6 Metrics to review before collaborating with influencers

The rise of social network platforms gave lead to the creation of new-fashioned influencer marketing. With over 6 billion revenue, influencer marketing is a prominent digital marketing strategy. Although 89% of marketers see influencer marketing ahead of other marketing technics, there are still companies that suffer from finding the right influencers, managing campaigns. Influencer marketing is a complex and long-time process, requiring in-depth research and analysis. Before starting the influencer marketing campaign you have to investigate the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the influencer market. Industry of influencers, numbers of followers, country, demographic characteristics of audience, language, aesthetic of their accounts are essential points to consider. Influencers with a large audience may look a good channel for promoting a product. However, based on the scope, nature of the project, one needs to review different metrics of influencers.

The importance of metrics can be changed depending on your objectives. Below you can find some of mostly used metrics before starting to work with influences. 

Engagement rate

influencer-engagement-rate

The preliminary metric that shows influencer’s monetary value is engagement, a sum of likes, comments, shares of posts. The engagement rate is the percentage of the audience that engaged in the post. Depending on the niche, the influencer size engagement rate can be less or more. It is an essential metric to review before deciding to collaborate with influencers

Active usage

It is important to check the frequency of influencer’s posts. If an influencer does not share often it means influencer is not committed to their job. Whilst, sharing very frequently may decrease the interest in influencer, thus, affecting the engagement rate. 

Sponsored posts

branded-influencer-posts

You need to check branded posts of influencers, to know whether they had worked with your competitors before and also to understand the approach of influencers to the partnership. It may also tell you the quality of the sponsored posts, their engagement. 

Cost per post (CPC)

Before asking how much an influencer charge, it is better to estimate influencers’ average earnings per post. Earnings or costs can differ from industry, country, sector, follower number.  This is one of the basic pricing options that every business should consider in order to best scale its influencer marketing efforts. 

Influencer Media Value

Influencer Media Value is the equivalent of advertising value. Accounts with more engagement and active status generate higher IMV. It tells the maximum value brand should pay for an influencer. If influencer asks more than the value of IMV, brands can switch to less costly channels. 

Earned Media Value 

We mentioned several metrics for estimating the value of influencer before collaborating. Now it is time for checking metrics for company performance. EMV is gain from unadvertised media, including affiliate links, influencer marketing, blog posts, reviews, mentions. Earned Media Value formula is the product of impression, cost per impression and another factor, which depends on the case. The reason behind estimating EMV is to compare the values you earn before and after the campaign.

influencer-media-value

In conclusion, 

As we mentioned, finding the right influencers for your company takes time and a lot of work. For a successful influencer marketing campaign, you need to define your objectives, target consumers, set time for the project, create content, choose a platform, then pick influencers up. After completion of the project, you need to check the above-mentioned metrics again to check the ROI of your influencer campaign what is the benefits to your company, share of voice your company owns. 

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5 Steps to Create an Effective Instagram Campaign for Your Business

When it comes to visual content marketing, Instagram is arguably the best place to showcase creativity and strengthen the brand image. Instagram has over a billion users, out of which more than half are active daily. This translates into tremendous exposure for brands, be them small businesses, or industry leaders. Apart from that, Instagram is already recognized as having the highest level of user engagement amongst all social media platforms, precisely because people seem to be drawn towards visuals that send a message, rather than reading entire pages of content. After all, we live in a fast-paced world, so you need to get your message to the audience quickly.  

If those numbers convinced you to turn towards Instagram marketing, but don’t know where to start, keep reading to discover what are the five essential steps to set your campaign into motion. 

#1: Focus on creating a goal-driven strategy

If you don’t know what you are planning to achieve with the campaign, then you will end up pouring resources towards something that may or may not succeed, and playing the lottery of success has almost never worked. 

The first thing you need to determine is the ultimate objective of your campaign. Instagram can be used to accomplish a multitude of goals, but you may want to focus on one at a time, to ensure success, especially if you are new to Instagram marketing.

Maybe you want to raise awareness about your brand or to prepare a big product launch, or even to increase sales. No matter your goal, it should be clearly defined before you even start thinking about your next post. 

After establishing the ultimate goal, it’s time to get into technicalities. You need to ask yourself two main questions:

  • How much time do I need to achieve my goal?
  • What are the resources I can pour into this? 

The answer to those questions, as well as the ultimate goal, should determine the most effective strategy. But before we get into that, there is one other aspect that needs to be taken into consideration: your audience. 

#2: Get to know your audience well enough

When you first launched your brand, you had an idea in mind about the people you want to attract. This is your target audience, and, ideally, all your decisions should be oriented towards them.

Who is your ideal customer? What are they doing on a daily basis? How are they spending their free time? This is what you need to know, in order to effectively interact with them. 

Put a good amount of time into finding out who your audience is. The more you know, the more you can tailor your campaign to appeal to them.

Look back on your previous posts and focus on the ones that seemed to engage your audience the most. Which one of your pictures got the most likes, comments, or reposts? That is the type of content your audience wants to see. 

#3: Decide on the message you want to send

With your target audience in mind, it’s time to start designing a message that will appeal to them. After all, the entire point of defining your audience is so that you will know how to “talk” to them. Take Dove for example. 

Dove is one of the best representations of how social media should be used for marketing. The brand has made it clear they want to address to women everywhere, regardless of their financial status, skin color, age or looks.

This is why, for the past several years, all of their campaigns seem to be focusing on promoting diversity, natural beauty, and women empowerment. 

People are not as attracted to direct product advertising as they were before, and Dove knows that extremely well. They managed to steer away from product advertising, and focus on consolidating their brand’s position when it comes to real-life issues that women are dealing with.

