Micro-influencers are basically “the next big thing” when it comes to marketing. Since they are more affordable and have the ability to reach a significant audience, they can effectively help in marketing start-ups and small businesses.
You can also add them to your list of strategies for lead generation. But even so, you need to carefully make a selection to ensure that you work with the right micro-influencers.
Before you launch your micro-influencer marketing campaign, make sure you consider the following factors. They will help ensure that you work with the most suitable micro-influencers for your business.
#1: Relevance
The first and most important factor is relevance. Is the micro-influencer influential enough on your target audience? Will they be able to generate the kind of results you desire on the right audience? In other words, is the influencer relevant enough for your brand, business, and/or campaign?
This is crucial because since micro-influencers have a smaller reach than regular influencers, you need to make sure whatever audience they have is significant to you. It won’t be too difficult to find relevant micro-influencers since a lot of them have a specific niche already. And you can just look for micro-influencers in the relevant niche in order to meet this factor.
For example, the following influencer is a beauty influencer and is promoting a code from Dodo Lashes. This is a relevant promotion of a beauty brand through a relevant influencer, who is sure to have an impact on the right audience.
#2: Creativity
And of course there’s the factor of creativity. The micro-influencer you plan to work with should be creative enough to come up with an original piece of content promoting your business. They can help tell your story in a way that resonates with their audience and engages them just like their usual content would.
Take a look at their regular content to see how creative they are. Do they maintain a consistent aesthetic that would appeal to your target audience? Try to find some of the promotional content they have created. How creative were they with the storytelling and how well were they able to promote the product or service without being overly promotional?
Sarah, a healthy foods micro-influencer, for instance helped promote products from Right Foods. But instead of just talking about the products, she’s using them to create original recipes. This is an excellent example of a creative micro-influencer.
#3: Authenticity
In addition to being creative, micro-influencers should also be authentic. They should maintain transparency even when they’ve been paid to promote a product. In addition to raving about the features they like in a product, they shouldn’t hold themselves back from pointing out the negatives.
This is crucial so that their audience continues to trust them. If an audience knows the influencer doesn’t hesitate to point out their dislikes, they’ll have a higher trust in the influencer’s praises for a product or service.
Take a look at the other promotional posts a micro-influencer has done. And see how well they’re able to voice their opinion in a natural and honest manner. See if they sing praises about every single product they promote or whether they’ve pointed out a few negative features while managing to turn it around.
For example, the following influencer gives a short review about some of the products she bought from Dr. Barbara Strum. And while she lists down some of the things she loved about the products, she doesn’t hesitate to mention that one of the products smells weird.
When you work with them, you need to make sure that they can continue maintaining this authenticity. Give them the freedom to create something original without trying to dictate everything they have to say.
#4: Engagement
Another crucial factor to consider is the engagement rate. For influencer marketing to work, the audience needs to be highly engaged so they can take notice of the products the influencer is promoting. And if they’re engaged enough they might even decide to try out the products.
The good news is that micro-influencers tend to have a much higher engagement rate than top influencers even considering the fact that engagement rates are higher on Instagram than on Twitter. On both platforms, users with 1,000 followers or fewer have an engagement rate that’s around five times higher than that of users with 100,000 followers or more.
Image source: Influencer Marketing Hub
At the same time, you should still carefully vet the micro-influencers you plan to work with. Calculate the average engagement rate they’re able to generate in the platform you wish to use. Tools like BuzzSumo can give you crucial influencer stats such as average retweets and average share rate.
But if you have to calculate the engagement rate manually, it’s a bit problematic as there is no single rule to accurately determine an influencer’s engagement rate. At the same time, this handy Instagram Calculator can make your job easier.
You just need to enter some stats such as the number of followers an influencer has and the number of likes and comments on three of their non-promotional posts. The calculator will then give you a clear idea how much engagements the micro-influencer has been able to generate in their usual posts.
#5: Ability to Take Direction
Although we’ve mentioned earlier that it’s important to provide micro-influencers with creative freedom, there still needs to be some structure in your partnership in order for it to work. You might still have some ideas you want the influencers to implement and some expectations you need them to meet.
This means you’ll be providing them with some guidelines and basic structure to follow. A good micro-influencer should be able to use these guidelines and structures while retaining their originality and creativity. They should be able to follow your expectations in terms of due dates and timelines so your campaign doesn’t encounter any setbacks.
Micro-Influencers, Mega Results
These are five crucial factors you need to consider when you work with micro-influencers. The first four factors are easily implemented before your campaign begins. But the fifth factor will need to be implemented after you start working with micro-influencers as a way to weed out the most ineffective and inefficient influencers.
How have you used micro-influencers in your marketing efforts? Tell us in the comments below!
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