Film stars, top athletes or music stars, brands have been happy to link their image to celebrities for longer than today. With the advent of the internet, social influence online has accelerated, meaning that not only major celebrities but also other influencers such as vloggers are linked to a brand. But how do you find the influencers within your market? What can an influencer do for your company? And is Influencer Marketing something that fits within your company? In this article we explain in short steps how you can answer these questions.

The target

The first question you should ask yourself critically is why you actually want to know who your influencers are? Is it to build relationships? Want to increase your brand awareness? Want to create more reach? Or perhaps you want more links to your website to increase your performance on Google? After answering this question, you will have to determine which KPIs you can attach to this goal and what your company can offer an influencer. Are there financial resources for Influencer Marketing in your organization? Can we share our network or content? Should there be another contract for this influencer?

Finding influencers

Once you have determined your goal, you can start looking for influencers. A logical first step in this search is to literally search using Google Search. Use relevant keywords from your industry and discover which popular bloggers there are. Then check whether the target group and the tone of voice of these blogs suit your company.

In addition to Google Search, there is the handy search function within Twitter. Follow relevant hashtags and discover what are popular tweets from influential people within your industry. If you are unfortunately still unable to find any influencers after this, take a look at a so-called Social Influence Metric Tool. These kind of tools like BuzzSumo among other things, we search Twitter profiles for relevant keywords to arrive at a list of influencers.

TIP: Have you now compiled a list of influencers? Then follow these people on social media, so that you stay informed of the latest developments within your industry.

Approaching influencers

Once you have found your influencers, it is important to remember that you are entering into a partnership that is mainly built on trust. So don't try to impose yourself or make extra sales, an influencer must suit your company and both parties must be able to strengthen each other. Involving your influencer in your content marketing, for example, can be a great way to bundle and strengthen each other's qualities.

Internal influencers

The majority of your employees will probably be on social media. Why not take advantage of that? Your employees are also ambassadors of your company! After all, starting internally means winning externally. Use specialists to create content, after all, they are the ones with the knowledge! In addition, set up a process for how content from your company can be easily shared to generate as much reach as possible.

Make it measurable!

Measuring the final results of influencer marketing is quite a challenge. The first steps are to determine your KPIs. You can then use (utm) tagging when deploying content, so that you can also measure these KPIs in Google Analytics, for example. Can tagging not be used? Then try to send traffic to a special web page or use a special promotional code.

Influencer marketing campaigns

You have a purpose, you found your influencers, you have your Doel made measurable, the only thing missing is a campaign. Therefore, for inspiration, here are a number of forms of Influencer Marketing that you can use:

Product Placement

A common form of influencer marketing is product placement, where a brand's logo or product and services are included in the influencer's content. Consider a blog post highlighting one of your services or a tweet mentioning your product.

Event marketing

Does your company organize webinars, seminars or other corporate events? Then an influencer can help you reach your target group. This is how you can choose takeoverThe influencer then takes over your social media channels to report and create maximum reach.

Product launch

Is your company's new product or service coming onto the market soon? Then invite your influencer for an exclusive preview and let him or her create content. This way, your product generates maximum awareness and you build trust with your target group.

Have you ever used influencer marketing? And were you positive about the results? Then share your opinion with us! If you need any inspiration for influencer marketing campaigns, this is it blog article from HubSpot is highly recommended.