Their most recent campaign, #ShowUs, called for women to share everyday photos on themselves, to showcase that beauty is everywhere. They came up with this campaign after conducting a study that shows 70% of women are not pleased with how they are represented in the media. 

#4: Connect your Instagram account to your website

I’m not only talking about putting a link in your Instagram description, that redirects to your website, but really making a connection between the website and your Instagram profile. If you are looking to create a powerful brand, then everything you do should align with the kind of message you want to send. 

Ikea, for example, created a landing page that is shared on their Instagram account. The page is made to look just like their Instagram, which sends a consistent message to the customer. If you don’t want to create a different page, then make sure your website and Instagram account look like they belong to the same business. 

Writing companies can help you create content for your website, which you can then link to your Instagram account. You can include the link in the description, as well as in your Instagram stories, by using the “swipe up” option, to direct those who view your story to the website. 

#5: Choose one (or more) of the best Instagram marketing strategies

The last step you need to take is to decide, based on the information you have gathered, which type of campaign is best suited to achieve your goal. You can even go ahead and combine two or more strategies, as long as they work well together.

The most used strategies are:

Influencer campaigns: many brands partner up with influencers, to reach an entirely new audience. Influencers can review your products, give out promotional codes, or become an ambassador for your brand. 

Hashtags: encourage people to share photos that relate to your brand, and use a hashtag that you have created, to form a community.

Giveaways: people can enter your giveaway by following your account, sharing a photo, making a story, or using a hashtag. You can then randomly select a winner. This will help, again, reach a new audience base. 

User-generated content: encourage users to post content that is related to your brand, then go ahead and share their content. This will increase engagement and draw new potential followers. 

Bottom Line

The most important thing when it comes to Instagram marketing is not what type of strategy you use, as there is no exact recipe for success, but that the type of campaign you create speaks to your audience.

Whether you contact influencers for collaboration, decide to use stories, or user-generated content, you need to ensure that you know what your goal and your target audience are, to make sure you get as much as you can out of it. 

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The True ROI of Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is in the new center of digital marketing. It helps smaller brands to scale bigger by targeting possible buyers rather than spending huge money on TV commercials for large consumers. With the help of influencer marketing, small businesses can expand their sales and large businesses can reach out to broader audiences. The high ROI of influencer marketing is one of its great advantages compared to the average display ad. Also, influencer marketing ROI has proven to be able to blow online advertising out of the water.

Influencer marketing statistics show that 89% of marketers already find influencer marketing more profitable than other marketing ties. Successful influencer marketing is aimed to increase brand awareness, create a conversion, generate positive ROI and reach your target audience. 

What is the ROI of influencer marketing?

what-is-roi-of-influencer-marketing

So, how the success of influencer marketing can be measured? Influencer marketing provides significant tangible as well as intangible return on investment for brands and is a growing trend for B2B

Tangible benefits 

Here include the total performance of your posts and the audience’s responsiveness to the campaign. It ensures profitable returns for particular amounts invested. 

Metrics like engagement, views, impressions, reach, conversion rates, etc. can show how your posts are performing. You can measure all of them with the help of in-app data insights that most social media platform provides. You may ask influencers to provide these insights.

Intangible benefits

Being less contrived than traditional methods is the key reason why influencer marketing works so well. It’s a great ability to grow loyal customers over time, build authenticity and trust, brand awareness, organic conversion, creative content and many more. 

Eventually, instead of creating more content, the clever strategy for businesses is to focus on ROI provided by influencer marketing as well as companions like employee advocacy and brand advocacy. 

How to measure ROI of influencer marketing?

how-measure-roi-of-influencer-marketing

Engagement, engagement rate, reach, impressions are the most-used metrics to calculate ROI of influencer marketing. However, none of these metrics exactly tell the true ROI. 

In order to estimate the true ROI of influencer marketing, brands need to consider pre and post collaboration sales figures, links to the brand’s website, keep track of ongoing campaigns. So read on before getting launched your next influencer marketing campaign. 

Here are several factors need to be examined for high ROI generating influencer marketing:

  • The relevance of influencers with the campaign
  • Partnership experience of influencers  
  • Demographic features of influencers’ audience
  • Using the right platforms for promotions
  • Creating organic and engaging contents
  • Using project-special hashtags 

Set achievable influencer campaign goals

set-clear-goals

First off, you need to decide what you want to accomplish. Defining the end goals is important for determining how you’re going to measure them. Some of the most common goals for launching influencer campaigns are: 

Increase brand awareness. Measuring the number of pieces of content produced and the total amount of impressions are two ways of measuring brand awareness. 

Lead generation. Leads may qualify themselves as subscribing to the blog or newsletter. 

Generate sales. Affiliate links to the influencers’ posts and discount codes help to record a more precise estimation of ROI. 

These are broad goals, however, for running a successful campaign you need to get more specific about your goals and which digital marketing techniques you’re aiming to use. This will also make measuring ROI easier.  

Share of Voice 

Share of Voice typically shows the percentage share of the brand’s paid advertising in the market. It reveals the performance of campaigns and allows you to benchmark your future marketing campaigns. 

Measure the share of voice by dividing a target metric that represents your brand by the total in your industry or market, then multiply that number by 100 to get the percentage of market share for that specific metric.

There are plenty of social media listening and analytics tools that measure your SOV relative to similar businesses. Mentions, hashtags, reach, impressions are metrics used to calculate the share of voice. 

Earned Media Value

Earned Media Value refers to the gains from various marketing channels, blog posts, word-of-mouth marketing, influencer marketing, brand mentions.

Although there is no exact formula for measuring EMV, the general formula is a product of impressions, CPM (cost per impression) and other specified metrics say, the share of voice and engagement depending on the project. 

