Influencer marketing on Instagram doubled last year. The number of influencer posts on the platform jumped to more than 1.5 million posts worldwide, according to influencer marketing tool Klear. That increase positioned Instagram as the preferred social media platform for sponsored posts by influencers. Klear defined an influencer post as one with the #ad or #sponsored hashtag recommended by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
FTC guidelines now require that influencers disclose sponsored posts with the hashtag #ad or #sponsored on sponsored posts, but the additional transparency didn’t slow influencer marketing growth. The use of influencer marketing on the platform continued to grow and shows an average growth of 5 percent month-over-month, according to Klear.
While most influencers work across multiple platforms, nearly all (92%) chose Instagram as their favorite platform, according to a survey by Hashoff. That may be because influencers enjoy higher follower growth rate on Instagram, according to research from Quintly. In addition, Instagram also offers a higher interaction rate than other platforms.
Following these steps can produce the most from partnerships on Instagram.
Define your goal. “Sure, they want to promote their business like every other brand. But that’s not enough for launching a marketing campaign,” says digital marketing consultant Shane Barker in Forbes. Goals could be to gain more followers, increase traffic to a website or specific landing page, or increase conversions.
Seek appropriate influencers. Influencers with large followers don’t necessarily mean their followers pay attention to their posts or heed their advice. Many of their followers could be bots. Experts recommend influencers with high engagement rates: a high ratio of likes, shares and comments. Research shows that micro-influencers — those with significant audiences but not the enormous followings of famous celebrities — tend to enjoy higher engagement rates. A social media monitoring service can find influencers with sizeable follower counts and robust engagement. It’s important to vet influencers by examining their audience and content, especially branded posts.
Consider influences outside your niche. Successful brands typically partner with influencers in their niche, but they sometimes work with influencers outside their sector if the influencer’s followers meet desired audience demographics. HP Australia partnered with fashion influencers on Instagram to promote its new HP Spectre laptop. IT wanted to raise awareness about the product among a young and style-conscious audience. “This is relevant because the goal is to raise awareness about the product among a young and style-conscious audience,” Barker points out.
In addition, consider people outside the conventional definition of influencer. They could be journalists or bloggers, but they could also be partners, employees or simply people with a passionate interest in your area.
Consider non-paid strategies. While sponsored posts offer advantages, nonpaid influencer marketing strategies often can be more effective. Audiences view sponsored posts skeptically and influencers worry about being authentic. PR and marketing teams can create content for influencers, share their content, provide influencers products to test and review, and offer sneak previews of new products, special tours of company facilities, or exclusive access to company events.
“The mentality should be going after earned media and getting people to share it,” states Benjamin Trinh, head of influencer and marketing strategy at Postmates, in a Forbes article. “I’m a believer that PR can be so beautifully orchestrated that it should be the number-one priority for a company looking for long-term growth.”
Ensure FCC compliance. Companies can run afoul of FCC guidelines that require sponsored posts to be clearly labeled as ads. Even if the FTC does not level a fine, brands risk reputational damage if they ignore the regulations. Although a surprising number of marketers remain unaware of FTC rules, many consumers are quite well aware – and some are known to report rule-breakers.
Measure results. Social media measurement enables PR and marketers to improve their influencer marketing programs, demonstrate its value to management and obtain increased funding. With integrated measurement, marketers can better track the effect of specific influencers, better analyze the return on the influence marketing investment, and better allocate budgets for future influencer campaigns. To implement an influencer measurement program, create a list of keywords relevant to your brand and product category, as well as reputational issues and thought leadership topics, suggests Joe Fields, digital marketing associate at SaaS. Also, retain the services of an established social media monitoring service. Even lower-priced services such a Glean-info produce the needed data to analyze influencer effectiveness and ROI.
Fields suggests tracking metrics such as:
- activity (volume of outreach to influencers),
- awareness (volume of brand mentions or other relevant topics from your influencer community),
- engagement (two-way interactions from target influencers),
- perception (quality of brand coverage from your influencer community) and
- action (site traffic generated by your influencer community)
Assigning posts UTM tracking codes to influencers’ sponsored posts makes it easier to track call-to-action results and referral traffic with greater accuracy.
Bottom Line: Instagram is the favorite platform for influencers – and influencer marketing. Brands can reach audience, increase awareness of produce, and ultimately boost sales through both paid and nonpaid influencer marketing on the image-centric mobile app.
William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.
