How Influencer Marketing Can Improve Your Online Reputation

Why influencers are a must-have in your digital strategy

Most businesses now know that influencer marketing is one of the best areas to invest for their marketing strategy, and companies from small startups to massive brands are collaborating with influencers for incredible results. From Instagram, Snapchat to YouTube, all sorts of businesses and non-profits are learning about the endless potential of working with influencers in their marketing strategy.

Identifying Influencers for your industry

To find a relevant influencer in your industry, you need to monitor the social conversation of your industry. This will give you a sense of who the important influencers are. These influencers are important people you must connect with. As the term implies, they can have a huge influence on how their followers and fans feel about you—or your competitors.

There are a lot of Influencer marketing platforms in the market today to help identify the right set of Influencers for your brand or organization. You can personalize your approach to each Influencer by finding out what they posted recently and use that to break the ice. A social listening tool is great for this because you can get a full profile of each user, and you may find that they might not be as relevant to your brand as you originally thought. You will also find people who already love your brand and are saying great things about you on social media. These are natural brand advocates. Reach out to them and look for opportunities to collaborate.

The importance of advocacy

It’s said that 18 percent of people trust brand influencers, 92 percent trust brand advocates. And nine out of 10 online consumers say recommendations from friends and family members are their most trusted form of advertising worldwide, while only two out of 10 trust online ads. It’s true that using influencers to market and sell to audiences. But Influencers can be a bigger part of your strategic planning. When implemented correctly, influencers can not only help achieve the outcomes, but they can strategically help improve a company’s online reputation.

The idea behind using influencers is that a brand might know the product or services but an influencer understands their followers. Influencers are smart, they know how to communicate with their followers in a way that produces value and drives the best results. Influencers have a huge fan following because of the content they create and curate. Which is why, getting good reviews and being featured by bloggers and other influencers helps to build trust in your brand. The more times your products or services are mentioned and viewed online, the more recognisable your brand becomes. This builds trust with consumers ‒ people trust the brands which they recognise.

Having a presence on social media is important in today’s world, but influencers who display positive sentiment around your brand can play a big part in increasing your social presence and improving your online reputation. Next time you consider implementing an influencer marketing strategy, look beyond the normal perceived value. Consider how influencer marketing can serve your entire brand by improving your online reputation. Don’t be afraid to make them a bigger part of your marketing strategy.