One drawback of EMV is that it is a simplistic and unprecise method for calculating the true ROI of influencer marketing. Impression, reach are partial numbers, as they do not exactly tell us who viewed the posts while surfing on the social networks. For comprehensive measurements, marketers need more complex analytics.  

Influencer Media Value 

Influencer Media Value is a genre of Earned Media Value. It is the equivalent value of the advertised post. Thus, if IMV of a post is $100 it means the post would have $100 value as a sponsored Instagram post.

IMV helps to estimate the worth of influencers before engaging in collaboration. Obviously, profiles with a large audience generate high IMV. It shows the maximum amount which brands can charge for a sponsored post.

At the end of the project, brands need to compare IMV with the previous post’s IMV. A successful influencer campaign should generate higher IMV.  

Evaluate the results

Measuring the performance of the overall campaigns is not usually enough. You need to pick a group of influencers to start with and in the beginning track each influencer’s performance.

With the unique discount codes and URLs, you can get the metrics for attributing sales brought in and track direct traffic coming from those influencers’ posts. 

Assessing the performance of each influencer will help you to filter out the poorly performing influencers and keep only the top-performing ones.

Repeat the process by running a short term campaign using the new mix on influencers – from your initial list and new ones. To track this ROI keep an eye on likes, shares, daily views, visitors to pages, comments and so on. 

It’s risk-free to run several short-term campaigns and keep filtering out low-performing influencers, so when you start a long-term collaboration with a chosen group of influencers, you’ll be setting yourself up for failure. 

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How influencer marketing works in China

Traditional marketing in China is losing its popularity because of the progress of influencer marketing. Although the social media ecosystem is different from the rest of the world, China has a very unique influencer marketing in terms of customized influencer platforms, credible influencers, high ROI sales and many more. Restrictions on almost all western social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube lead to the creation of a better influencer market. Closed influencer networks created a more interconnected influencer-brand-follower environment. Influencers otherwise known as Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) are essential factors in guiding the purchasing decisions of customers. 

Differences between Chinese and Western influencer market

china-vs-western-world
graphic by  Yang Liu

Let’s start with understanding the main differences from the Western industry. 

First of all, influencer marketing or KOLs marketing as it’s called in China has more complexities and is more business-oriented. It entails tight integration with the e-commerce and supply chain. 

Credibility is another factor that differentiates the Chinese influencer market from that of the Western. Instead of gathering huge audiences, Chinese influencers have real-life followers who are inspired by the influencers and share their thoughts about products.

Fashion influencers in the West tend to advertise ready products for their audience while Chinese involved in the production process considering follower views on the product, its design and finally selling the ready products. 

E-commerce sites are transferring into social media which is one of the future trends influencer marketing in the US. Multifunctional platforms such as WeChat and Weibo bring together online payment, chatting and e-commerce interface that enhances influencers’ role. 

Media Matrix, a self-sustainable social media ecosystem, is a distinct influencer ecosystem where influencers invite and support new influencers on their channels which helps to expand the audience and to create more quality content.

Influencer Marketing is a $9 billion industry in China


China is not only the world’s largest social media market – but it also owns an incredibly rich and diverse online landscape. Despite the differences between the Chinese and Western social media landscape, China is three to five years ahead of the rest of the world. The advanced functionality and integration of social media, digital payment and e-commerce have enabled business models that are yet to be explored in other countries.  

Rhunn is one of China’s earliest and most successful influencer incubators. The company which enables influencers to sell through e-commerce has runaway success to the point that the e-commerce giant Alibaba invested in the company leading the Chinese influencer industry to grow to nearly $9 billion. 

Chinese KOLs turn fans into sales

Chinese influencers mainly consist of columnists, reporters, socialites, video produces and photo & video bloggers who are extremely powerful with the ability to heavily influence consumers’ purchasing decisions on a level that their western peers can only dream of. We can categorize them as the following groups:

  • Celebrities
  • Experts
  • KOLs
  • Micro-KOLs
  • E-commerce KOLs

Yes, there are E-commerce influencers in China. Because of the huge price gap between the mainland and other areas of the country. These KOLs are also entrepreneurs who have their own retailing channels. 

With many influencers in different segments, we can list a few most well-known Chinese KOLs here:

Becky Li 

Having 3 million followers on Weibo and 4.5 million followers on WeChat, Li is one of the most powerful influencers in China. Dubbed as Goddess of Shopping, she sold 100 Mini Coopers with five minutes in her blog on WeChat in 2017. So, she is not our average digital influencer. 

Apart from collaborating with Western luxury brands Burberry, Armani, Rebecca Minkoff, she launched her brand over WeChat with 1 million renminbi of revenue. Becky stated that the key to her success is writing on the topics that interest her, credibility, promoting products tested on herself, considering customer reviews. 

Zhang Dayi

Zhang Dayi started her fashion career as a model. Followers’ huge interest in her stylish clothes led Zhang to open her own stores. Her sales reached 100 million RMN on SIngles’ Day in 2017. With 20 million followers in total Dayi is a prominent figure in Chinese retail e-commerce.

The success of her first store on Taobao made Ruhnn create a new influencer-incubator-supply chain model. Instead of telling features of dresses, products, Li finds it better to communicate with followers, asking their opinion on her photos on social media. She believes that her followers love her because not only for her style but for her values and personality. 

Chrison

Being a former magazine editor led Chrison to create a unique fashion blog. In contrast to other fashion and beauty influencers, Chrison has rarely shown his face off on social media. With a black background on his profile, he focuses on the content he writes rather than the perfectly edited photos.

Besides stylish outfits, his followers are interested in the quality of his writings. Thanks to aesthetic storytelling ability Chrison worked with luxury brands Fendi, Cartier, Gucci, Prada. 

