How To Hire Social Media Influencers

Are you looking to but don’t know where to hire influencers? You have come to the right place. There are hundreds if not thousands of people who call themselves social media influencers, but most do not fit the requirements needed by marketers. Here, we’ll discuss the entire process to hire social media influencers that fit your brand’s persona and get you maximum returns on investment (ROI).

What do you aim to achieve through the influencers?

Are you looking for brand awareness or sales conversions? Whatever be the reason, you can mix and match the types of influencers according to your budget. If you want to spread the word to a large audience and have deep pockets for the same, you could hire a mega influencer with more than 100,000 followers. If you want to keep costs down and target a specific niche, you could hire influencers who regularly post interactive content in that niche. These could be influencers with varying levels of followers, but when combined, could cover your target audience.

Which social media platform are you targeting?

For this, you have to put yourself in your target audience’s shoes. Which social media platform does your target audience generally prefer? What do they generally search for? To answer these, you have to prepare buyer personas that relate to your target audience. Examples of buyer personas include a teenage high schooler who is interested in the latest fashion trends, an engaged young employee who is looking for the right vacation spot for his honeymoon, and a salon owner who is looking for the latest in cosmetics as demanded by her customers. In these examples, generally, the teenage high schooler, the to-be-married employee, or the salon owner would be interested in short reels, how-to videos, and other engaging content that resonates with their needs. 

Based on this, you can start hunting for the relevant social media influencers. They could be found on traditional platforms like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and more recently TikTok.

Make a tentative list of potential influencers

Based on where your target audience hangs out online and what media they prefer, you can research relevant influencers who may fit the bill. Make a tentative list of influencers who answer the following questions-

• Is their niche in line with the brand identity?
• How often do they post, and when they do, how well engaged are the posts?
• How many comments, likes, and shares does each of their posts have on average?
• Does their follower profile match yours?

Choose those influencers that match your goals

You can then vet these influencers to zero down those that match your needs. These influencers should be able to achieve your influencer marketing campaign’s objectives. For example, if you are looking for genuine leads to sell honeymoon vacations, the to-be-married employee that we discussed earlier should be able to relate with the influencer’s post and make an inquiry for the vacation.

Where to find the right influencers?

Though the obvious answer would be the various social media platforms, getting the right influencer is easier said than done. Based on your niche, you can have a select set of influencers, but can you be sure of the actual conversions or sales numbers they can get you?

Here is why many marketers find it difficult to hire social media influencers. Even if you do your research well and hire influencers that you feel match your requirements perfectly, there is no guarantee that they will perform the way you expect them to. In fact, many influencers increase their followers and engagement through dubious means. To protect yourself from such people, an easier way to get hold of the right social media influencers is through an Influencer Marketing Platform like Quikplace which helps you choose a verified influencer and guides you through the process of influencer marketing.

There have been cases of many novice marketers who have been cheated of their money by frauds who claim to be ‘influencers’ by artificially increasing followers and faking post engagements. Do double-check their credentials to ensure complete safety.

How to ensure you aren’t taken for a ride?

Once you have finalized your influencer (or a list of influencers), you then need to draft a mutually acceptable influencer marketing contract where the influencer and the company (marketer) rules are defined. This should be done to ensure complete transparency and also encourage the influencer to boost sales. You can add a variable pay where each product sold via their post can get them a certain percentage of commission.

Based on your requirement, you can hire influencers for short-term or long-term partnerships. If your target is brand awareness, you could get your influencer to post about your product in more than one instance while short-term partnerships would be ideal if you need to boost sales.

Wrapping Up

Social media influence is one of the best ways to boost sales or increase brand awareness. Getting it done right is crucial, any mistake or wrong step can harm the reputation of your company and brand. It would be very difficult to regain that. The whole social media influencer marketing process should be well researched and thought of to ensure the best results.