Brands must re-think their influencer strategy

dubai - Focusing only on goliath followings is a method that seems to reach a dead end

Marketing and public relations in the past was arguably simpler. A creative campaign, supported by proper media placements and perfectly-timed editorial content could do the job. Today, the rise of hundreds of bloggers and influencers has completely changed the way brands are built globally and definitely in the Middle East. It does not matter what brands say about themselves as much as it matters to have the right people talking about them. The personal touch of the influencers' comment, tweet or post is the secret of a brand's popularity and success.

In the Middle East, influencers are hugely responsible for driving awareness, interest and eventually trials for brands through personal usage. Millions of fans emulate them for their choice of cars to fashion, travel to food, and make-up to even baby brands. The range is extremely wide. In view of this, marketers and brands are leaning towards shared media options and collaborating with these influencers.

The question that arises is how someone is defined as "the right person" to talk about a brand and who entitles someone as an influencer. Are the influencers a new target audience or are they the new media entitled for silver-spoon treatment in order to become brand "supporters"?

According to a recent survey of two million social media influencers by influencer marketing platform Markerly, for unpaid posts, Instagram influencers with fewer than 1,000 followers have a "like rate" of about eight per cent, while those with 1,000 to 10,000 followers have a "like rate" of four per cent.

Furthermore, as the follower base continues to increase, the "like rate" keeps decreasing as Instagram influencers with 10,000 to 100,000 followers see a 2.4 per cent "like rate", compared to 1.7 per cent for those with one million to 10 million followers and more.

Big compensation
So, what does this mean for brands? Is the number of followers enough to be the sole criteria of judgment? It is apparent that brands need to become more sophisticated on the way they define and approach a potential influencer. Focusing only on influencers with goliath followings and being challenged by humungous compensation levels is a method that seems to reach a dead end.

This view becomes stronger with the recent USA statistic that influencers are 50 per cent overpriced against the impact they create. It is obvious that the influencer's space is entering an era of correction. The influencer's relevance becomes the core of the discussion and the key component of an influencer's success depends on conversion rates.

But, are brands well prepared to identify the new, ever evolving, influencer's setting? Social listening tools are incapable of providing 100 per cent influencer relevance rating. This is because the dimensions of relevance are no longer measured in number of posts or number of influencers, but in several "intangible" parameters.

Seeing a post is important, but what makes the difference is being willing and actively engaging with the content. On a qualitative level, what matters is the capacity of an influencer to persuade on different topics and align his/her content to the real readers' needs while inspiring them to share the content as well.

Gartner predicts that by 2020, the customer will manage 85 per cent of the relationship with a brand without interacting with a human being. This means that they will spend majority of their time online doing their own research by reading reviews, customer experiences and much more to formulate their own perceptions and determine whether they should engage with the brand or not.

Correct judgment
Furthermore, research compiled by Invesp revealed that it costs five times as much to attract a new customer than keep an existing one and by increasing customer retention rates by five per cent, profit increases by 25 per cent to 95 per cent.

At the end, what matters the most to a marketer is bottom line, proactivity, social listening and correct judgment of influencers based on scientific parameters instead of mere number of followers. These are absolutely crucial in today's age as it has the ability to create digital assets that have the potential to last forever, attract new customers, without incurring high costs, while exponentially increasing profits.

The writer is managing director at Golin Mena. Views expressed are his own and do not reflect the newspaper's policy.