Popular Chinese social media platforms

social-media-platforms-china

While there might not be the exact version of Western social networks, China has several social media platforms with similar and even better features. 

Chinese super app WeChat is a combination of chat, ordering, online payment sites. Its official accounts ease transactions between business people. The official account helps to directly connect to target customers, advertise products.

Once you have an official account, you can easily store, sell your products in an e-commerce panel. CRM functionality allows companies to manage contacts within official WeChat accounts. In recent years, the platform launched WeChat Advertising, which includes KOL ads, banner ads. 

Not just only WeChat, the other social media platforms like Weibo, Douban, and Douyin are also quite popular in China.

Weibo – the Chinese version of Twitter

With more than 500 million monthly users, Weibo is the second biggest social media platform in China. It is a micro-blogging site mainly resembling the features of Twitter.

Weibo amplified its functions by adding live streaming and short video channels. It also works with Alibaba in commerce and marketing fields. Enterprises can either work with influencers to promote your sales or set up enterprise accounts to interact with customers, display products, track sale process. 

Xiaohongshu – giant community e-commerce platform

Xiaohongshu is a luxury shopping platform comprising social media and e-commerce sites. The company is also known as “Little Red Book”, mainly serves young women by selling fashion and beauty products. Users can buy and share their reviews about products on the platform. 

In 2018, Xiaohongshu launched its own influencer marketing platform which connects brands with influencers. Global brands like Dior, Fendi, Channel, Gucci, Shiseido, YSL partner with Chinese KOLs to reach local customers. The company’s mission is to create authentic word of mouth advertising. The site gives rewards, earnings for active and quality content creators. 

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The Growing trend: B2B Influencer Marketing


Influencer marketing is an inseparable part of digital marketing. Although the use of influencer marketing for B2B is not very common in practice, it’s growing into a new trend. Partnering with influencers on B2B is a much more complicated process. For B2C seeing the results of working with influencers is immediate while for B2B evaluating the effectiveness of collaboration takes a long time, as influencers cannot make a story or a video post about taste, style of the product. 

Finding the relevant influencer for B2B is also different from B2C. For effective marketing strategy industry experts, and real influencers are needed. There are several factors that business need to consider once they are willing to collaborate with influencers:

  • Active use of social media. There should not be a long pause between influencers’ posts.
  • Finding on topic influencers. The ones that rarely post about related business may not give high ROI.
  • Focusing on the right social media channel. Instagram may not be an effective platform for marketing tech products. 

So what is the right strategy to collaborate with influencers on B2B? Here are several strategies that will move the needle in any industry and for companies of all sizes.

Look for existing advocates

brand-advocate-b2b-influencer-marketing

To find their “fresh” advocates companies should look nowhere but inside their existing ecosystems. Often, relevant influencers are already somehow associated with your brand. After identifying why you want to carry out B2B Influencer Marketing the next step is to carefully analyze and asses your current customers, business partners, fans and employees for proof of influence and advocacy. With the help of online tools, you can examine the influence of everyone around your brand on social channels that can generate exceptional insights. 

Collaboration with micro and nano influencers

working-micro-influencers-for-b2b-influencer-marketing

Brands usually tend to partner with influencers that are more famous and have a larger audience. Instead of working with mega-influencers, business needs to consider micro and nano influencers, as they are more engaged in social media. Their small but engaged audience creates credibility and more in touch relations between followers and other influencers. Apart from this, micro-influencers are cost-effective from a marketing perspective. 

Co-create content with industry experts 

working-with-industry-experts

Expertise from the influencers to create and launch new products. Word-of-mouth does not work all the time. For big business decisions, you need more in-depth research and real users. Industry experts are one way to increase awareness about the product or service. Working with influencers not only for advertising but also during the production process, guest-posting on influencers’ blogs, showing real-life experience over promoted product. This approach provides a natural distribution channel for your content and builds credibility. 

Leverage employee advocacy

leverage-employee-advocacy-for-b2b-influencer-marketing

Social media is the main assistant for employee advocacy. In fact, employees are more active on social media users than the corporate accounts and they have more followers than their employers. Resharing the company posts get more click than the original post. Employees are internal influencers for your company. They have an organic audience and real connections for your business. Because employees work on the given product, they can effectively share their knowledge and experience in real life as well. 

While companies still face difficulties in finding the right influencer campaigns, we can mention a few of the successful influencer campaigns.

Dell Influencer Marketing Programs

This one is a good example of B2B Influencer Marketing. But instead of partnering with influencers, Dell works with industry experts for increasing brand leadership such as guest blog posts, podcast interviews and inviting influencers to Dell events. Dell launched the “Dell Luminaries” podcast which worldwide tech experts share their views over different topics from technology to Formula One. Through the program, the business can see and analyze the importance of technology for every business which in turn, will help Dell to reach more business partners. Outside expert views on innovative technology bring new audiences for both, Dell and influencers. The shared value of influencer programs are vital for Dell’s partnership, said Dell marketing expert. 

Prophix – Adapt & Innovate: AI and the Next Evolution of Finance

As a global corporate performance management software, Prophix intended to build leadership in the tech applied finance industry. The company intended to make business analyze the role of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to amplify its future position. Prophix created microsite called Adapt & Innovate: AI and the Next Level of Finance where expert influencers and AI personality Penny answering customers’ questions. The site included blog posts, insight infographics, promotional emailing for influencers to share. Virtual Financial Analyst eliminates time spent on repetitive and manual tasks, gives quick analysis for finance professionals. 

3M Science Champions 

3M has done the biggest science research, the State of Science Index to increase everyone’s access to the depth and complexities of science. Featuring twenty-one experts and influencers “Science Champions” podcast launched in relation to the research. 

