Influencers are everywhere these days. In fact, it’s nearly impossible to scroll through your Instagram without coming across a promotional post from one. But nowadays, it’s likely that you won’t just be scrolling past these posts but instead, you may be actively looking for them. In fact, did you know that 81% of people use Instagram to research products and services?
With the amount of time that we spend behind a screen every day, it’s no surprise that we are turning to social media for our shopping habits. Social media platforms like Instagram have grasped this opportunity, providing us with not only an incredible platform for Instagram influencers to work on, but the availability for e-commerce businesses to sell to us directly through the app.
In order to engage social media users on the hunt for a new product or favourite brand, it’s up to the brand to find influencers that can create engaging content for their viewers. So without further ado, let’s take a look at some content ideas for your next influencer campaign.
Why influencer marketing?
When thinking about expanding your marketing strategy with new techniques, influencer marketing should not be overlooked. As one of the fastest-growing techniques due to its low cost, yet highly beneficial qualities, it’s one to get on board with this year.
On top of the year spent at home because of the pandemic, social media usage has been on the rise for years. Influencers have been appearing across all social media platforms and consumers are taking really well to them. In fact, as many as three-quarters of consumers trust product recommendations that they see online, which guide them in making purchasing decisions.
Traditional advertising methods are not exactly being forgotten about, but influencer marketing really is creating bigger opportunities for brands. As mentioned, this is a low-cost strategy. Depending on the type of influencer used, brands can expect to pay small fees, or sometimes collaborate for the product alone. Even with a manager charging higher fees, the costs usually still equate to less than conventional advertising channels.
As well as this, influencers are a great way of reaching not only a much larger audience, but also a more relevant one too. Audiences can be in the millions, with followers across all corners of the globe. However, follower count isn’t necessarily the most important thing in influencer marketing. As influencers tend to be experts in a particular area, they will likely have a specific group of followers with similar interests, allowing you to access a niche community that you can promote to.
Types of content
If you’re new to this and in need of some extra information on the basics of setting up a campaign, then I’d recommend checking out our influencer marketing guide. But for now, let’s take a look at content ideas to consider for different types of campaigns.
Competitions
Competitions are one of the most effective ways to engage consumers with your brand through the help of an influencer. Most commonly, they will promote a giveaway to followers, which will require a few steps to be followed in order to enter. Giveaways are great, as they can be used by any type of business, and will always guarantee excitement to be created about your brand. Who doesn’t love winning free stuff, right?
To enter a giveaway, the typical rules to follow would be to:
- like the post
- follow the brand’s account
- tag a friend in the comments
You will sometimes see “share this post for an extra entry”, too.
Giveaways are usually posted on Instagram in the format of a regular ‘post’. By asking those interested to follow these steps above, it will provide so much for your brand at once. Firstly, people will be talking about you. Think about comments like: “did you see that competition to win a flight to Greece with — airline?”. There’s nothing better than word-of-mouth to get people talking about your brand.
As well as bringing new followers and engagement to the influencer, this type of content will increase both of these for your brand’s own account too. Be careful though, as it’s common to see a decrease in followers after the competition is over.
Tutorials
A popular type of content amongst influencers is tutorials and ‘how-to’ videos in the form of a demonstration. You will typically find these in video format, often on YouTube or on Instagram’s video areas too. As YouTube allows for lengthy videos, this is a great place to start. Although, if you’re familiar with Instagram’s Reels and IGTV, then I’d recommend considering these for tutorials too.
Tutorials are a great way to allow users to see a product in action before making the purchase. Whether your product is complex or not, people always love to see how it works first. Consider working with a few Youtube influencers here, as each can show the product in a different way.
For example, influencers frequently provide video content for make-up tutorials. By working with several influencers, they can each provide a different make-up look or a unique way of using the product that can result in a different final look.
Unboxings
Unboxings have become incredibly popular due to their correlation to the idea of influencer marketing being the most authentic advertising method. Influencers will work with video content here, generally giving their initial reaction and first impressions on the product as they open it.
Consumers understand this to be their genuine reaction, without the product or packaging being changed after it has arrived. They love to see how a product will arrive if they order it, and to get an influencer’s opinion.
Like tutorials, because this content is typically in the form of a video, they can be found on YouTube, or on Instagram’s video areas. However, Instagram Live has recently become very popular within influencer marketing for content like this. As the influencer is engaging with their audience at the moment, their reactions are deemed the most authentic, with no chance of them having re-recorded the video.
Q&As
Speaking of content that is live, Q&A’s are becoming more frequent on channels like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok Live. Although influencers will often pre-record their Q&As, having previously asked their audience to send in questions, they can also now do this in real-time. On Live channels, viewers will type their questions in the comments for the influencer to answer there and then.
Of course, influencers can skip any questions that they don’t want to answer. However, the benefit here is that the answers they do give will be entirely spontaneous and real, unlike on pre-recorded videos where they could have planned their answer in advance.
It’s important to note that with the rise in more spur-of-the-moment content like this, you will need to ensure that the influencers you are working with genuinely love your brand. This way, their live comments will really benefit you and there is little chance of them accidentally deterring viewers from your products.
Conclusion
