Influencer Marketing: Is It Right For Your Brand?
Every brand wants to get the attention of their consumers. But like all things, the attention span of any human is finite. Here’s the reality...
We are bombarded with 4,000-10,000 ads per day. (source)
Search results are crowded with sponsored ads. News articles and recipes online are surrounded by retargeting ads. You can’t watch your favorite team without some brand inserting itself into the space. As a response, consumers have increased “banner blindness”. We’ve learned to ignore content that resembles ads, is close to ads, or appears in locations traditionally dedicated to ads.
If the goal is to gain the attention of consumers, we have to explore other avenues that are less crowded and where consumers are actively giving their attention.
That’s why influencer marketing has become such a popular and effective way for brands to increase their visibility and gain credibility with consumers.
4.76 billion people—nearly 60% of the world’s population—use social media every day for an average of 2 hours and 31 minutes. That is about half of the total time we spend on our phones every day. Not only that, but the average teenager increased their social media usage by 17% between 2021-2022. (source)
In all that time consumers are spending on social media influencers have shown measurable impacts on awareness and sales for brands across a wide range of categories.
As a matter of fact, it’s created such an impact for brands that the influencer marketing industry has grown to a $16.4 billion industry in 2022. That’s because influencers not only have access to consumers, they have their attention and trust.
76% of internet users are likely to trust brand-centric content created by “normal” people instead of the brands themselves. (source)
75% of 18–25-year-olds say social media influencers informed their purchase decision of a product. (source)
So, is influencer marketing right for your brand? Possibly. At the very least, you should explore the opportunity.
In the post below, we’ll share an overview of influencer marketing, how it can be used to create an impact on Amazon, and a handful of tips for success for any brand looking to explore influencer marketing for the first time.
What is Influencer Marketing?
Influencer marketing is a collaboration between a social media influencer that has an engaged following and a brand looking to promote a product or service. Influencers can range from:
Mega-influencers: >1 million followers
Macro-influencers: 40,000-1 million followers
Micro-influencers: 1,000-40,000 followers
Nano-influencers: <1,000 followers
Regardless of the number of followers, any brand looking to partner with an influencer should be more concerned about the level of engagement from their audience.
Brands collaborate with influencers to craft content that is true to the influencer’s personal brand and passions, while aligning on the core values and essential callouts of the promoted brand and its products.
How can Influencer Marketing be impactful on Amazon?
Amazon has its own influencer program, which allows influencers to promote products to their followers through an Amazon storefront. Influencers can build a custom Amazon storefront where they can easily add products from their partnering brands. They can utilize Amazon Live to create content, or create content on other platforms, and promote products from their partnering brands to earn a commission on every product sold through their store.
Amazon’s Influencer program is set up to help simplify the partnership between a brand and an influencer. But even if your sights are set on influencers from other platforms, you can still work with them to drive traffic to your individual brand store or PDPs.
Whichever path you choose, influencer marketing can provide a number of benefits, including:
Increased Visibility
By collaborating with influencers, brands can sidestep the “banner blindness” most consumers have and utilize influencer marketing to increase their visibility online, including on Amazon. Influencers can promote a brand's products to their followers, who may not have been aware of the brand or its products before. This can lead to increased sales and brand recognition while retaining customers in the long term due to the trust they have in the judgment and taste of the influencer.Credibility
If 76% of consumers put more trust in an influencer’s words about a brand than the brand itself, that trust can be translated into credibility for the brands those influencers promote. When an influencer promotes a product on Amazon, their followers are more likely to trust the product and purchase it because of the proven track record the influencer has with past product promotions. This can be especially impactful for new or lesser-known brands that are aiming to establish a well-respected, trusted brand in the public eye.Targeted Advertising
Influencers have a specific audience that follows them on social media, and brands can use this to their advantage. By collaborating with influencers who have a similar audience to their target market, brands can reach their desired demographic more effectively and even dip into overlapping customer bases that they normally would not otherwise reach.
Tips for Success with Influencer Marketing on Amazon
While influencer marketing can be incredibly effective, there are a few things to keep in mind when launching your influencer strategy to optimize the effectiveness of your campaign:
Choose the Right Influencer
The influencer you pick will either make or break your influencer marketing campaign. Brands should look for influencers who align with their values and have a similar audience to their target market. They should also look for influencers who have a high engagement rate, a history of promoting products that resonate with their followers, and a clean track record with their online presence and public relations.Provide Clear Guidelines
When collaborating with influencers, set the right expectations by establishing clear guidelines for the content they create. Brands should outline what they want the influencer to promote and how they want the product to be featured. This can help ensure that the content is on-brand and resonates with the influencer's followers, while still allowing them enough room to be creative and incorporate their personal touch.Pair an Influencer Campaign with Other Ad Products and Tactics for Maximum Impact.
An influencer marketing campaign is a great way to drive traffic and gain visibility for a brand or product. But to help maximize conversion, we recommend partnering the influencer campaign with a search and DSP strategy, and promotion, like a coupon or “Best Deal”. This combination will help ensure you show up when the customer is in-market and drive them to convert.Measure Results
Brands should be tracking metrics such as sales, website traffic, and social media engagement to see how the campaign performs. Amazon makes it a bit easier to track some of the most important metrics through both Amazon’s Attribution Report and Amazon’s Influencer event metrics.
Amazon Attribution Report includes Click-throughs, Detail Page Views, Add to Cart, Total Purchases and Total Product Sales. You’re also able to filter down by exact campaigns (I.e. - if you’re driving from a Facebook Ad, an Influencer tag on an IG Story, etc.)
Amazon Influencer Event Metrics includes a recap of photos from the event, brand callouts by platform (I.e. - IG, TikTok, etc), Posts, Impressions, and Reach.
Metrics like these will provide the necessary insight to adjust a strategy for future campaigns and determine if this influencer is the right fit for more promotions going forward.
Is Influencer Marketing right for your brand?
We all want to gain the attention of our consumers and turn that attention into conversions. With the right strategy, influencer marketing can be a powerful tool for brands looking to increase their visibility, gain more traffic, and ultimately channel that into more product sales.
Amazon’s influencer marketing program is designed to help make it easier for influencers and brands to partner together on promotions. But even with influencers on other platforms off-Amazon, the opportunity is still there. You just might have to do a little more of the structure work to make it happen.
But, with the rate of growth for both the influencer industry and the consumer’s banner blindness, every brand should at least explore the opportunity.
Need help determining if influencer marketing is the right fit for you? Reach out to us through the contact button below.