2020 promises to be a good year for social media stars, if the findings of an Augere survey are true. That survey reported that 84 percent of companies polled expected to work with a digital influencer star this year.
Lord & Taylor can attest to that. In a prequel to their Design Lab Collection rollout, the clothier had 50 of their influencers wear the same dress on Instagram and sold out of it by the end of the week.
On the other hand …
As some influencers gain in popularity, their ability to engage with their followers diminishes because of a sheer lack of time. Influencer marketing agency Markerley’s survey reported that influencers with less than a thousand followers received an average of 8 percent likes on their posts, while influencers with more than ten million followers got likes 1.6 percent of the time.
Based on the results of this study, Markerley recommended that influencers who had between ten to a hundred thousand followers offer the best balance between reach and engagement. The company discouraged the use of celebrity influencers primarily because of the very low engagement rate.
Markerley’s admonition about celebrity influencer marketing was validated by another survey, by the Keller Fay Group, a market research and consulting firm. The company had a different conclusion, however, in reporting that micro-influencers, those with 500 to 5,000 highly-engaged followers, were best because they’re more enthusiastic about their brands. Keller Fay also said micro-influencers had more than 22 times the conversations per week about recommendations on what to purchase than the average consumer.
However, younger audiences on Snapchat might beg to differ—44 percent of users aged 16 to 24 say they discovered a brand as a result of a celebrity influencer. London-based GlobalWebIndex, a market research firm, also said its research revealed that expert bloggers and vlogs are also very popular.
As entrepreneur Hamed Wardak recently noted, “Marketers considering Instagram also need to keep in mind that 71 percent of its users are under 35 years of age, and to keep their own target audience in mind. Globally, 6 percent of Instagrammers are between 13 and 17 years old, 30 percent fall between 18 and 24, and 35 percent are 25 to 34 years of age. The percentages drop even further among those aged 35 to 44 at slightly over 16 percent. “
Tell me a story
Storytelling has always been popular on every platform. Instagram was the latest to experience the explosion from 150 million daily Instagram Story users in 2017 to an estimated billion last year, according to Statista.
Regardless of the platform, storytelling remains popular. Marketers should continue seeking out good and compelling stories to share on the platforms they use.
What you see is what you get
Some people attribute that comment to comedian Flip Wilson. Regardless of its origin, video continues to gain in popularity, particularly on YouTube. It’s especially valuable when used for demonstrations and explanations. The beauty of video is that it can be used effectively on just about every social media platform, including Twitter.
