The Era of Influencer Marketing - A Detailed Case Study

1. Evolution of Influencer Marketing & Types of Influencers

2. ● Identifying, engaging and supporting people who create high-impact conversations with the audience about certain brand, products or services. ● Marketing products and services to those who have a sway (read influence) over the things other people buy. Typically stems from an individual's popularity or reputation. Influencer Marketing- What Is It? Marketing to an audience of influencers is similar to word of mouth marketing ● Influencers, unlike celebrities, can be anywhere. They can be anyone. ● Bloggers have become important influencers because they are seen as authentic and have loyal followings. Blogger Recommendations seem more trustworthy than traditional advertising

3. Types Of Influencers 1. Celebrity Influencers (hardest to connect with) (highest budget requirement) 2. Industry Experts (journalists, academics, advisers, etc). Respected because of their qualification, experience, and position in society. 3. Authority Influencers- write books, do speaking gigs, write articles, host a podcast, do a video series, or write for prominent publishers. Their goal is to build an audience who will listen to them. Approach them during their fresh style projects- needs more audience that you can help achieve. 4. Bloggers - ● Participate in guest posts, and allow sponsored posts. ● Dictate what’s “cool and trending” on a cultural level yet are more approachable. ● partake in intimate dialogue with their readers. ● Find the ones who are already talking about your brand enthusiastically. ● Highest Influence, hence, ability to connect with audience.

4. ● ● Do not go after a big audience. Their followers are comparatively smaller in number. Aim is to connect with people on a personal level. Targeting a very special niche. Chances of conversion rates appear to be very high. Proves more successful than the rest Micro Influencers ● ● ● ●

6. Before the 20th century Companies bagan recruiting celebrities to promote consumer products like cigarettes and home goods. The queen and the Pope endorsed patented medicines, heightening the appeal and adding an element of “pop culture” to a fairly dull industry. Evolution Of Influencer Marketing

7. 1890- Aunt Jemima Pancake Mix R.T. Davis Milling Co. hired former slave Nancy Green as a spokesperson for the Aunt Jemima pancake mix in 1890 She became the recognised spokesperson for the brand.

8. COCA-COLA (Late 1920s) Coca Cola decided they needed a character that people could relate to, and care about. Santa was born He became a ‘real’ person; a friend that people could look up to. Became associated with Coca- Cola indefinitely. ● ● ● ●

9. 1950s- Marlboro ● ‘Marlboro Man’ started being associated with the brand. The biggest influencer, he endorsed the brand up until 1999 He was played by many actors in an attempt to make smoking look more ‘macho’. ● ●

10. 2010- Social media pushed influencer marketing to unprecedented heights due to the surge of Facebook. Amazon even connected Facebook with their brand so consumers could see what their friends and family members were buying. This drove other brands and platforms to take influencer marketing more seriously. Airbnb leveraged her popularity to showcase their vacation rental properties Mariah shared the details of her stay with her fans on social media.

11. Need For Influencer Marketing ● Word of mouth is more important than ever. ● Customers have been blocking more and more ads lately. ● A significant majority of consumers now use at least one social channel ● Consumers are more likely to follow the opinions and decisions of others on social media. ● Consumers are swayed (consciously or not) by the content they consume on social media. ● Social media is more interactive. ● Audience wants to interact with brands, instead of just being talked to. ● Prefer informed and entertained over traditional forms of advertising. ● Influencers are believed to be unbiased. Hence trusted more. ● Have the power to drive traffic to websites and social media pages, consequently increasing sales.

12. Relevance - How aligned is their blog/content with your ➔ message/brand strategy? Engagement- Do readers respond to, comment, like, and share? ➔ What % end up purchasing? Reach- It is imperative that the followers of your influencer are a ➔ Choosing An Influencer- What To Look For contextual fit. Frequency- How often they post, the traffic and rate of return ➔ visitors. High quality content published on a regular basis is more likely to attract the audience than bloggers who don’t post as frequently. Authenticity- Bloggers having a smaller ratio of sponsored ➔ content tend to come off as more trusted and authentic. Genuine use and mention/recommendation of products will induce more into buying.