For successful B2B experience on influencer marketing, detailed market research and expert comments are vital. The key factor here is, creating credibility in customers’ eyes. Instead of traditional marketing, expanding business networks with internal experts as brand advocates and outside experts is more viable. If you want to give Influencer Marketing a try with us just click the “Register” button below with the respective category. 

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Top 5 Fashion Influencers in the USA you should follow

 

In an ever-growing and competitive fashion industry of the USA, as an influencer, it is hard to set yourself apart and grow your loyal followers. The following list of Top 5 Fashion Influencers in the USA covers those who managed to make a huge impact on dictating the entire direction of the industry.  

Exposure is the name of the game and the power of influencers stands in how deep they go with their followings and the relationship they’ve developed with them. Obviously some of the people we’re going cover in this article have already accumulated a huge audience. So, we sorted out 5 inspirational fashion influencers that we believe will grow a lot in the following years. Our goal is to find up-and-coming bloggers with 10K to 50K followers that blog in the USA. Also, you can see the complete list of fashion influencers by logging in Keepface Influencer Marketing Platform and filtering by country.

 

@ivajorg

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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Me to literally every bug that gets in my way. [SWIPE FOR MINI EDITING TUTORIAL ✨] Glitter edit via @picsart

A post shared by IVANA JORGENSEN (@ivajorg) on

As a lifelong desert dweller, Ivana Jorgensen is sharing her fashionable life in scenic surrounds of Las Vegas, which is far from huge buildings and neon lights. 

She is sharing her passion for desert-inspired style, fashion, and photography through her blog and a well-curated Instagram account with 35.1K followers. She is a wonderful inspiration for her followers who is fun of colorful outfits. Also one can find the stunning goldish presets she uses in her photos from her blog. We genuinely like everything she does. Her style is dynamic with all of her photos full of colorful, positive vibes. 

@dandyinthebronx

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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IT’S SHOWTIME! ? This Halloween… I’m the ghost with the most, babe. Beetlejuice! I wore this at 34th Annual Bronx Halloween Parade this past weekend. I always try to find an excuse to wear a suit, no matter the occasion ? Huge shoutout to Bronx’s @lissettelissette for providing the make up for this. I’ll have some more detailed shots in the stories. Book her for your next cosplay or special event! / ??? ??? ????? ?? ?? ??? ?? ????!⁣ ????, ???? ??? ?? ????? ????? ?? ? ???⁣ ???? ??? ???’? ??????? ??? ??? ?’?? ?? ? ⁣ —⁣ Makeup by @lissettelissette ⁣ Stripe suit by @spirithalloween ⁣ Shirt by @highbarshirtco ⁣ Boots by @drschollsshoes

A post shared by Diego León (@dandyinthebronx) on

Dandyinthebronx is a menswear blogger with 42.9K followers on Instagram. His devotions to menswear started when he worked as a preschool teacher, continued with diving into various blogs, as well as, social networks learning more about menswear. He is someone more rough around the edge in various styles of suit. He’s got a Hispanic kind of vibes in his tailored outfits that make him look so unique and artistic. 

@hannahdonker

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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Lavender is the Warmest Colour ?

A post shared by Hannah ? (@hannahdonker) on

Coming in the 3rd number, another micro-influencer is a 27-year-old Canadian model Hannah Donker moved and currently lives in New York City.  She has modeled extensively since then, becoming the face of a number of campaigns. She’s got 32.3K followers on her Instagram channel. You’ve probably met her in The Weeknd’s “Secrets” video. You’ll get a lot of cool inspiration from her simplistic and unique look. 

@leonegoddess

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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I’m a firm believer that happiness makes people prettier. It’s a noticeable glow ? PS if you don’t have cleavage, you always have clavicle darling ❤️

A post shared by Betty A. Kanu (@leonegoddess) on

Another US-based micro-influencer on our list is Betty A. Kanu. As of 2019, she has attracted  45.7K followers on her Instagram feed. Betty focuses on fashion and hairstyle tutorials in terms of its fashion sense. She is one of the top Instagram fashion influencers and has worked with many fashion, and styling brands. She stands out with her African style. Bursting with energy, this influencer knows how to get her message across “blossoming is free”.

 

@shedoeshim

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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It’s a vibe ?: @dj.freesmeier || #shedoeshim #mensstyle #lesbianstyle #lesbianfashion #tomboylookbook #tomboystyle #lesbianthattravel #tomboyish #tomboylookbook #womeninmenswear #nonbinary

A post shared by Allison Graham (@shedoeshim) on

Allison Graham as she stated in her blog “found her niche with menswear” and she wants us “to see menswear in a different world”. 

She is as big as the people on this list. She has about 30K followers. She showcases a unique take on classic Brooklyn style on her fast-growing Instagram channel. He has a very focused niche and very-down-to earth style. Allison’s a keen eye for details and creating not just an outfit but a full “head to toe” versatile ensemble. 

 

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Top 10 Beauty Influencers in the US that Brands should focus in 2019

 Influencer marketing, a new marketing tool all over the world, is also on the agenda of the beauty industry. The beauty industry is one of the fastest adapting sectors to influencer marketing. When you open Instagram’s “discover” tab, there is the whole host of one-minute-long makeup videos. 

It’s also obvious that with the popularity of beauty and makeup influencers, caused a huge swing in who we turn to when it some to beauty advice. The generation before us usually asked their moms, relatives, or close friends, even read the magazines for the best advice. Of course, they are still great sources to look to for useful beauty and health advice and tips but what I’m saying is that now there is a whole new source of exerts you can call upon for beauty advice and tips.

