A Guide To Your First Influencer Marketing Campaign

So, you’ve made the decision to maximise your brand’s marketing potential by utilising influencer marketing, but you don’t know where to start with your first campaign? Well, you’ve come to the right place! 

At Disrupt, we know that influencer marketing is the best way to drive brand awareness, gain authenticity and create some HUGE brand love. However, we understand that it can be a slightly frightening space to get started in. So we decided to put together this step-by-step guide to creating your Influencer marketing strategy and running your first campaign. Let’s get started!

Define your goals

Before you launch any Influencer marketing campaign, you first need to set your goals by deciding what success looks like for your brand. What are you trying to achieve and what are your objectives? Do you want to increase your sales, brand awareness, or both? These are common questions we ask our clients in pitches and kick-off calls to understand exactly what they want to achieve from their campaigns. Defining your goals and metrics will help you accurately measure the success of your campaign. 

Once your goals are set, outlining the ‘key performance indicators’ (KPIs) for your campaign is just as important. Your KPI goals are based on your campaign objectives, for example, if you’re running an influencer marketing campaign to increase your brand awareness, we recommend tracking metrics such as impressions and engagement rate. Alternatively, if the purpose of your campaign is to increase your conversion rate, we recommend focusing on metrics such as open rates, and click-through rates.

Set Your Budget, Pick your platform

Now that your goals and performance metrics are set for your Influencer marketing campaign, it is time to decide on your budget and choose which platforms you want to target. 

How much spend are you willing to put behind your Influencer marketing campaign? Setting an accurate budget determines the size of your influencer, the number of influencers and the deliverables in your strategy. It also determines usage rights – do you want to spend a little more and add paid-spend behind content or are you happy to keep it organic? It’s important to determine what you are hoping to achieve, based on your budget limitations. Find out how Disrupt thinks you can maximise your budget👇

Finding the right platform for your influencer marketing campaign is fundamental to its success. The outcome of your influencer campaigns is hugely dependent on the platform’s demographics. Content needs to be in line with your brand ethos, therefore determining your KPI’s, budget and target audience will help narrow down which platform your brand is aligned with the best in order to maximise results.

If you plan to repurpose your influencer’s content, be sure to discuss this with them ahead of time as usage rights can affect your budget. In influencer marketing, usage rights define who owns the content, where it can be used and how long it can be used for. There are different types of usage rights that can be used, however, at Disrupt, we most commonly see two:

●  Organic social: organic reposting on brands’ social channels

●  Paid social: paid amplification of content across social

If you want additional information on usage rights for your Influencer Marketing campaign, because there are a few other options, check out our video on usage rights👇

Is this a quick fling or something long-term?

When planning your Influencer Marketing campaign, one question that always arises is the length and approach of your campaign. Again, this is dictated by the goals, objectives, and budget you set.

There are two types of campaign strategies, ‘long-term’ and ‘one-off’. Long-term campaigns, also called ‘always-on’, help to build credibility and earn the trust of your brand’s target audience. They are often used when a brand is trying to introduce products or service in new territories, or just simply to stay top of mind over a longer period. Long-term campaigns don’t focus on one specific product launch, but rather on general awareness of a brand. They’re also an effective way to push consumers down the funnel over time.

One-off campaigns also called ‘projects’, are used when brands commit to one campaign spend for a short period of time. These campaigns are often effective for a product launch, promotion or a short sale period such as Black Friday. One-off campaigns are a super successful method for getting eyeballs on your brand, pronto.

Identifying the right influencer

Identifying the right influencers for your campaign is the most VITAL step in the success of your influencer marketing campaign. Recognising which type of influencer really speaks to your target audience’s values is necessary to ensure your campaigns are authentic and to help hit your goals. Here at Disrupt, we pride ourselves on the outstanding influencer choices we deliver to our clients. Finding influencers that are relevant to your brand’s aesthetic will help you get the most out of your campaign.

Here are a few points we keep in mind whilst sourcing influencers:

Size

Influencer size depends on the goals you are trying to achieve with your campaign. Disrupt usually suggests a mix of micro and macro influencers for each influencer campaign to maximise your budget. Micro-influencers have more targeted audiences, demonstrating more credibility and authenticity. They also deliver higher engagement and promote conversation due to their relevance and dependability, and are fantastic at getting their audience to take action. 

Mega or Macro influencers help reach a wider audience, being able to create a huge buzz and an increase in brand awareness as well as increased traffic to your brand’s website. As a result, Disrupt recommends a combination of these two tiers, the best of both worlds! 

Data

Influencer’s authenticity is fundamental to your brand during the influencer selection process, it is no good finding influencers you think are great for your brand without knowing how authentic they really are. Therefore, you need to dig deep and ask influencers for their performance metrics (stats), or have access to a platform that delivers this for you.

Disrupt always looks out for a number of data points, such as an influencer’s impression/view rate, engagement rate, and audience demographics. This holistic view is needed to truly understand if the influencer is going to be beneficial to your brand and objectives.

We Can Help!

Setting up your influencer marketing campaign may seem like a daunting task but with the right resources, research, knowledge and step-by-step guides (wink wink), it won’t seem so bad after all! If you nail your budget, goals, and influencer selection before starting your campaign, you will be amazed by the benefits of influencer marketing for your brand, and you’ll never want to go back!

At Disrupt we do all of the above every day, and we like to think we can match brands in any vertical with the perfect influencer for their campaigns. Our team of experts are ready and waiting to help elevate your brand to the next level and deliver you some incredible results, so what are you waiting for? Get Disruptive, let’s do this!