Content, Audience & Influence: Cornerstones of Influencer Marketing

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Marketers know that content, audience and influence are the cornerstones of influencer marketing, but it’s always shocking just how much content publishing it takes to be an influencer.

We’re knee deep in immersing ourselves and our clients in brand building. Whether they are in lifestyle, publishing, real estate, business or fitness, the goal is to eventually turn these clients into influencers within their respective industries.

An influencer is an individual with a large social reach that has the power to “influence” the decisions their audience makes. Because they’ve built an engaged audience that follows them across top social media channels, influencers can become powerful brand advocates as they promote brands and make a product or service relevant to their audience (source).

We want to develop our clients into influencers so that other businesses and brands pay them as thought-leaders, brand ambassadors and opinion-shapers.

Marketers know that producing quality content, having a large audience and having influence over that audience, are the cornerstones of influencer marketing.

But it’s always shocking to a new client who is looking to develop their brand position and become an influencer, just how much content publishing it takes to become an influencer.

[bctt tweet=”Become an influencer by producing content, growing your audience & developing relationships.” username=”alethea_r”]

It’s also surprising to new clients, just how strategic they have to become with their messaging, captions, visuals, hashtags and overall visual brand.

But if the goal is to build your profile, attract brands and get paid for what you post — then these considerations are exactly what it takes.

As an influencer, a brand is not going to pay you for 1,000 followers. They can get that themselves with you. They might not even pay you for 5K followers who never comment or interact with you. Again — that number might just be a static metric.

The reason brands even bother with influencers is to get what they don’t have and might not otherwise have access to: an influencer’s audience and their influence over them.

Oprah, Beyonce, Sheryl Sandberg, Lena Dunham all have products, services and offerings based on their respective talents. They also have massive followings who are willing to read, travel, eat and buy what these celebrity influencers tell them to.

Indeed, Nielsen tells us that 90% of consumers deeply trust recommendations of their peers, while only 33% trust ads.

If you are interested in developing your personal brand in such a way that you can attract other businesses, brands or enterprise companies to pay you as an influencer — consider the three cornerstones of influencer marketing below:

Produce Quality Content

Influencers consistently produce quality content that resonates with audiences, gets shares across social platforms and prompt conversations.

Content that might include blog posts, videos, newsletters, podcasts, vlogs, tutorials, infographics, e-books and social media posts. The frequency of said content is also high. A business might post two or three blog posts a week, but an influencer might post a new blog post every day in addition to new videos every week.

American fashion and beauty influencer, Mattie James, recommends posting on Instagram 3-4 times per day in order to grow an audience.

Audience Size Does Matter

Influencers make it easier for brands to connect with their target audience. Influencers give brands the ability reach a large following.

By tracking the reach, impressions, click-through rates, engagement and ROI metrics of their influencer marketing campaigns, brands can also use influencer marketing to better understand who their customers’ needs and priorities.

Influence and Authority

Authority is the ability to shape the opinions of others, to affect their decisions, and in the context of brands, to influence purchase intent or even sales (source). Without authority and influence over your audience — and even with a large following — you might not be able to deliver value to a business or brand.

What’s the Bottom Line?

The Google Trends data speaks for itself. Influencer marketing is on a high note. But it’s important to know how to get there in your efforts to break into this marketing niche and become an influencer.

Produce a high volume of quality content, grow your audience and develop relationships with them in order to carve out your influence.