This is statistically proven that 79% of consumers of cosmetics and health-care products choose to watch online videos about a product before purchasing it, and 85% of women think that the content of beauty influencers is the most reliable source to be trusted when buying cosmetics.

Let’s get started to know the newest trendsetters and rising stars in this industry. We’ve compiled for you the top 10 awesome beauty influencers who are based in the USA. 

 

@itsannchovie

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Annie Cho 조혜정 | Style + Travel (@itsannchovie) on

LA-based, blond beauty Annie Cho is the first on our list of beauty influencers. She’s amassed 20.3K followers on her colorful Instagram account. Annie Cho is someone who “dedicated to finding happiness in little things”. As she said, her blog is dedicated to inspiring the readers to jump into new adventures and to live their life to the fullest. Put a focus on beauty and makeup tips, her blog also encompasses topics around fashion, travel, and creative photography. 

 

@fashionfabnews

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Lina Mayorga (@fashionfabnews) on

The next US-based beauty influencer Lina Mayorga is also a fashion designer with 40.4K followers. Lina features her insights on beauty, fashion, and fitness on her blog and social media accounts. On her Instagram profile, she serves her audience with daring makeup and out-of-the-box style 

She also parlayed her huge influence by launching her sustainable clothing brand. Why sustainable? Because she is making clothing with organic, recycling, or up-cycled materials and designed with zero-waste methods. Long story short, Lina wants to destroy the stereotypes of sustainable clothing. 

 

@olive_chels

 

 

This Young lady is our next successful beauty influencer in the USA with 32.2K subscribers on YouTube. She is specialized in hairstyles, beauty tips, DIYs, and fashion. Chelsy is the one to follow if you like natural hair DIYs teamed with lots of before and after videos showing how she’s managed to get such luscious, healthy curls at home and that’s going to get you scrolling, and scrolling to see more.

 

@stenss

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Stenie (@stenss) on

 

Stenie is a US micro-influencer with 45.3K followers and she is also a really active one on Instagram. She is best known for her eye makeup, focusing her proficiency on finely detailed looks employing sharp lines and a range of bright colors. Go check her Instagram account to get more inspirational looks.   

 

@makeupbyemma00

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by emma donado | chicago mua esty (@makeupbyemma00) on

Chicago based micro-influencer Emma is more popular on Youtube, with 20.7K subscribers, rather than Instagram. She serves her audience with skincare tips, makeup tutorials, and aesthetic hairstyles. She is curious about bold eye makeup accompanied by neutral lip color. Emma’s content is taken selfie-style in her daily life is an amazing inspiration for her audience. 

 

@ohmglashes

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Oh!MGlashes (@ohmglashes) on

Another amazing beauty and makeup micro-influencer from the US, Ohmglashes has 11.8K followers on Instagram.  She is a rising makeup enthusiast filled her feed with selfie-style photos of daily looks, tutorials as well as shows off her outfits. Her unconventional eye makeups are just stunning. 

 

@japanslayz

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by DeLion ??‍? (@japanslayz) on

DeLion is a 20-years-old US makeup artist highlighting over-the-top glamorous eye makeup looks on his İnstagram account. He rapidly rose to fame over the past years and reached to 29.2K followers on Instagram. The boy is a true inspiration for bold ring makeup lovers. 

 

@mua.lydia

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by ????? ?????? (@mua.lydia) on

 

Lydia Grayce is another rising makeup enthusiast from the US with 45.4K followers. She is a natural redhead, beauty, hair, and lifestyle micro-influencer who does jaw-dropping makeup looks on her Instagram feeds with glowy, highlighted eyes and matte lips. 

 

@gwendilara

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Gwen Dilara (@gwendilara) on

Gwen is a makeup artist and beauty educator from the US with 49.1K followers. She’s one of the influencers who managed to turn her skills and influence into the business. She is shooting makeup gorgeous makeup tutorials. Gwen’s like a genuine wizard at creating remarkably charming looks.

 

@dimplybean_mua

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Ellie (@dimplybean_mua) on

Ellie, the last beauty influencer on our list, is a US-based, self-taught makeup artist with 21.2K followers on Instagram. Besides makeup, she is also a professional SFX artist, which differentiates her from the others on this list. Just go and check her account, as there are no more words to say. Just incredible!

 

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The Rise of the “Kid Influencers”: Meet the new generation of Influencers

Social media influencers are getting younger and younger over the years. These “kidfluencers” now have their own accounts even before they are born. Maybe the kids don’t understand social media, but social media definitely gets them. 

Brands with a target audience consisting of children look no further than these incredible “smaller influencers” or as it’s referred in a digital world – “Kidfluencers”. And many of the bid brands already leaped at the chance to leverage them to advertise products easily. 


Kids become influencers before they can even talk


Sharing some part of children’s lives online with family members and parents’ friends is normal these days. According to a study average parents share approximately 116 photos of their children before they turn eight, but now a growing number are actually making a living at it.

However, for a small but growing number of kids, their online footprint is much more noticeable and far-reaching. The past several years have seen the rise of “Kidfluencers” – children whose social media presence has garnered enough attention that they attract advertisers and sponsors, turning their YouTube or Instagram into a money-making platform. 

While big brands love collaborating with celebrities, they’ve also learned that the kidfluencers are great for endorsing kids’ toys, clothing, and other products. 
In this industry, there is a niche for everyone at any age. From fashionistas to tech-savvy, kidfluencers have already made their way in a digital era.  

Kidfleuncers range from children who have become an Instagram sensation, to children who star in videos of themselves unboxing and playing with toys.

