6 challenges with influencer marketing campaigns
Influencer marketing campaigns have become one of the latest trends in marketing in recent years, and for a good reason:
In 2018, 81% of marketers reported that using influencer marketing was an effective strategy.
Many marketers are already working with or considering working with influencers. So it is worth delving into what some of the challenges of these collaborations are.
6 challenges in influencer marketing campaigns:
Influencer engagement rates are reaching a historic low
As social media allows more people to achieve influencer fame and status, social media has quickly become saturated with influencers. It is impossible for audiences to keep up to date with all content.
According to a Mobile Marketer report, the participation rate for sponsored posts fell to 2.4% in Q1 2019, while the rate for non-sponsored posts fell to 1.9%
How can marketers avoid this problem across the industry? Rather than working with influencers who have lots of followers, consider that micro and nano influencers can interact more with their audiences and form more united communities, thus inspiring greater participation.
Non-authentic collaborations and content
We have all seen content where don’t seem to have a natural fit or interest with the products or services that they promote. Brands need to think critically about the influencers they partner with. An audience can tell when content is not authentic, and this inauthenticity hurts a brand’s credibility.
A Bazaarvoice study reports that 47% of customers are tired of influencer content that appears to be inauthentic, and 62% of customers believe that these promotions take advantage of impressionable audiences.
The best practice for brands is to partner with influencers who use and love your product or service before even entering into a sponsorship deal.
FTC Regulations
Along the same lines of authenticity, marketers should be aware of the penalties they could face if their sponsored content is interpreted as misleading. In April 2017, the FTC revealed in a statement that it sent more than 90 letters to influencers, telling recipients that “they should clearly and visibly disclose their relationships with brands when promoting or promoting products through social media.”
A 2018 survey by eMarketer shows that 41% of the surveyed only tag their posts with the hashtags required by the FTC when explicitly asked, while 7% never tag their content as sponsored at all.
Focus on curating content in a way that engages audiences despite hashtags and “ad” tags.
Moral conflicts
Influencers are human and make mistakes, but marketers must be careful that even if an influencer has an attractive fan base, certain characters themselves can turn out to be dangerous investments.
Marketers can ensure that they are free to sever ties to a troublesome influencer by including a morality clause in any contract with an influencer, allowing them to easily sever them if an influencer does something that goes against their brand values.
Purchased followers
Social media marketers should also be wary of influencers who buy followers or have a high proportion of bots that make up their follower account.
In a survey conducted by Hit Search, 98% of respondents admitted to having seen that the number of a person’s Instagram followers increased unnaturally or during a short period.
Use follower analytics tools like HypeAuditor, available on the VoxFeed platform, that allow you to scan followers for robots.
Ethical implications
The ethical implications of working with an influencer may be the last thing on a marketer’s mind. But that’s part of the problem: influencers are treated more like merchandise than human beings.Ultimately, influencers choose the career and take on the obligations and risks that go with it, but marketers need to recognize the hard work that influencers do and not harness them to the best of their ability.
One of the best ways marketers can facilitate the work of their influencers (while improving the quality of sponsored content) is to give them creative freedom when it comes to creating content. Allow influencers to do what they do best: create social media content. They will be less interested in annoying their audience and their content will be authentic.
Let VoxFeed help your brand
Hopefully, you have learned something about how to work with influencers. If you want to learn how to start a campaign with influencers, create a free account and schedule a free call and we will gladly help you get started.