches a wider network, making more potential customers know about your product or services.
However, during the course of your partnership with influencers, you may run out of ideas and your cooperations can stall as talks die down. As a result, you may fail to source that much needed influencer content. That’s bad from a marketing perspective, considering that content is at the heart of any marketing strategy. So how can you make sure you’re getting influencer content on a regular basis?
1. Reach out
In most cases, initiating communications is your responsibility. Influencers won’t come knocking on your door to discuss their plans in making your brand fly. That would be nice, but in the real world you will have to reach out to them, even to your existing partners, and let them know about your plans. Then let them be part of the creative process of creating videos, composing photos, or shooting clips for Instagram stories.
The mistake is to let the talks dwindle. Influencers can simply find someone else to collaborate with if you’re too busy doing something else. However, thanks to the power of influencer marketing platforms like linkr in ensuring constant communication with your key partners.
2. Ask and it shall be given
Sometimes, all you have to do is ask. Content influencers don’t know when you need something done. If you want them to feature your brand, just say so. Of course, this is easier said than done. Asking for influencer content isn’t as convenient as simply sending them a message and telling them you need a review for your homemade drain cleaning solution. You need to outline your guidelines and see if they agree with them.
Now, consider what happens if you need user-generated content from multiple influencers. The planning stage can be a nightmare. But that’s why there are influencer marketing tools that make communications with branded content influencers so much easier.
3. Outline your goals
Your goals determine the path of your mission as well as the kind of content your influencers need to deliver. Goal-driven marketing strategies should have well defined metrics to guide your analysis and assessment. Otherwise, you’re working in the dark, not knowing what to measure and what to look for. But more importantly, branded content influencers will work based on the goals of their clients.
However, when you’re working with multiple influencers at once, you have to take into account the differences in their personalities, their way of talking to their audience, their way of delivering content, and the platform they’re on. Your goals should, therefore, be flexible. For instance, you can’t ask a YouTube star to write a blog post about your product. Ask them to do a video review instead.
Communicating your goals clearly ensures you will get the results you need.
4. Let content creators be part of the planning
They are not your employees. They are your partners, and you should treat them as such. That’s why they should be part of outlining your plans and making decisions. We get it. It’s your brand, so maybe you should call the shots. Well, not so fast. Your influencers’ audiences are not your own. In content and influencer marketing, voice and tone matter, and people can quickly figure out if an influencer loses his or her voice when promoting a brand. So let them talk to their audience the way they do.
5. Set reasonable deadlines
We understand that influencers are busy. They have their own lives. They have their own channels and time lines they need to update from time to time. After all, their social media lives don’t revolve around brands, because they’re not advertisers. Nonetheless, that’s no excuse for taking your agreement for granted. Sometimes, you need to remind them if they haven’t uploaded that photo with your latest wristwatch collection. Or better yet, set good deadlines from the get go.
6. Thank them
The worst thing you can do to your social media partners is to ignore them completely after each campaign. That’s a sure way to lose a potentially great relationship and miss a chance to work again with them.
Even though you’re compensating them in some way for their creativity, social etiquette still calls for you to express gratefulness. It won’t hurt to send each of them a message of appreciation for collaborating with you and actually using their time and resources to deliver your campaign. If you can’t thank your content influencers one by one, you can make use of linkr’s centralized communications feature.
7. Use an influencer management tool
Collaborating with one influencer and asking them to generate content for your brand is easy. But hardly any brand works with a single content influencer nowadays. Most brands now are working with small influencers. It’s hard to keep track of collaborations when you’re working with 20 people. Hence, brands have started to utilize automation to hasten the process of setting up campaigns, communicating with multiple content creators, and analyzing results. Technology allows you to source UGC from several influencers at once.
User-generated content is trusted by consumers. Aside from the fact that it’s cost-effective, it can also be repurposed. Moreover, you can brag about the high quality content made by people trusted by consumers.
Are you ready to see the benefits of content generated by influencers? Start sourcing UGC now!
Sign up here for a free subscription, upgrade later.
