What is it and why does it work?

The debate about whether influencer marketing works is over. Have you caught up with the trendis the better question! If you don't know what it is or how it works, let's take a short primer.

What is Influencer Marketing?

Marketers are always looking for new ways to approach the ongoing problems of lead generation,customer conversion and outreach scaling. Influencer marketing has the ability to touch all of theseissues holistically, providing long term solutions rather than temporary bandages over and overagain.

Precisely defined, influencer marketing is the use of an online pitchman to advertise a product. This"pitchman" is not the infomercial guy from the 80s, though - far from it. He or she is usually acontent creator who incorporates use of the product naturally into the content. This inboundmarketing gives the product credibility and context, allowing the audience members to make adecision about the use of the product without pressure.

Influencer marketing is not limited to social media, but a great deal of its popularity comes fromvisual content creators. Popular channels on Instagram, YouTube and Facebook are among themost popular influencer marketers in the world. They combine visual content with the salesmanshipand indirect content that marketers are all pining for. The major platforms also keep great analyticson channel audiences - data that can be leveraged for more precise marketing activities.

How Does Influencer Marketing Work?

Influencer marketing works so well because it provides more benefits for the cost when comparedto traditional marketing - sometimes exponentially more. Online content creators do not chargeHollywood prices for their services. However, the media that content creators post on major socialmedia websites has a much longer shelf life than a traditional TV or radio ad. It is indefinite, in fact.Unless the entire channel closes down, the content continues to generate opportunity for amarketer literally forever.

Influencer marketing is an especially important construct for international markets. For instance,many companies in NZ owe their expansion efforts to outreach going into the United States,Canada and many other English speaking countries. Marketing to those countries is easier thanever, with less cost than ever. Combined with the reduced overhead of modern digital distribution,the advantages of doing business with influencer marketing are just too good for any business topass up.