 
 
 
 
 
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Who’s who? ? @nununuworld @mypopshoes ? @familymattersphoto #ministylehacker #brothers

A post shared by Collette Wixom (@ministylehacker) on

A story of an 8-year-old Ryker Wixom started with the search of his name on Google. Instead of finding unrelated pages or accounts with the same name, he found his photos as a toddler on the top of the results page. While scrolling down there is an article for him on a website called famousbirthdays.com and a video on a Daily Mail video of 4-year-old himself trying to do a magic trick.  He came mother with a question of whether he is famous. Mom answered that he is not famous, but people know him from his pictures. 

As the mother explains, Ryker always knew that his mother likes taking his photos but he never knew that the people actually saw these pictures too. His Instagram account @ministylehacker amasses over 300.000 followers and created by his mother Collette Wixom in 2014. The mother started the account, she only posted Ryker’s photos of wearing kid-sized versions of men’s wear, but now the profile is full of photos of her three sons. Many of these photos are sponsored by various retailers like eBay and natural baby products brand – the Honest Company. 

Social media platforms, particularly YouTube and Instagram are lucrative ground for marketers looking to promote their products, especially children’s products like child food, clothes or toys.  And these young influencers are the best option for marketers to target the right audiences. 

Some of these kids, like Ryker, are features on his parent’s account, but the others have their own accounts. But all these young social media influencers‘ fame comes as a result of their parents calling the shots and running the business behind the scenes. 

Like the parents of 9-year-old photographer Hawyeke Huey. This creative and tech-savvy Kidfluencer became popular as a photographer with a sharp eye for details. The fact that his father is also a professional photographer at National Geographic, proves the natural creativity of the family. 

As of 2019, his Instagram account has 199k followers and the feed is full of pictures of Hawyeke himself and his shots. 

Ryan Kaji is one of the recognizable kidfluencers in this game. Known by his YouTube channel’s name Ryan ToyReviews, this 7-year-old child star’s channel already has 19 million subscribers and over 29 billion views. 

Ryan’s channel features various videos that reflect his interest, such as playing with Legos, monster trucks, Disney heroes and trains that recorded by his dad. Besides playing with toys he also talks about different educational topics like Science experiments for kids or healthy food choices. 

Examples like this are endless. It goes without saying that Kidfluencers are on the rise. Whilst the young generation exposed to social media is having kids, this trend is only set to continue.


How much do kidfluencers make? 

One family with kidfluencer identical twins said that a sponsored post could earn between $10,000 and $20,000. Another seven-year-old kidfluencer has made $22 million playing with toys on his YouTube channel.

A parent shared the prices commanded by the parent’s child on the condition of anonymity, citing concern that the disclosures could harm negotiations with brands. The parent said brands might pay $10,000 to $15,000 for an Instagram post while a sponsored YouTube video might cost $45,000. A shout-out in 30 to a 90-second in a longer video can cost advertisers between $15,000 and $25,000.

Such fame and money at a young age raise the question:

 Is all this really in the child’s best interest?


Some parents of these young influencers work carefully establish boundaries between work and having fun for their kids. But this is not always the case. Sometimes the kids’ fame gets in the way of the child’s regular routine. 

Concerns about the harmful effects of social media on kids are not new, but if the case is being famous, the game changes.  

The rise of kidfluencers has generated concerns about children’s privacy, particularly when it comes to how parents’ social media sharing could affect their child later in life. Forbes argued in December that, “Parents are already some of the biggest violators of their children’s privacy, leaving potentially harmful digital footprints well before the age of consent.”

At the same time, social media became a part of the everyday lives of the majority of Gen Z, so the fact that children are the subject of their parents’ social media posts is hardly surprising. People post about what’s important to them, which means they post about their kids too. 

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How to become a LinkedIn Influencer in 2021?

LinkedIn is a social networking site for the business community to foster connections with former, current and potential colleagues. It’s a great place to exchange business ideas, build relationships with prospects, search for jobs or talents. 


In 2015, it gave access to all users of the English speaking countries to its publishing platform in an attempt to increase page views and time that the users spent. As a result 320 mln LinkedIn users granted access to the publishing platform allowing them to become an influencer in their respective niches. 

Each day, over 2 mln posts, videos, and articles flow the LinkedIn feed, generating tens of thousands of comments every hour – and tens of millions more shares and likes. So how to stand out in this business-focused social media platform? In this post, we will answer this question.

How to Become an Influencer on LinkedIn? 

create fresh content

To be a LinkedIn influencer is quite different from being an influencer in any other platform like Instagram, Twitter or Facebook. The platform brings out its annual “Top Voices” list of most engaged creators and influencers. To appear in this list you don’t necessarily have to be the CEO of a global company or professional expert with years of experience in a particular field. Each year, LinkedIn’s editors only choose the most active and engaged users independent of their industry. 

So, it just takes a reasonable period of time to do research and dedication, to get noticed by the team. 

#1 Publish Fresh and Curated Content

As stated by Bill Gates “the content is king”. However, creating fresh and eye-catching content requires to invest your time and effort. Engaging content is what makes people scroll on your newsfeed. And people engage in your content if they find it useful and informational. 

The key point here is to post daily and post right. Start posting content that is related to your and your connections’ industry. Showing your expertise in a particular industry you need to create and publish long-form posts which are over 600-1000 words. Just publishing content will not alone do the whole job, you will need to engage with the audience through comments and reply to the posts that have shared by your connections.

The latest news and developments perform really good on the platform. You can also share curated content and short videos. In this way, you are not attracting just random people, but people who are really engaged with your industry. 

#2 Build Your Audience

By sharing industry-relevant content you already attracted followers, but if you want them to engage, you need to add value by providing insightful and informational content.  Focus on what matters most to your followers. 

LinkedIn’s publishing platform gives you an opportunity to grow your audience. Here you can interact with others who might be interested in your industry.  Always keep in mind that here the type of connections is more important than the number. You need to focus on forming strategic connections. 

