The 4 Keys to Build a Successful Influencer Marketing Strategy

What's happening now in the advertising landscape is the most fundamental shift since WWII. With the birth of the internet, the rise of social media, and the increase in time spent online, your customers now have as much of a platform as your brand does.

The biggest opportunity for any brand or company right now is getting their customers to talk about them more on social. Even better, create lasting partnerships with those customers that have an influence on their audiences, or who we call ambassadors.

How to be successful when building an influencer strategy

Here are four tips for building a successful influencer marketing strategy.

1. Pick the Right Person

It goes beyond 'does this influencer meet the needs of the campaign?' to 'does this person embody this brand or this feeling we're going for?'

It's actually less about your genuine excitement to work with this person that you've followed for years, though admittedly, this is a really fun perk of working in influencer marketing. Instead, it's about digging deep into the vibe the influencer gives off, and do they match my brand or my company.

Unfortunately, it is possible to have a partnership that negatively impacts your business because you picked the wrong person who isn't excited about your brand, or who doesn't exhibit real love.

2. Bringing the Influencer to the Table Creatively

You are working with the person who has built the community that you are trying to access. We want to bring these people to the table because they understand the community and what works.

We need to work with and coach that influencer to give them both creative freedom but also boundaries.

If you aren't letting them help drive the creative, then you're wasting your hard-earned marketing dollars.

"It is the brand's job to deliver a brief that gives the influencer the flexibility to inject their voice into that post to tell their story and how that story intersects with the product... The brand has to give them a brief that allows them to inject their personality and their point of view into it. That's why we follow them." - James Nord, A Drink With James, ep. 169

3. Be Transparent About the Partnership

Hiding sponsorships or keeping the fact that it's an ad a secret used to equate to success.

While having the partnership feel natural is a great goal, it's increasingly difficult to hide the fact that these sponsorships are advertisements and that there's money involved.

That's why these partnerships need to not just feel real, but to be real. (We speak more on the celebration of these wins and the transparency of sponsored content for Gen Z, especially on TikTok, in our latest report).

4. Have Fun!

Influencer marketing should be fun! If you're not enjoying collaborating with the agency, your coworkers, or the influencers you're working with, you'll never succeed.

Passion is the most compelling, persuasive, infectious thing in the world. The way to have effective marketing is to help people feel excited and engaged with what you offer.

Fohr's Founder James Nord presented these ideas and more thoughts on the past, present, and future of the advertising industry during the ‘End of the Advertising World as We Know It’ webinar. Watch the full webinar here.