13. Brands That Use Influencer Marketing

14. Poker Stars (online Poker) ● Collaborates with influencers on Facebook to create interesting videos. Collaborated with both comedian Kevin Hart and retired athlete Usain Bolt to create a series of short comedy videos called #GAMEON Videos are highly entertaining and relevant. As a result, the videos have been viewed by millions of people. ● Poker Stars ● ●

15. AMAZON Affiliate Program Participants make money by linking to Amazon product pages: Anytime a shopper uses an affiliate link, the affiliate partner gets paid. Influencer Program Amazon helps the participant create a page on Amazon’s site, filled with products the influencer recommends. If someone buys a product from an influencer’s page, the influencer gets paid

16. Amazon’s Influencer & Affiliate Program

18. ● Collaborates with influencers who actually wear and post about their brand in their everyday photos. ● This way, their campaigns appear less of an ad despite Instagram explicitly labeling influencer posts as a “Paid Partnership“.

19. ● Collaborated with Hip Hop star Jay-Z on the launch of his album, 4:44 ● The album was released exclusively to Sprint and Tidal users. ● A Calculated effort to appeal to the younger generation or millennials.

20. Results Of Influencer Marketing

21. Grows faster and fetches better results than organic search

23. Success Stories

24. NIKE To promote the new Air Vapormax series, Nike decided to team up with the popular YouTube channel “What’s Inside?” The channel is run by a father-son duo, and is famous for cutting up everyday objects to showcase what’s inside. The duo has almost 6 million subscriptions. Result- Garnered over 3.6 million views times, and has received 32,000 likes

25. Pottery Barn To promote their new collection of decors, they collaborated with Holly Becker, an influencer who has an eye for interior design, and runs the blog Decor8, for the campaign Through one influencer alone, the campaign generated 500 reader comments, and more than a thousand engagements. The social reach of the campaign was close to 4 million!

26. Maybelline To promote: Falsies Push Up Mascara Worked with beauty influencers to create content rel. to beauty tips. Influencer- Kimberly Pavao Results- 73,700 views and 35.7 million total impressions. There were 10,900 engagements to the influencers’ blog page. And the brand’s total media value increased 1.3 times.

27. Potential Threats 1. Only for the paycheck / No dedication (e.g., Oprah Winfrey) partnered with Microsoft to promote the new Surface tablet, and included a sponsored tweet. However, her followers noted that the tweet was actually made from an iPad.

28. 2. Authenticity Some influencers are so careless they forget to check what they are supposed to post – like Naomi Campbell’s sponsored post (ADIDAS)

29. May not care for/ use it IRL See through the act Yardley Cosmetics’ partnership with Helena Bonham Carter Does Sofia Vergara really use Diet Pepsi as she seems to be in the commercials? Helena spoke in an interview about how she never wore makeup, didn’t understand why people did. Backfired against Yardley. Does Cristiano Ronaldo use a robotic smile-enhancer on the daily? The whole thing seems artificial and inauthentic. Note: These threats are triggered only when influencers are approached without a proper study or background check.

30. Ft. PewDiePie Over 53 million subscribers. Amassed a huge following making videos featuring his own brand of irreverent running commentary while playing video games. One of the world’s most sought-after creators for influencer marketing campaigns. Led to lucrative deals with Disney’s MakerStudios and a coveted spot as a content partner on YouTube Red. ● ● ● ● What went wrong- One of the videos PewDiePie posted included a man dressed as Jesus, saying, “Hitler did absolutely nothing wrong.” Another featured two men holding a sign that said, “Death to all.” both Disney and YouTube Red have announced they’ve cut ties with the YouTube megastar.

32. “PewDiePie was known for his over-the-top humor, and any brand buying ads against an influencer, or working with them on a campaign, takes a risk of putting themselves into an influencer’s hand,” -James Nord, CEO of Fohr Card

33. Spend time vetting influencers before working with them for sponsored content to make sure their values are well aligned. Monitor influencers after a campaign is over to make sure the messaging doesn’t slip. ● How To Avoid A ‘PewDiePie’ Situation ●