#3 Optimize Your Profile

As your LinkedIn profile is like a resume or business card, it’s essentially a marketing tool. Optimizing your profile will have a great impact on your personal brand. So, consider creating a well-written and resume-like profile that potential partners can notice the benefits of collaborating with you.  First of all, make sure all important areas are in order. Let’s start with profile and background images. It is recommended to make the profile photo visible to everyone. This move will develop trust and make your profile easily found by the search engines. 

Add the professional profile of skills, experience, interests on your headline. Try to express what you do in 120 characters in a creative and informative way. Keep your summary short but don’t forget to add as many relevant keywords as you can. It makes your profile easier to find when looking for experts in your field of specialization on LinkedIn. 

#4 Stand out in your industry

LinkedIn is your chance to get your name and face in front of hundreds (or even thousands) of professionals in your industry. But to build an influence you need to stand out among those professionals by being a reliable source of good information and to address your audience’s pain points. You need to constantly publish creative and innovative solutions through fresh and curated content. 

Differentiate yourself. Don’t just recount the day’s news. Instead, put a spin on the mundane by writing short articles with catchy headlines like “Why your pain medication may be killing you!” This will make your audience sit up and take notice.

#5 Promote Your Content  

Of course, your content will not get around by itself. Sponsored Content is native advertising on LinkedIn. It allows you to promote your content directly in the LinkedIn feeds of the professionals you want to reach on LinkedIn and increase your content’s reach as a LinkedIn Influencer. 

But there are some tactics, some of which work far better than others. To help you out, here are the tactics of LinkedIn content promotion so you can start getting more attention for your content. 

  • Go after your ideal readers,
  • Use groups, 
  • Use LinkedIn’s publishing platform – The Pulse,
  • Buy some Sponsored Update Advertising.  

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What is Earned Media Value? How to measure it?

Earned Media Value (EMV) is a method to measure the value of the work that PR experts and marketers do to promote a particular brand or company. EMV is a monetary worth of any third-party exposure your brand gets that your marketing and PR specialists strive to achieve: being featured in a media asset, getting great reviews willingly or getting brand’s post been shared by dozens. This post will identify what is Earned Media and three main models to measure its value.  

Let’s first see what is earned media? 

Earned Media represents one of the three sides of marketing: Owned and Paid Media. It is a tool used to publicize created content, such as press releases, blogs, social posts, influencer marketing, etc. In a nutshell, earned media is all the buzz around the brand posted by anyone outside of that brand.  

earned-media-paid-owned

Earned media is generally reached through promotional efforts other than paid media advertising. If we think of owned media sites as a destination then earned media is the vehicle that helps us get there.

Why it is so valuable?

Earned media are mass media that have not been created or purchased directly by the company. All content about the company that is shared by customers, fans or users is defined as “Earned media”. Unlike in the paid media, they all talk about your brand voluntarily without being paid for it. So, earned media is a form of word-of-mouth. This form of media value is especially essential for brands because it confirms how many people talk about you aside from your paid marketing and PR efforts.

Earned Media is all about reliability

Earned Media is usually defined as the most credible content form for brands. Of course, you can tell your prospects how well your product performs and why it is the right choice for them, but eventually, they know that you want to sell your product. Existing customers or brand advocates, on the other hand, can provide their honest opinion about your product without any strings attached. Therefore, it is just a question of reliability.

Cons of Earned Media

Although earned media is very valuable, it also carries some risks. Unlike owned and paid media, it cannot be easily controlled. Since owned media is formed by the brand itself and paid media develops according to the brand’s conception, earned media, on the other hand, is completely disconnected from the brand’s scope of action. As a brand, you have almost no control over the evolvement of this mechanism.

How to calculate EMV?

Evaluation of earned media is another disadvantage of Earned Media. The grim reality is that there is zero consistency when it comes to calculation of the value. Every brand can formulate its own metrics based on its campaign goals, communication channels, and content types. 

Typical measurement metrics such as impressions and likes, are not concrete and do not address the brand’s business goals. Therefore, Earned Media Value is considered uncharted and unpredictable territory for many companies looking to transform earned media into tangible value.

Although there isn’t one agreed-upon formula and reliable benchmarks to base for measuring earned media value, it can be measured by these three different models: 1. Impressions Model; 2. Media Impact Model; 3. Target Influence Model. 

We can come to a conclusion on how to measure the result of earned media and return on investment that results in a tangible outcome.

Impressions Model

Calculating earned media value according to the impressions proves the awareness of the brand’s target audience of a particular product. 

This model works like this. Once a certain number of people with an audience have been exposed to and made aware of traditional or digital media assets, a brand will need less exposure to trigger their awareness, , comprehension and opinions about particular products or services. This goes on in a cycle to influence commitment and engagement.

Target Influence Model

This one is the most common method of assessing influence, the survey of a representative sample can be used to determine whether exposure to a message has reached its target. With this model, it’s important to measure for recall, retention and general indicators of attitude change such as motivation.

social-media-icons

Media Impact Model

In simple terms, the media impact model traces coverage against sales over time in various markets and is a useful statistical study for describing an ROI. 

In this type of calculation process, we measure the models of sales by market and time against marketing tactics – one being earned media. 

The assessment can determine which tactic generated sales. Using this model, a business can determine the estimated ROI of each campaign and see sales improve over time based on earned media publicity.

Nevertheless, an earned media value shouldn’t be compared to paid advertising efforts, brands should understand the role of earned media in marketing. The difficulty to measure EMV shouldn’t discourage marketers to avoid using earned media, but to encourage brands to plan earned media strategy carefully with achievable targets. 

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