Welcome to 2022, where influencer marketing is taking center stage! If you don’t believe me, the Influencer Marketing Hub cited that marketers will continue to increase their spending on influencers into 2023, with expenditure projected to reach $4.6 billion in the US alone. Influencer marketing has become one of the hottest new ways to advertise and provides a great way for brands to engage with their audiences in new and authentic ways. However, when it comes to working with influencers, it’s not all rainbows and butterflies. Check out our top three pros and cons of influencer partnerships!

Pros Of Influencer Marketing

Influencers Help You Reach Your Desired Audience

Not only do influencers help broaden your brand’s reach, but they also allow you to be specific with the exact audience you’re trying to target. Influencers typically have established communities with followers who share similar interests, desires, shopping habits, etc. Whether it’s food, fashion, gaming, fitness, or parenting, you’re sure to reach an audience that will be interested in your brand!

Influencers Establish Trust

Establishing trust with your desired audience should be the ultimate goal of influencer partnerships; however, building relationships with influencers is important for creating long-term partnerships and success. According to Influencer Marketing Agency, over 37% of influencers say they’re working with brands for extended periods of time versus one-off partnerships to help the audiences become more trusting in the brands being promoted.

Influencers Improve Your Content Strategy

Running out of fresh ideas for social media or recipe content? Influencer partnerships help provide new and engaging content for both the brand and the influencer’s feed. Typically, we partner with influencers who allow us to re-share and use their content with proper credit, which gives us the opportunity to share different images, recipes, video content, etc. that we usually wouldn’t be sharing with our audience.

Cons Of Influencer Marketing

Influencer Marketing Can Be Pricey

Excuse me, you said HOW much to create a Tik Tok?! It can be difficult to work Influencers into your marketing efforts, especially when you’re working with a limited budget. With short-form videos on the rise, influencers’ price tags have increased due to the amount of work needed on an individual post. Now, it’s not all bad news. There are influencers out there who can fit into your budget, they will just have a smaller reach than a celebrity endorsement. Micro-influencers are a great way to get your name out there into a smaller more niche market at a more reasonable price.

Measuring Results From Influencer Marketing Isn’t Black & White 

Sure, we can check follower counts and monthly website visits to measure impressions, but what are the true results of influencer marketing? Like I mentioned earlier, one of the greatest benefits of influencer marketing is building trust with your shoppers… trust is hard to measure but that doesn’t mean it isn’t important. One way to help minimize the ambiguity is to analyze the results of a month with influencer partnerships versus one without. This means checking social media follower increases, and website visits and analyzing where exactly the website visits have come from.

Communication Is Not Everyone’s Strong Suit

Communication is key when it comes to working with influencers; however, not everyone responds in a timely or professional manner. Miscommunications are inevitable no matter whom you work with or what you do, but the misspelling or pronunciation of a brand’s name in a sponsored post…yikes. Poor communication can lead to a plethora of simple mistakes such as improper inclusion of tags, not following photography requirements, and not following through on promised content. At DMA, we will create an “influencer playbook” with correct messaging, tips and tricks from the brand, necessary hashtags, and all social media handles to ensure our communication is clear for our influencer partners.

At the end of the day, the pros definitely outweigh the cons when it comes to influencer partnerships. If you’re looking to jump into influencer marketing for the first time or just need help managing the partners you have, feel free to give us a call and let us know how we can help!