Throughout your efforts in your career or side gig, you have probably looked into various forms of marketing. One type that has been growing in popularity in recent years is the use of influencer marketing. If you are unfamiliar with influencer marketing, it is “a relationship between a brand and an influencer. The influencer promotes the brand's products or services through various media outlets such as Instagram and YouTube. Not to be confused with celebrity endorsements, influencer marketing does more than just attach a well-known celebrity to a brand. Influencers must be trusted figures within a niche community and retain a loyal following. In addition, they typically possess knowledge or experience about what they are advertising. For example, a popular fitness vlogger on YouTube with extensive knowledge in weight training and proper nutrition may be asked to do advertising for sportswear or a supplement company. On occasion, an influencer may not have experience relevant to the product they are advertising. In this situation, they rely on the trust and loyalty they have built within their community to influence their followers.” When working with influencers as a marketing tool, it is important to build a cooperative relationship between you as a brand and the influencers with whom you want to work. “Influencers operate independently, creating their own content and integrating a company’s advertising specifications into it. The influencer is in control of the brand's message, choosing how they would like to portray it. This promotes authenticity and can help reach a specific target audience.” This is why it is so important to cultivate that dialogue to ensure you and your influencers are on the same page about what those promotions are going to look like—you want to be well represented and so do they.

So how do you go about picking the right influencers for your needs? The first step is to check out the individual influencer to make sure that their image aligns with your values as a brand. “The use of uncanny or offensive content could have negative consequences on the brand's reputation.” This can be particularly important to consider in the event that an influencer lacks the maturity that you want for your professional image. Additionally, it is worth exploring the validity of an influencer’s followers. “An influencer can purchase fake followers, making them appear to have a much larger fan base than they actually do.”[1] There are several tools online you can use to evaluate an account’s followers based on engagement, spam, and overall activity.

Ultimately, it is up to you to decide if influencers are the right path for you and your marketing goals. As with any marketing campaign, there are risks involved, but influencer marketing can allow you to advertise to your target market and could yield a high reward.

[1] Mathew, Joel. “Understanding Influencer Marketing and Why It Is so Effective.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 10 Dec. 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/theyec/2018/07/30/understanding-influencer-marketing-and-why-it-is-so-effective/?sh=7c8208e171a9.