Again we’ve grabbed the backstage pass to our Rockstar CMO’s, hang out in the Green Room and pick over the topic of the month. In this issue, we discuss the current state of influencer marketing.
In this issue, with all the hype, fakery and commentary about influencer marketing, we pose the question to our Rockstar CMOs:
What do you think about the current state of influencer marketing?
Christine Bailey
“Riddled with deceit” is how the Wall Street Journal described the influencer economy last week, with social media personalities accused of lying about the number of followers (sometimes buying fake ones by the thousands) and promoting products they don’t use. Not helpful for the B2B sector who are just beginning to experiment with it as a channel for distributing content, given that (according to Nielsen) 92% of people trust recommendations from friends and family over branded content. Unlike B2C, it’s unlikely that lifestyle bloggers on Instagram will hold much sway over the key decision makers you want to attract. Increasingly, it’s the micro-influencers that are crucial to B2B. How to find them? Use a platform like www.onalytica.com.
The influencer community shows you where the innovation is within your sector. They can help you to write with your audience in mind, rather than yourselves. Their aim is to create content for target audiences, and they don’t care about products and services. They can also help you to throw things out that aren’t of interest. If a brand thinks they have great stories to tell, the influencers will give them that validation. Conversely, if they don’t think it’s worth talking about then it probably isn’t worth pursuing.
Don’t be that bore at a party – make sure you’re in the right conversations! If your influencers are creating content that spirals and goes viral then you know they’re talking about the right things.
Dr. Christine Bailey is CMO of Valitor, an international payment solutions company headquartered in Iceland. Forging a career in the tech sector, she’s led European marketing functions for Hewlett-Packard and Cisco Systems and was recently voted #1 woman in tech by B2B Marketing.
Learn more about Christine in backstage Q&A here.
Amber Osborne
A couple of issues ago we went on the tour bus with Amber Osborne (@missdestructo) to get her insiders view of influencer marketing, as aside from her CMO experience, she was part of the Adobe Insider influencer marketing program, here is an excerpt from that conversation:
There’s a lot of great influencer marketing magic that can happen when you look for the micro-influencers, not the wham bam thank you ma’am megaphones.
Find those people and champions that are passionate about your product, industry or products like yours, their audiences are genuinely interested and you can create more lifetime customers rather than fifteen minutes of fame… Read more
Although Amber has now moved on as CMO at Doghead Simulations (and we can’t wait to find out where she lands), if you are interested in influencer marketing it’s a fabulous interview.
Ted Rubin
Influencer marketing, when used to its best effect, is about building a network of business relationships that will yield results over time. You’ll get as much out of the program as you put into it. So if your goal is to find a platform, and make this like programmatic advertising, and do whatever you can to automate the process… you will be throwing the majority of your budget down the drain. [ Read more in Ted’s article in this issue ]
Ted Rubin is a leading social marketing strategist, influencer, keynote speaker, Photofy CMO/advisor… Speaker, Author, Provocateur Ted is our resident rock star. Read more about Ted.
Robert Rose
Today, influencers aren’t celebrities who endorse – they are the amplifiers of our story. As marketers today, this can be one of the core aspects of our programs. We can look to today’s influencers as a means of amplifying and becoming a multiplier of our communications programs. The key, of course, is integrating this program holistically into our story – our strategy – and not just looking for the “endorsement”. [ Read more of Robert’s insight in this article ]
Robert Rose is the Chief Strategy Advisor for the Content Marketing Institute, is the co-host of one of our favorite popular marketing podcasts This Old Marketing and founder and Founder, Chief Trouble Maker at The Content Advisory.
Back Catalog
Influencer marketing has been a strong topic over the 20 issues we’ve published, here are some other articles you might be interested in:
Bad Influence
Our social channels are saturated with ‘influencers’ representing brands looking to sell us something. Maude Churchill talks with ENDLESSLOVESHOW founder Kazim Rashid and asks: Have we reached peak influencer?
Dedicated Followers (After a Fashion)
Influencers are the latest group to buy fake followers in order to boost their appeal. But while a large follower count may look good, as Dave Waller discovers, this isn’t just a numbers game
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