As a witness to the evolution of marketing from print media to social media, we can without a doubt say that one of the things that never gets old in the world of business is “marketing”. Infact, it is one of the constantly evolving parts of business. Ever since the rise of social media close to score years ago, it has changed the face of marketing as we knew it. Along with its rise, social media paved the way for modern day influencer marketing.

But what is influencer marketing? How important is it in the current digital era? And why should influencer marketing form the major part of your social media marketing campaigns? In this blog, we aim to answer your queries about what is influencer marketing, its importance and also the significance it holds in your marketing campaigns.

What is Influencer Marketing?

In layman's terms, the marketing of a product or service with the help of an influencer is known as influencer marketing. The reason they are called influencers is because they have the ability to affect the purchases of their followers who could be your potential consumers. These influencers have over the years built their personal brand in desired niches and created a fairly loyal follower base. Influencer marketing on social media helps you target and reach a specific gentry of people to promote your brand, increase brand value or spread awareness about your particular product or service. Over the years, influencer marketing - which has become quite the buzzword for modern marketing techniques - has emerged as one of the most important strategies of social media marketing. Although influencer marketing seems to be a relatively new term, the actual case is not so. Influencer marketing has been there since a long time hiding in plain sight. The celebrity brand endorsements that we have been seeing is also a type of influencer marketing.

Social media is currently dominated by seven social media platforms viz. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube and Snapchat. Each platform has played its own role in changing the face of social media marketing as we know it today. Amidst all this evolution of marketing, the one type of marketing that has been there ever since print media and which continues to remain common among all social media platforms is none other than Influencer Marketing. What makes influencer marketing one of the most important social media marketing strategies? Before curiosity kills the cat, let us break it down for you.

Importance of Influencer Marketing:

1. ROI:

Ideally, the desired ROIs exceed the amount invested, display positive trends, show an increased brand awareness, etc. Most brands which resorted to influencer marketing as their major social media marketing strategy have reportedly seen an upward trend in their ROI. ROI or Return on Investment is an indicator of how successful your campaign has been. Based on your goal - be it increased sales, managing reputation, targeting audience - influencer marketing combined with tracking tools helps you measure and achieve your desired ROI, which may not be the case with other social media marketing strategies.

2. Niche Targeting:

Each influencer has their own niche of expertise for instance. Choosing the right influencer for your product or service will help you address the right audience. An important way to enhance your visibility among social media users to reach your desired audience is by influencer marketing. For instance, if you are a fitness apparel brand, the right choice of influencer to build brand awareness would be choosing a mix of both fashion and fitness influencers.

3. Credibility:

A product or a service, when marketed through an influencer is more likely to be consumed as compared to the traditional ways of marketing. The reason being that people follow influencers because they derive inspiration from them and feel a connection with these influencers, which is not the case with the other ways of marketing. Due to this connection, people have agreed to have bought a product solely because an influencer recommended it or advertised about it.Therefore, it helps you build trust and credibility with your customers.

4. Cost Effective:

More often than not, businesses have to burn their pockets to advertise via billboards and television ads. However, working with social media influencers is more cost friendly and also provides a better reach compared to the number of people that would watch your TV or a billboard ad.

5. Lead Generation:

While some brands feel that placing a regular ad across social media platforms would help them generate leads, it frequently so happens that the leads generated turn out to be false. With influencer marketing, you can generate relevant leads. This is possible because influencers, having well defined niches like beauty, fashion, fitness, food, travel, etc. have instilled in the minds of their followers an image of being an expert in their defining niche.

6. Boosts SEO:

To rank ahead of hundreds of thousands of other websites on search engines is something that many brands strive for. An important key to boost search engine optimization is by opting for influencer marketing. Influencers, while marketing your product, can create backlinks to your website, thereby generating more traffic to your website and thus boosting your SEO.

7. Subtlety:

A product or a service, when marketed through an influencer is more likely to be consumed as compared to the traditional ways of marketing. The reason being that people follow influencers because they derive inspiration from them and feel a connection with these influencers, which is not the case with the other ways of marketing. Due to this connection, people have agreed to have bought a product solely because an influencer recommended it or advertised about it.Therefore, it helps you build trust and credibility with your customers.

8. Suitable to All Businesses Irrespective of Size:

Irrespective of whatever the size of the business, influencer marketing seems to work fo all. With benefits like cost effectiveness, less input of time and efforts for creating content around a product, wide reach, etc influencer marketing has proven to be the go-to mantra for an effective social media campaign.

Why Should You Consider Influencer Marketing?

Worldwide, more than 4.5 billion people use the internet. Out of those 4.5 billion people, 3.5 billion users - which forms 45% of the worldwide population - are on social media. India - being second only to China in the total number of internet users - recorded over 450 million active internet users by the end of March 2019. By February 2020, India surpassed over 680 million active internet users, which makes up an approximate of 50% of India’s population. With an ever growing population, comes an ever growing number of internet users. By the end of 2020, the number of social media users in India and worldwide is projected to cross 500 million and 4 billion respectively. This can only mean one thing that the brands need to up their game to stand out and reach a wider audience, and influencer marketing helps you achieve just that and more. Further, given the rise of different social media platforms ever since the ban of TikTok in India, it has become important to make the right amount of investment in influencer marketing on these emerging platforms. Any more or less could only result in a lower than expected return. On the flipside, zero investment on influencer marketing could cost you your potentialcustomers. Social media platforms, whether old or new, are all contained with a vast number of influencers. To let your brand get the best of influencer marketing, it is important for you to consider and implement influencer marketing as the major social media marketing strategy. Footprynt’s AI run platform, expertise and influencer reach helps you attain the perfect mix of influencer marketing across social media platforms.